DAGUPAN CITY ,Philippines – Some 45 large-scale fish vendors in the province, known here as consignaciones, are holding an eat-all-you-can milkfish boodle fight today in front of city hall to show that bangus caught here are safe for consumption.
City agriculturist Emma Molina and other city hall officials held a boodle fight last week to allay the fears of buyers. Bangus sales, however, have remained low.
Molina said the consignaciones sought their help yesterday to address the low sales of bangus after the fishkill in Anda and Bolinao towns in Pangasinan, as well as in Batangas.
The consignaciones said that before the fishkill, they traded five to eight tons of bangus a day but now, they only trade two to three tons.
Molina said the city government used to issue four to five auxiliary invoices of one ton each to bangus traders who ship fish from the Magsaysay Fish Market to Metro Manila.
An auxiliary invoice issued by the agriculture office is an assurance that the fish to be traded is of good quality.
After it was reported that there were double dead milkfish from areas affected by fishkill sold in markets, the city government implemented a stricter system for clearing shipments of bangus.
Aside from the auxiliary invoice, authorities now require a sanitary permit by the City Health Office.
Molina said that in the past, the effect of bangus fishkill on trade lasted only two days and was not considerable.
“The problem is, when you say bangus, people have that impression that it’s from Pangasinan, much more from Dagupan, so we are doing our best to make the market become alive and robust again,” Molina said.
Vendors of other kinds of fish will join in the boodle fight because they are also affected by the fish scare.