At its recent meeting in Cambodia, the 23rd Governing Council endorsed some significant changes to the NACA Work Plan. One of the key changes is the formation of the Sustainable Farming Systems Programme, which will incorporate the former Inland Aquaculture and Coastal Aquaculture Programmes. One of the key issues the new programme will address is sustainable intensification, seeking to increase the productivity of farming systems through gains in efficiency, rather than only through additional resource inputs. As the global population continues to grow, feeding the world without further degrading the environment is a key challenge that must be met.
We are pleased to announce that the Sustainable Farming Systems Programme will be mentored by Prof. Peter Edwards, who will already be well known to many people in the network. Prof. Edwards is an Emeritus Professor at the Asian Institute of Technology, where he founded the aquaculture programme and he has 36 years of experience in aquaculture education, research and development in the Asian region. He will also be familiar to readers of Aquaculture Asia Magazine, for which he has written a regular column on rural aquaculture for many years.
NACA wishes to welcome Prof. Edwards and looks forward to his assistance with the development of the Sustainable Farming Systems Programme.
The project aims to reduce the perception of small-scale marine fish farmers that trash fish performs better as a food source than compounded feeds. The project will facilitate a transition away from dependence on trash fish to more sustainable alternatives, contributing to the overall sustainability of the sector and the livelihoods of the many thousands of farmers involved. The project will contribute to the development of better management practices (BMPs) for improving efficiency of marine finfish feeding and building capacity amongst practitioners on improved feed management.
NACA held the first in-country marine finfish hatchery training course for the Philippines, 7-27 April 2008. The objective of the training course was to disseminate marine finfish hatchery technologies that have been developed by various institutes and projects in the Asia-Pacific region. 10 fully funded positions were made available by ACIAR. The training course was jointly organized by NACA and SEAFDEC AQD and was conducted in Tigbauan and Guimbal, Iloilo. The training activities were conducted by the SEAFDEC AQD.
Marine finfish aquaculture provides an important livelihood option for poor coastal fishing communities in some parts of southeast and east Asia. The sector has been criticized by many for contributing to environmental problems such as coral reef destruction, high nutrient loadings and use of 'trash' fish as feed. There is an urgent need to encourage better management practices that will ensure the economic and environmental sustainability of small-scale farmers.
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