About the program

Milkfish (Chanos chanos), which is locally known as “bangus”, is the Philippines' national fish. In the Philippines, milkfish is more than just a fish—it is the nation's pride and a staple food fish on the Filipino table.Milkfish aquaculture first occurred around 1800 years ago in the Philippines and spread to Indonesia, Taiwan, and into the Pacific. The country has been the lead global producer of milkfish from 2001 to 2009, however, it was surpassed by Indonesia in 2010 (FAO-Statistics, 2010). Apart from climate and topography related factors, the Philippines milkfish industry lagged behind due to vulnerabilities in its value chain that impeded its growth and sustainability.
As identified by the stakeholders, the industry’s perennial problem is the lack of continuous and adequate supply of local seedstocks. Overdependence to imported fry, which has a relatively high mortality rate than that of local fry, negatively affected production efficiency. Moreover, high production cost and low technology adaptation has been hampering milkfish production ever since.
Despite setbacks in the industry, bangus remains first among food fish cultured in the country. In 2022, milkfish harvest shared 390,098 metric tons amounting to Php 48 billion contribution to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (PSA, 2022). Milkfish production increased by 84.5% for the past 20 years mainly due to high private sector investment for mariculture cages. Innovations on milkfish value-added products are also now gaining popularity in the global market. This is a cutting-edge opportunity against other country competitors.
To complement the efforts of the private sector, BFAR initiated the National Bangus Development Program (NBDP) as one of its banner programs in 2023. NBDP is a 5-year development plan (2023-2027) that intends to contribute to BFAR’s vision in increasing local production of food fish, ensuring available sources of seedstocks and reducing post-harvest losses.
Anchored to the strategies from the Comprehensive National Fisheries Industry Development Plan (CNFIDP), National Bangus Development Program focuses on various aquaculture, post-harvest and capacity-building interventions that will directly and indirectly contribute to the enhancement of the milkfish value chain. In general, it aims to contribute to the country’s food security through improving milkfish production and food fish access to Filipino people as well as to contribute in alleviating poverty through empowering men and women fisherfolks on various milkfish production and processing technologies

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