A Fisherman Who Never Goes To Sea

 

Mike Sipe began experimenting with tilapia an African freshwater food fish, after earning a degree in agriculture from the University of Florida in 1968. Tilapia grow and reproduce very fast, making them a possible source of inexpensive protein. With visions of feeding the masses, Sipe bred a genetically altered strain that grows even more rapidly than the original. He also altered its appearance from long and black to a more appealing chubby and red.

In 1976, with $15,000, Sipe founded Natural Systems Inc. of Palmetto, Fla. But by 1980, his friends and advisers were telling him to call it quits. He owed $850,000, most of it guaranteed by his mother, and he was so far in debt that his living room couch had been repossessed.

In order to generate capital, Sipe then established a demonstration fish farm to help feed the ehildren of a Mexiean orphanage. Mexican government officials learned about his demonstration project and decided it had potential. In May 1981, they awarded him his first major contract, a $1.3 million order for a complete hatchery. By that October, Mexican authorities had established 17 hatcheries, and they now intend to set up 100 altogether.

In November 1981, Natural Systems purchased a technology -- aimed at spurring the growth of fish -- that had been developed in a joint research project with Shearwater Fish Farming Ltd., a subsidiary of Kraft Inc. Two months later, they had put the technology, which involves injecting liquid oxygen into the fish tanks, into operation. Sipe expects revenues of $3.6 million in 1982: he projects $40 million by 1984-85.

Agriculturists now come from around the world to see Sipe's 15-acre fish farm in Florida, where about 1 million fish live in 31 large steel tanks' which occupy only one-twentieth of an acre. Sipe sells approximately 1,000 pounds a week, mainly in the form of smoked fish for snacks, a popular treat in Florida bars. But the main purpose of his farm, he says, is to perform further breeding experiments.

Sipe estimates that producing his freshwater fish on land costs about the same as catching an equivalent fish in the salty ocean. The advantage, he says, is that his supply is more reliable than ocean catches and that fresh fish can be made available in cities far from the docks of fishing villages.

With rising world energy costs making it ever more expensive to operate fishing boats, freeze catches, and transport fish to distant markets, Sipe expects his fish-farming method to gain a significant eost advantage in the next few years. "People will always pay a premium for fresh fish," he says.