Evaluating Innovations in the Ornamental Fish Industry: Case Study of a Discus, Symphysodon aequifasciata, Farm

摘要

The ornamental fish industry has a number of characteristics that must be taken into account when suggesting a method for evaluating innovations at the farm level. A small model discus, Symphysodon aequifasciata, farm (high-value, low-volume egg-layers) served as the case study for this article. Innovations target such technological parameters as annual reproduction per pair, egg fertility, larval survival, and growth. The methods employed in this study involved the following steps: (a) building an operational model; (b) parameterization of the domain of all possible production plans, based on an innovation index tau; (c) tabulation of an objective function f_(tau); (d) analysis of unit-free measures of economic response to innovations-point and arcelasticities of approximated f_(tau)and identification of innovation stages by their response to increase in tau. Numerical modeling (steps a, b, c) showed that improvement of larval survival allows an increase in net present value, which is several times larger than that effected by the other parameters tested. Three stages of innovation are identified in step d. A sharp decrease in elasticity at stage C indicates that further technological improvement cannot be economically efficient under limited aquarium volume. The method can be used to evaluate innovations for other farm types and other varieties of ornamental fish, both livebearers and egg-layers.