The Hindu Business Line : ‘Coldwater fisheries growth important for food security’

Kochi, Nov. 25 Development of coldwater fisheries is important in the context of food security at the national, regional and village levels, especially at high altitudes and cut-off areas where prices can be very volatile due to globalisation, difficult access and various other reasons.

In his opening remarks at the Regional Workshop on Production and Marketing of Coldwater Fish Species, Dr S. Subasinghe, Director of INFOFISH, highlighted the importance of coldwater fisheries and said India and some neighbouring countries would benefit greatly from the project and there is scope furthering the project with FAO technical collaboration.

Though this is the 29th workshop jointly organised by INFOFISH and the Marine Products Export Development Authority, he lamented that this is also the first coldwater fisheries workshop to be organised by the two in the last 27 years. Dr Subasinghe said they had tied up with marine and freshwater fin fishes and shell fishes in the Asia Pacific region so far.

AQUACULTURE PRODUCTION

While Iran, Thailand and Sri Lanka have created some facilities in coldwater fisheries, they were nothing compared to the facilities developed in Himachal Pradesh, a report by MPEDA said. The workshop was organised at Manali.

Coldwater fisheries would turn out to be nothing but culture fisheries and not capture fisheries, Mr Tarun Shridhar, Joint Secretary (Fisheries) in the Union Ministry of Agriculture said.

The current global fish production is 142 million tonnes of which more than 100 million tonnes are from marine resources, contributing to over 70 per cent of the total production. Fish, globally, is recognised as an essential commodity in the global food basket and thus conservation and culture of fisheries gains great significance, the MPEDA report said.

INCREASED DEPLETION

However, marine resources have been getting increasingly depleted and capture fisheries in several countries have begun to report negative growth. Poor technology and growing costs of operation have made venturing out to sea more expensive, reducing the catch from the sea.

The global growth rate of marine fisheries and culture fisheries remain marginally different at 5.5 and 5.7 per cent. This is poised to change as production from culture fisheries accelerate and marine fisheries stagnate.

India is aiming for 7-10 million tonnes of fish production at the end of the XI Five Year Plan.