KOCHI: Despite contributing about five percent to the agricultural GDP of the country, the fisheries sector is still reeling for want of technology.Speakers at the one-day workshop on ‘Forecasting Technological Needs for Fishing and Fish Processing Sectors in India’ stressed the need to invest in fishing and processing technologies in India. Over 14.48 million people in India depend on fisheries sector for their livelihood. Yet there are obstacles that fishing industry face, including over-exploitation, pollution, adverse impacts on biodiversity, lack of diversification in fishing and fish processing, capture of juveniles, apathy towards scientific advice for obtaining sustainable fishery yields, fuel cost hike, low technology application and climate change impacts. The workshop is being held under the National Agricultural Innovation Project at the Central Institute of Fisheries Technology (CIFT) on Thursday. It is being jointly conducted by the Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute, New Delhi, and the CIFT. In the first session CIFT director T K Srinivasa Gopal and scientist Charles Jeeva spoke on future technological needs for sustainable and development-oriented fishing and fish processing sectors of the country. “Compared to other countries, India is lagging behind, in terms of quality of fish production and export,” says Anwar Hashim, president, Seafood Exporters Association of India, Kochi. He spoke on the possibilities in the export of Octopus, Mahi Mahi, Red Snapper etc. The topics discussed, include the relationship between research and development in agriculture, technological needs and infrastructure, institutional support required for sustainable development. IASRI scientists K Gopakumar, V K Bhatia and Ramasubramanian V, CMFRI team comprising P U Zachariah and N G K Pillai and CIFT experts C N Ravisankar, M R Boopendranath and S Balasubramaniam made presentations.
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