For years, women living around Lake Victoria have played an important role in the fish trade without necessarily controlling the production of the fish they sold.
In communities around Gwassi Ward in Homa Bay County, women traders often depended on fishermen for their supply. When catches were low, accessing enough fish to maintain a business could become difficult.
For Eunice Auma of Rasira Beach, that reality began to change when she got an opportunity to move from simply selling fish to producing it.
Eunice is the chairperson of the Rasira Women Group and also leads a wider coalition of women’s groups involved in fish farming at Rasira Beach. Through the Investing in Women in Blue Economy Project, she and hundreds of other women were introduced to cage fish farming on Lake Victoria.
The project brought together more than 300 women from Rasira, Mukuya, Orore and Osoyi in Gwassi. Instead of remaining entirely dependent on fish caught by others, the women began participating directly in fish production.
For Eunice, the experience changed how she viewed her own economic potential.
“I can now refer to myself as a qualified fish farmer.”
The knowledge she gained through the project gave her the confidence to consider owning cages of her own and producing fish for the market.
A new role in the fish value chain
The significance of the project goes beyond simply putting fish cages in Lake Victoria.
It gave women an opportunity to take on a different role within the fish value chain.
Rather than purchasing fish after it had already been harvested, participating women became involved in the production process itself. They learned how to stock cages, feed fish, monitor their growth, carry out sampling and keep records.
The cages were managed collectively through registered women’s groups. Each cage could hold up to 25,000 fingerlings, with groups sharing responsibility for their management. Members took turns visiting the cages and learning the different aspects of production.
This hands-on approach was important because cage farming requires more than simply stocking fish and waiting for harvest.
Feed management, water conditions, cage maintenance, sampling and mortality records all influence production results.
Nivah Ondieki, the farm manager at Fio Fish Farm, guided the women through these activities. Feeding was particularly important as the fish grew and their feed requirements increased.
The women also learned to monitor fish numbers and growth. Dead fish were recorded so that survival could be assessed at harvest, while sampling helped determine fish size and guide changes in feeding.
These may appear to be routine farm activities, but learning them gave the women practical skills that could eventually allow them to operate their own production units.
The first harvest
The first harvest provided the women with an opportunity to see the results of their work.
The fish averaged about 500 grams, while the reported selling price was Sh300 per kilogram. For women who had previously depended on purchasing fish from fishermen, producing fish themselves represented a significant change in how they could participate in the industry.
For Eunice, the income had an immediate household impact.
She explained that she could now contribute toward school fees for her children and meet other family needs.
The significance was not only the money earned from one harvest. The experience demonstrated that fish farming could become an economic activity through which women could build their own income and assets.
That is why Eunice and other members were already looking beyond the shared cages.
Pamela Ososo, another beneficiary, said the women wanted individual groups to eventually own cages so that fewer members would share the returns from each production unit.
Producing fish to improve market access
For Pamela, the opportunity also addressed a problem she had experienced as a fish trader.
She had previously struggled to obtain enough fish for her business because of declining supply.
This illustrates one of the connections between fish production and fish trading. A trader’s ability to earn depends partly on having reliable access to fish. Increasing local production can therefore create opportunities not only for farmers but also for businesses involved in marketing the harvest.
Rio Fish Farm CEO Angela Odero explained that the project was also intended to address the relationship between fish scarcity and the vulnerability of women traders.
The project sought to increase fish production through cage farming while giving women a more consistent source of fish for their businesses.
In that sense, aquaculture becomes more than a method of producing fish. It can also strengthen the wider value chain by connecting production with traders and markets.
The economics of cage farming
The women’s progress has not come without challenges.
Feed is one of the largest costs in intensive fish production, and the project faced the same challenge.
The source reported that feed could account for up to 65 percent of production costs. This makes feed management critical because inefficient feeding can quickly reduce the profitability of cage farming.
The women were therefore being linked with financial institutions and trained in financial management. Part of the intention was to help them develop stronger financial systems, access credit and eventually establish a savings and credit cooperative.
The first harvest was not simply viewed as money to be spent. Some of the proceeds were deposited with financial institutions as part of preparations for future investment.
This approach is important for any farmer hoping to move from a supported project into an independently managed business.
Building ownership beyond the project
One of the strongest aspects of the women’s story is the ambition to move from participation to ownership.
Training can provide knowledge, while a project can provide initial resources. Long-term success, however, depends on whether farmers can eventually acquire the assets, capital and management capacity needed to continue production independently.
For Eunice, the goal was to use the skills she had acquired to establish her own cages and supply fish to the market.
That ambition reflects a broader transition.
The women were not simply being trained to work on somebody else’s farm. They were gaining practical experience that could potentially help them establish their own enterprises within the fish value chain.
A changing role for women in aquaculture
The experience at Rasira demonstrates what can happen when women who have traditionally occupied downstream positions in a value chain gain access to production opportunities.
Women who were primarily known as fish traders became fish farmers.
They learned to manage cages, handle feeding programs, monitor fish growth, keep production records and participate in harvesting. At the same time, their existing knowledge of markets and fish trading remained valuable.
This combination of production and market knowledge can be particularly important in aquaculture because profitable fish farming ultimately depends on producing a product that can be sold at a viable price.
The women therefore entered cage farming with an understanding of the market that many new farmers have to develop over time.
More than one harvest
The first harvest was an important milestone, but the bigger measure of success is whether the women can continue building viable businesses beyond the initial project support.
That requires access to affordable feed, working capital, technical knowledge, reliable markets and suitable production equipment.
It also requires strong group management where farming is carried out collectively.
For the women of Rasira, the ambition was already clear. They wanted greater ownership of cages, stronger returns from their work and a larger role in supplying fish to the region.
Eunice’s journey captures that change particularly well.
She began from a position where accessing fish for trading could be difficult. Through cage farming, she gained the opportunity to become a producer herself.
That shift changes more than where she earns her income. It changes her position within the fish value chain.
From buying fish to producing it, from depending on supply to helping create supply, and from participating in the market to building an enterprise around production, Eunice’s story shows how aquaculture can open new economic opportunities for women around Lake Victoria.
For Kenya’s growing aquaculture sector, these stories matter. The future of fish farming will depend not only on producing more fish, but also on creating opportunities for more people to participate meaningfully in the businesses that surround production.
The women of Rasira have already taken that step. Their first harvest was not the end of the journey. It was the beginning of their ambition to become fish producers, entrepreneurs and suppliers in their own right.