4 JUNE 2013 • WORLD AQUACULTURE • WWW.WAS.ORG Although some may consider the expression of appreciation to outgoing officers to be de rigueur, I do sincerely express my appreciation and admiration to both outgoing and continuing officers for their work. USAS is financially strong, has well-designed operational procedures and a committed membership. My appreciation extends to the highly competent staff at WAS. It is highly recommended to occasionally review the reason for our chapter’s existence. According to our bylaws, “the mission of the Chapter shall be to provide a national forum for the exchange of timely information within the U.S. aquaculture community through workshops, meetings, educational programs, and publications.” We are all familiar with the extensive exchange of technical information via our meetings and publications. But our exchange of education must extend past technology and our definition of the aquaculture community must be broad enough to include all who have an interest and are impacted by aquaculture. U.S. Aquaculture Society I would like to discuss three issues of major concern to me and many others in our society. Government’s role in aquaculture I was particularly pleased to read the op-ed from Max Holtzman, Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, in which he acknowledged that aquaculture has a critical role to play in meeting the 60-70 percent increase in demand for food supplies that will occur if current population trends and food habits continue. According to him, “There must be an understanding and acceptance that start-up of an aquaculture operation is treated no differently than any other beginning agriculture enterprise” and “second, multidisciplinary research in aquaculture should be expanded to improve production efficiency, economic viability and long-term sustainability through new transformational advances in genetics, nutrition, health and technology.” Latin American and Caribbean Chapter The Latin American and Caribbean region has a vast aquaculture potential and it is time that it lives up to expectations. To fully develop this potential, we must face important challenges. Today, the aquaculture sector in Latin America is fractured; communication between academia and the production sector is not active. With few exceptions, there is no cohesion among producers. Professionals in the region have not been team players and, when they have associated, it has been mainly for political reasons. The paternalist mentality of the region, where governments are expected to be the engines of the agriculture sector, generates a lack of an entrepreneurial vision. Development programs have been based on subsidies that actually hinder progress instead of encouraging productivity. Although I am conscious that the World Aquaculture Society, specifically the Latin American and Caribbean Chapter, cannot solve all these issues, I am sure it can make important contributions to strengthen aquaculture activity in the region. We need to integrate academia and producers, creating a bidirectional flow of information. It is a fact that most scientific information is written in English, which means that information is available to producers in a fractured and generally deficient way. Producers cannot access information directly because they do not speak the language. Although we cannot translate all scientific information in aquaculture, we can start translating selected information to Spanish and Portuguese, the main languages of the region. We need to foment the importance of regional languages and therefore the LACC webpage will soon be available in Spanish, Portuguese and English. One of our main goals is to start publishing World Aquaculture magazine in Spanish, electronically at first, so LACC members start looking at it as a trustworthy source of information. We want to become a forum where producers can express their needs and concerns and these are taken into consideration by scientists and decision makers. If the real needs of commercial aquaculture are exposed, it will be easier to focus research into areas of real impact. In addition, knowing the needs of producers and academia, decision-makers will be better informed in choosing particular development, investment and/ or research programs to fund. Our first solid step in achieving this goal was receiving an invitation to participate as observers of the RAA (Red Acuíocola de las Americas/Americas Aquaculture Network) meeting organized by FAO and regional government decision-makers to be held this July in the Dominican Republic. We are looking forward to maximizing this opportunity. The promotion of the Latin American and the Caribbean Chapter of the World Aquaculture Society is without a doubt one of our highest short-term priorities. The easiest and most direct way of promoting and consolidating the LACC is through our regional events that, starting this year, will be denoted as LACQUA. LACQUA 13 will be held in Villavicencio, Colombia from the 8-11 October. Different LACQUA events will have Spanish and/or Portuguese as official languages to encourage the participation and integration of producers in the region. Nonetheless, to encourage contributions from experts beyond the region, simultaneous translation to English will be provided for specific presentations. Another way to promote participation within the LACC is to offer innovative services to specific categories of members, such as (CONTINUED ON PAGE 5) (CONTINUED ON PAGE 8) CHAPTER REPORTS
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