Dr. Joykrushna Jena, Deputy Director General (Fisheries), ICAR, New Delhi visited ICAR-Central Institute of Brackishwater Aquaculture, Chennai during 27-28 September 2022. During the visit, Dr. J.K. Jena inaugurated the new facilities in the presence of Dr. K.P. Jithendran, Director, ICAR-CIBA; The Kiosk, a commercial outlet of the institute at Muttukadu Experimental Station (MES) for providing multiple services such as; seafood products (fresh and ready-to-eat), value added seafood products, live food and ornamental fish, products of ICAR institutes and promotion of aqua ecotourism. Dr. P. Mahalakshmi, OIC, Engineering Cell and Shri. K.P. Sandeep, OIC, MES explained the objectives and facilities available at the Kiosk and its future expansion for the benefit of aqua-farmers and consumers. Dr. Jena also launched the sale of shrimps harvested from the bio-floc based grow-out farming carried out under the SCSP scheme. Later, he reviewed the progress of the newly launched flagship project on Penaeus indicus funded by the Department of Fisheries, Govt. of India under PMMSY Scheme. Dr. Jena critically reviewed the relevance of each objectives of the project and had in depth discussion with the project team to draw a route map in view of the changing needs and future challenges.
Second day, on 28 September 2022, he inaugurated the newly developed ‘Centre for Bioinformatics’ in the presence of Dr. K.P. Jithendran, Director, ICAR-CIBA. The DDG appreciated the efforts of the institute in modernising its facilities with the state-of-the-art bioinformatics centre equipped with the latest tower workstations and capabilities for undertaking research in frontier areas. Dr. M.S. Shekhar, Scientist In-charge, Nutrition, Genetics and Biotechnology Division briefed DDG about the programs in hand in the area of bioinformatics. The DDG also interacted with all the scientists and scholars and stressed the need for in-depth studies in the area of functional genomics. He also opined that the genomics knowledge shall be put to use for improvement of candidate brackishwater species. The scientists, staff and students of CIBA and Madras Research Centre of CMFRI were present on the occasion. Later, during the interaction meeting with scientists, he reviewed the progress of the research projects on CRP on Genomics and Network Project on Fish Health.
