Shrimp health and aquatic environment camp was organized at Kaikaluru, Krishna District in Andhra Pradesh under the “National Surveillance Programme for Aquatic Animal Health Diseases (NSPAAD)” project to sensitize the shrimp farmers on emerging diseases and their prevention by adopting better management practices (BMPs). A total of 150 farmers and stakeholders from Kaikaluru attended the programme. The unique feature of shrimp health and aquatic environment camp was ‘on-farm’ testing of shrimp samples for important diseases such as white spot disease (WSD) and Enterocytozoon hepatopenaei (EHP) using real time PCR test at free of cost for the farmers. The farmers were also offered pond soil and water quality testing for as many as 12 parameters such as redox potential, pH, salinity, alkalinity, hardness, etc. and estimation of Vibrio load in the haemolymph. A consolidated report on the health of shrimp and pond ecosystem and remedial measures required were provided to all participant farmers free of cost. The shrimp farmers of Kaikaluru had a day long interaction with the scientists on different aspects of aquaculture, especially on the management of shrimp diseases such as WSD, infectious myonecrosis (IMN) and acute hepatopancreatic necrosis disease (AHPND). The farmers were also provided with information on EHP, a disease that has caused enormous production loss to aqua farmers in the south Asian countries including India. Since WSD remains the most important disease of farmed shrimp, adoption of biosecurity measures and BMPs like screening of seed during procurement, pond drying minimum for 30 days and lime application were emphasized to prevent the diseases. Environment plays vital role in the productivity of aquaculture operations, the scientists stressed on keeping the optimal levels of soil and water quality parameters for shrimp aquaculture. The shrimp farmers were provided with set of hand-outs on WSD, IMN, EHP and AHPND written in Telugu to create awareness. Shri. Dulam Nageswara Rao, Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA), Kaikaluru, Govt. of AP, was the Chief Guest for the camp and distributed the sample analysis reports to the shrimp farmers. Shri. M.A. Yakub Basha, Joint Director, Dept. of Fisheries, Krishna district, AP, and Dr. P. Rammohan Rao, DD (Rtd.), Dept. of Fisheries, AP, Mr. S. Ashfaq Ahmed, representative from Community Development Centre for Learning, Livelihood & Research (CDC-LLR) Laboratories of the KCT Group, Bhimavaram and officials from Dept. of Fisheries, Krishna district, AP participated in the camp. ICAR-CIBA scientists Dr. M. Muralidhar, Dr. M. Poornima, Dr. S. Kannappan, Dr. P. Ezhil Praveena, Dr. R. Ananda Raja, Dr. T. Bhuvaneswari, Dr. J. Joseph Sahayarajan, and Dr. A. Nagavel and scholars of Aquatic Animal Health and Environment Division (AAHED) coordinated the camp.
