WWW.WAS.ORG • WORLD AQUACULTURE • MARCH 2015 23 adverse impact on consistent animal agriculture production and its expansion in developing countries. Pathogens have inflicted extensive losses on animal and human health, adversely affecting producer livelihoods and national and regional economies. The committee accordingly recommended that disease research and education – in topics such as biosecurity training, the use of model organisms for investigations into disease etiology and diagnosis and rapid, specific and well documented corrective or prophylactic treatment of disease – receive considerable research funding. This funding should also focus on the establishment of associated infrastructure to achieve long-term goals of disease prevention, diagnosis and management. There were a number of identified research priorities that accompanied recommendations and they included issues that are highly applicable to developing countries and smallholder animal agriculture, such as food security and infrastructure related to food security problems; food loss, particularly at the beginning of the value chain; overcoming international trade barriers to participate in supply chains and commercial markets and achieve compliance with international regulations; land constraints and water security. One identified research priority addressed policy and certification systems and the aquaculture sector was used as a positive example to illustrate that most successful certification efforts arise from diverse stakeholder input whereby adoption of common international standards can be realized. Research that can be used to increase marine-based aquaculture production systems in different countries and regions of the world was identified as a priority. Relative to the introduction of technologies to improve production in developing countries, the committee identified a research priority whereby investigative results will lead to a compatibility of the technology with particular human-environment conditions in the region under consideration. Notable Research Priorities — Relevance to Aquaculture For aquaculture research, the benefits derived from acceptance and implementation of several overarching and key recommendations found in the report have previously been noted, in part, by other investigative committees (World Aquaculture Fund, FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Department, ARS Aquaculture Action Plan, NOAA 10-Year Aquaculture Plan, as examples) and their suggested points of action. In response to other recommendations in the NRC report, performance of aquaculture production research must become more conscious of the critical need to integrate with other disciplines and thereby embrace a holistic approach. Such an approach would be made manifest by realization of the importance of societal concerns about certain types of research, the socioeconomic issues that impact aquaculture production, and the need to engage in response to current and future climate change effects, and effective communication among researchers, stakeholders and the public. Public funding for aquaculture research is noted with the objectives of building better public-private partnerships as sources of funding. Research priorities underlie the goal of sustainable intensification, with emphasis on the establishment of practices that conserve land, energy and water resources and efficiently utilize nitrogen. For aquaculture, recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS), biofloc and partitioned aquaculture systems (PAS) were identified as good examples of sustainable intensification approaches that warrant continued research funding. With these systems, land and water resources are conserved and the environmental footprint attributed to aquaculture species is diminished. However, the economic feasibility of these systems continues to frustrate widespread adoption. Research to further expand aquaculture to marine environments was identified as a priority to increase global production with the concomitant intent that additional production in this environment will mitigate further competitive pressure on global freshwater and land resources. Other research priorities identified in the report that are particularly pertinent to aquaculture production include the genetic improvement of stocks, an area, in contrast to terrestrial animal production sectors, that has contributed very little to documented production increases over the last 50 years. Recommendations call for more research focused on the development of breeding strategies through the integration of genomic and phenotypic research to achieve the goal of increased production. The committee also identified embryo transfer and cryopreservation technology as highly beneficial research priority paths toward increases in production and these areas of investigation are certainly relevant to aquaculture. Because of the universally recognized operational expenses associated with feed production and feeding, technological improvements in feed content, processing and distribution are recognized as important components of sustainability, particularly for achieving higher efficiencies of energy utilization in feed and production industries. Efficient processing of feed ingredients (feedstuffs), those in current use and those with potential as effective and efficient alternatives, and feeds per se is essential and has been identified as a priority area of research. Another aligned research priority that has applicability to aquaculture, as well as all other animal production sectors, is the identification of contaminants within feeds or feedstuffs, with the ultimate goal of defining content limits resulting in globally accepted regulations, combined with effective means to deliver such information to feed manufacturers. Efficient provision and utilization of nutrients derived from feeds remains an ongoing identified research priority in the pursuit of increasing production. The recommended research priority of producing efficient feeds for different stages of growth has particular application to larval aquaculture. The lack of successful larval culture techniques has been a bottleneck in the goal of efficiently increasing production of many species. Progress can only be attained through research that will successfully address persistent knowledge gaps that reside in addressing water stability, nutrient requirements and (CONTINUED ON PAGE 24) The U.S.-based research recommendations offered by the committee call for a restoration of funding to the level of real dollars, especially for basic science research, and support for development and adoption of technology.
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