32 DECEMBER 2017 • WORLD AQUACULTURE • WWW.WAS.ORG been in place since the fourteenth century (Lo 1990), ever-increasing population growth, environmental degradation, and land and water scarcity have prompted the development and implementation of IAA systems to increase resource-use efficiency (Barg et al. 2000). IAA systems are characterized by a variety of local human activities integrated with aquatic and terrestrial crops, with on- and off-farm inputs derived from animal husbandry, sanitation, and cottage-level industries such as silk and soybean processing wastes (Edwards 2008). Small-scale farming of inland rice-growing areas has the greatest potential for integrating aquaculture with existing terrestrial crop production (Edwards 1999a, Little and Edwards 1999, Edwards et al. 2002, Little and Edwards 2003). Rupandehi, in the southern plains of Nepal, has abundant potential for expansion of fish farming. It is one of the prime fish farming districts of the nation and was recently designated as a Fish Zone through the Prime Minister’s Agriculture Mechanization Program. In this region, fish farming occupies more than 1000 ha of land. In addition to government interventions, many national and international organizations are actively engaged in fisheries and aquaculture projects Sustainable development must focus on three issues: concern for quality and fairness by ensuring the rights of the poor and of future generations; keeping a long-term perspective by applying precautionary principles; and through systems analysis to grasp the inter-connections between the environment, the economy and society (Biggs and Smith 1998). Hunger and food insecurity in least developed nations are caused by low agricultural productivity from technological, policy and institutional constraints, by high year-toyear and seasonal variability in yields and food supply (often from insufficient water) and by financial instability through lack of off-farm employment to buffer the vagaries of urban and rural economies (FAO 2003, Karim 2006). Until recently, the main focus of aquaculture in development has been to isolate fish production from other parts of the farming system, rather than aquaculture as a means to achieve multi-faceted, integrated rural development (Haylor and Bland 2001, Friend and Funge-Smith 2002). Sustainable aquaculture is often linked with “sustainable livelihoods” and “integrated farming systems.” Although integrated agriculture aquaculture (IAA) systems have Integrated Polyculture of Carps and Small Indigenous Species with Dike Cropping of Vegetables in Rupandehi, Nepal Shailesh Gurung, Sujan Bhattarai, Hugh Thomforde and Arun Thapa FIGURE 1. Dike cropping of vegetables in Nepal.
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