The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : `Fish productivity key to poverty alleviation'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 24, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

`Fish productivity key to poverty alleviation'

Special Correspondent

"Natural fish stock is fast depleting and under serious threat"

Stephen Hall, Director- General of World Fish Centre. — Photo : N. Sridharan

CHENNAI: The demand for fish is on the rise, but the availability is on the decline.

Concerted efforts should be made to improve fish productivity, as it would help achieve the millennium development goal of reducing poverty and hunger, said the Director-General of Worldfish Centre, Stephen Hall, here on Thursday.

Giving a lecture at M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation here, Dr. Stephen Hall said the aim of the centre was poverty eradication, a healthier better nourished human family, reduced pressure on fragile natural resources and people centred policies for sustainable development. It could be achieved through research, partnership, capacity building and policy support. The centre was also promoting sustainable development and use of live aquatic resources, based on environmentally sound management.

He said that the centre believed that its aim could be achieved only if it was carried out in partnership with local governments and non-government organisations. It was for developing a strong national research and development system, better utilisation of scarce resources and achieving quick gains from research results.

The Director-General said that though fish played a major role in poverty alleviation and in improving nutrition, natural fish stock was fast depleting and was under serious threat. As 90 per cent of fishermen were poor, it was difficult for them to participate in activities that would improve the fish production. For their benefit, the centre was concentrating on research.

The centre, he claimed, had many success stories. It had developed a new strain of fish (tilapia), which could grow up 85 per cent larger at 20 to 30 per cent lower production costs. Fishermen could take three crops a year and the strain was being used in 13 countries. This would not only improve the income and nutrition of fishermen but also increase the availability of fish.

In Bangladesh about 6,000 farmers had benefited from an increase in aquaculture production by 100 per cent and the household income by 60 per cent. Farmers, including the landless, were helped by the centre through innovative arrangements in aquaculture and community based management. Successful trials were done in Bangladesh and Vietnam with about 900 farmers, which helped them to earn more income per hectare and reduction in the cost of production by 10 per cent.

To fulfil the aims, the centre had to grow in size and in terms of geographic presence over the next three to five years. It would not be possible without the partnership of local governments, he said.

The Chairman of the Foundation, M.S. Swaminathan, introducing Stephen Hall, stressed the need for a system where agriculture and aquaculture could co-exist. He said the National Commission on Agriculture, for which he was the chairman, suggested a national aquarium policy in its recommendations.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Tamil Nadu