Heat processed fish in flexible pouches will remain fresh for at least three years solving the problems associated with keeping fresh and transporting frozen food over long distances. The new pouches will also fill the vacuum in the domestic market for ready to serve fish as the old-fashioned canned fish has long gone out of the market owing to a variety of reasons.

CIFT, in collaboration with the Marine Products Export Development Agency (MPEDA) and the Seafood Exporters' Association of India (SEAI), has already exported to the Gulf countries and to Japan about 1,000 packets ofheat processed fish in flexible pouches. Test marketing of the new products is on. Results are expected within a couple of months. A team of CIFT scientists has been working on the new technology for almost six months now, Ravindran said.

For the Gulf countries where there is a big population of expatriate Malayalis, Kerala special fish curry has been processed and packed in the pouches. For the Japanese, fish has been processed according to their likings. The processes were carried out at the CIFT laboratory here and the equipment for the experimental packing was gifted to CIFT by the Natural Resources Institute as part of a long-term collaboration plan, Ravindran said.

He said the flexible pouches technology had been in use worldwide for quite some time now. However, "we have pioneered the use of the technology in fish processing". CIFT has a mandate to develop newer post-harvest technology to make fisheries more profitable in the midst of stringent quality standards set by importing countries and stiffcompetition in the international market.

Though it is oft repeated that value addition holds the key to survival in the international market, appropriate technology generation is the only way to survive as shown by the application of the new technology, Ravindran added. This is more so in the case of fish products because currently there is no way of reaching processed fish to consumers within the domestic market.

Almost 80 per cent of the fish consumed in India is sold fresh in the market. Processed and frozen fish is often not available in the domestic market. And tinned fish, considered inconvenient by most users, has long gone out of fashion and Ravindran feels that processed fish in flexible pouches will fill this vacuum.

On the cost front, ready-to-serve fish in pouches would come slightly costlier initially but with mass production of processed fish, the new technology would bring down the cost, Ravindran said. More than the cost, he pointed out, it was the problems associated with the movementof frozen food that would be solved. Moving reefer cargo has always been difficult in India. Inadequate infrastructure has landed exporters in trouble in the past.

CIFT plans to transfer the new technology to private entrepreneurs interested in marketing processed fish in flexible pouches once the market reports come in.

This is part of CIFT's larger objective of developing new technologies to make the fisheries sector more profitable. CIFT has been entrusted with the task of developing technologies that will enable the country exploit its marine resources. However, the emphasis has been on developing technologies for sustainable exploitation of our marine resources. With this in mind, CIFT was also involved in developing techniques to improve quality of processed fish, developing new bi-products from fish and designing more fuel-efficient fishing vessels and improved fishing gears, Ravindran said.