ICAR-Central Institute of Brackishwater Aquaculture (ICAR-CIBA) observed the National Fish Farmers Day and the National Campaign on ‘Emerging Aquaculture Systems and Practices’ as part of the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav on 11th July, 2022. Two parallel progammes, an online Hindi webinar and an interaction meet with fish farmers at the field level were organized to celebrate the day.
Navsari Gujarat Research Centre (NGRC) of ICAR-CIBA conducted the Hindi webinar under the “National campaign on emerging aquaculture systems and practices” on 11th July, 2022 from 1100 to 13:30 hours for farmers from Gujarat, Maharashtra, Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan. In the virtual mode, Dr. Manoj M Sharma, a progressive shrimp farmer from Gujarat state presented a talk on “Recent advances in shrimp farming and scope for brackishwater finfish farming”. About 150 participants including farmers, technicians, marketing officials, scientists, and students participated in the event. Dr. K.P. Jithendran, Director, ICAR-CIBA welcomed the farmers and detailed the activities taken up by the institute as part of the National Fish Farmer’s Day and Azadi ka Amrut Mahotsav. He also highlighted the significance of brackishwater aquaculture sector, importance of shrimp farming and facilitating the aqua farmers in getting successful crops.
Dr. Manoj Sharma in his farmer-friendly talk emphasized the multi-phase shrimp farming concept, advantages and the economics of it vis-à-vis conventional shrimp farming. He opined that diversification in brackishwater aquaculture with finfish farming is important and a ‘technology package’ which assures a moderate profit to the farmers is the key for its take off. He underlined the importance of giving fillip to domestic marketing in the country and suggested a special campaign on promotion of domestic fish marketing need to be undertaken under the PMMSY scheme at the national level. Later, he interacted with the participants on production and marketing related queries in brackishwater aquaculture farming. Earlier, Shri. Pankaj Amrut Patil, Scientist & OIC NGRC of CIBA welcomed the participants and introduced the speaker. The event concluded with a positive feedback from participants. The webinar was coordinated by Shri. Pankaj Amrut Patil, SIC, NGRC and team consisting Shri. Jose Antony and Shri. Tanveer Hussain, Scientists, NGRC, Navsari.
A field level interaction was organized at Karangadu village in Ramanathapuram district, Tamil Nadu on Integrated Multi-trophic Aquaculture in which 130 fish farmers and fishers has participated. Mr. Gopinathan, Assistant Director of Fisheries, Government of Tamil Nadu, Ramanathapuram and Dr. Sesh Serebiah, Chairman, Jehovah Sammah Centre for Marine and Wildlife Research participated in the event as guests of honour and interacted with the fish farmers. Dr. D. Deboral Vimala, Principal Scientist, Social Science Division organized this field interaction.
