Society of Coastal Aquaculture and fisheries (SCAFi) and ICAR-CIBA jointly celebrated “World Ocean Day’ on 8th June 2018 at CIBA. On this occasion, Dr.R.Venkatesan, Head, Ocean Observation Systems, National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT), Ministry of Earth Sciences, Chennai has delivered a lecture on “India’s Ocean Observation Programme – Relevant to the Society”. In his lecture, he related the Indian subcontinental ocean research and its relevance vis-a-vis the global counterparts as “WE SEE MORE SEA THAN OTHERS SEE”. The need for sustained ocean observations to improve the scientific knowledge about the ocean climate and ecosystems, human impact, and human vulnerability has been discussed. He sensitized that tracking the extreme climatic events like cyclones, flood, Tsunami and storms are important for a national surveillance system. The environmental problem, called deep-sea litter was highlighted and the danger it causes for the marine living organisms. He cautioned that plastic pollution in the sea is a major manmade problem and stressed that “we cannot manage what we cannot measure”. Deep-sea images and videos obtained from Remotely Operated Underwater Vehicles (ROV) and submersibles operated by the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) provide a key idea of the nature of these deep-sea litters. Early warning systems with the aid of sensors and moored buoys network in the seas are providing real-time data to track the cyclones and able to alert the governments.
Dr.G.Gopikrishna, Principal Scientist and Head, NGBD in his presidential remarks emphasized that Ocean is so vast and our knowledge about oceans are still limited, and we need to know more. Dr. S. Kannappan, Secretary SCAFi in his welcome address highlighted the initiatives of SCAFi related to the coastal environment and introduced the chief guest to the audience. At the end, Dr.J.Raymond Jani Angel, Joint Secretary, SCAFi proposed the vote of thanks.
