SHIPPERS and suppliers of milkfish to Dagupan City will now have to produce the auxiliary invoice of their products, otherwise their fish would be ignored in the city’s fish market.

City Agriculture Emma Molina said this is one of the measures adopted by the city to protect the native Dagupan bangus from the incursion of milkfish coming from other areas, such as Bulacan, Pampanga and Batangas that often taste like mud.

Auxiliary invoices are issued by the municipality or city where the fish products come from, Molina said, adding that it will indicate what town, province or region the commodity originated.

It is a wonder that while Dagupan and Pangasinan are already the leading producers of milkfish in the country, traders from other region still bring their milkfish to the big wholesale fish market in Dagupan.

The wholesale fish market here, the biggest in northern and central Luzon, is the source of milkfish flooding Metro Manila, Baguio and other parts of northern Luzon daily.

Here, smart traders from other places hope to get better pricing for their product as they expect their fish to be re-classified similarly with the native Dagupan and Pangasinan bangus.

Noting that this incursion of non-Dagupan or Pangasinan bangus into the city’s wholesale market is destroying the milkfish industry in the province, Mayor Alipio Fernandez has ordered the labeling of Dagupan bangus.

“We are going to that direction (labeling), said Molina, adding that they are thinking of eventually putting tags on the native Dagupan bangus, o buyers can easily distinguish them from the rest of the milkfish produced in other areas of the country.

Bonuan bangus, whose top distinguishing feature—aside from its unrivaled taste—is it has caudal fins at its tail, one of which is longer than the other, is definitely priced higher than the milkfish produced in other regions of the country.

Molina said in the spirit of free enterprise, traders from the south can still unload their milkfish in the Dagupan Fish Market but these will not be re-classified by wholesalers, locally called “consignaciones”, in similar category as the native

Dagupan bangus that is produced in the city’s swampland that is resting on clayish soil.