WWW.WAS.ORG • WORLD AQUACULTURE • SEPTEMBER 2025 63 farm, often with undesirable results. And unfortunately, due to the absence of effective marketing channels, they fall prey to middlemen who call at the farm gate at harvest time and dictate unfair prices. But I suggest that the most important component that will make a significant impact at this stage is the provision of skills and information. If we scale up the delivery of information and skills to our farmers, they will be able to practice better aquaculture. As the President of the Ghana National Aquaculture Association, I have been privileged to meet farmers in different parts of our nation, and have been struck by the passion of my colleagues, and their keenness to achieve better results. But many of them lack the level of skills and awareness required to make the desired impact. If this component is provided, they will make an impact, and make it easier to solve the other problems. Farmers need to assure the integrity of their ponds before the fish are introduced. They need to bring in quality fingerlings in the right conditions, and they must provide the right water conditions for the fish to live in. Then there are basic issues like monitoring the behaviour of the fish, abstention from bad practices like the misuse of antibiotics, and effective biosecurity. Most of our micro-level farmers lack these skills, which are crucial to the achievement of national aquaculture strategy results. What can we do about this? Fisheries officers, with their limitations of numbers and resources, try to support farmers with some skills and information, and they try to respond when farmers call for help. But I would like to suggest that as one group comprised of many of the qualified and competent professionals in Africa, the African Chapter of the World Aquaculture Society raises its game to help provide this need. Many remember the webinars organized by Lanre Dr. Badmus and his associates during the Covid period, which shared valuable information at a time when it was badly needed. We have very competent specialists in our midst, and this is perhaps the time to find ways of delivering this important service. Webinars are one way of providing information. We can join hands with fish farmers’ associations and national authorities to put together online training programmes which farmers in all parts of the continent can access from their phones. The WAS has brought many professionals across Africa together, and I suggest that we mobilize more members, and assist farmers. The Ghana National Aquaculture Association recently started a Training Course for Farmers programme, which is intended to raise the skills of farmers across the nation. The first programme brought together a team of specialists to train farmers on the topics mentioned above. But sending trainers across Ghana to speak to farmers is certainly a logistical nightmare, so one of the suggestions being made now is to prepare videos on various topics, and to arrange follow-up actions. Videos and other training materials can be shared among African nations. There is one example. A couple of years ago, our own Deaconess Foluke Areola contributed a two minute video which formed part of a set of training videos in Ghana named Aqua Army Africa. You can call this the beginning of a discussion on how to deal with one of the major challenges we face today. Fish, I believe, is the major component of the Food Security problem we face as Africans. We need to provide enough fish, in affordable quantities, to feed our increasing population, to remove the scourge of malnutrition from our midst. The majority of the fish farmers expected to drive this change are willing, but they lack the skills and awareness. Shall we, as the experts, rise up and solve the problem? Notes Francis de Heer, President, Ghana National Aquaculture Association PHOTO 3. Across Africa, the most important component that will make a significant impact at this time is the provision of skills and information. PHOTO 4. Due to the absence of effective marketing channels, many producers fall prey to middlemen who dictate unfair prices. In recent years, large numbers of Africans have ventured into fish farming, which is certainly a good sign. Small numbers of investors are also entering the business, with significant levels of capital and technology to impact production levels over the long term. Presently however, the vast majority of fish farmers are micro level operators accounting for only a few thousand tons per year, at best.
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