Luxury resorts in India transform swimming pools into fish ponds.

Due to the Covid-19 outbreak, India implemented a nationwide lockdown in March 2020. Since then, only a few hotels have been allowed to reopen, but their revenue has plummeted.

Faced with this situation, the Aveda resort in Kerala, India, which used to attract a large number of domestic and international tourists, had to temporarily convert its 150-meter-long, 15-meter-wide swimming pool into a fish farm. Among hotels and resorts in India, not many have a swimming pool that can hold 7.5 million liters of water and be repurposed like the one at Aveda.

Sharing about their current predicament, the resort's manager stated that due to a lack of revenue, 16,000 two-month-old pearl spotted fish have been released into the pool. This species of fish takes approximately eight months to reach maturity and is a popular ingredient in dishes in South India and the Middle East. The estimated value of the approximately 4 tons of pearl spotted fish being raised in the resort's pool could reach $40,000 on the market when harvested in November.

Although this makeshift farm cannot compensate for the losses caused by the pandemic, the resort's head hopes that the money from selling fish can help cover basic bills so the business can "stay afloat" until tourists return.

Nevertheless, the Aveda resort also plans to continue its pearlfish farming operation even when the tourism business recovers.

In India, the tourism industry has suffered losses of 15 trillion Rupees this year due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. This is three times the estimated loss of 5 trillion Rupees given in March. At least three-quarters of tourism businesses in India have also been affected by the pandemic.

Minh Chi