AQUACULTURE PAST SCENARIO AND FUTURE PROSPECTS

Aquaculture is the farming in water. It includes farming of fin fishes, shell fishes, mollusks, aquatic plants, algae and other animals and plants. In terms of fisheries India is standing at second position whereas ranking third worldwide in terms of aquaculture. At the first position China has positioned and at second Vietnam is there. Approximate aquaculture production of India is about 11 million tones. Whole of the finfish production is consumed in the domestic market except some of the fresh water prawns and shrimps, which are exported.

Main aquaculture production in India is from freshwater, brackish water and marine water. The production is very much from the fresh water. 55% of fishes are being produced from fresh water. Fresh water sources of India is rivers, ponds, reservoirs, fresh water lakes etc. India is having 14 major rivers, 44 medium rivers and numerous small rivers and streams. Pond and tanks are estimated to cover the area of about 2.36 million ha. It's only 40% is used for aquaculture purpose whereas it is giving 55% of the production of the fishes and the interesting thing is it that in India, the overall production of the aquaculture is being increased only due to the freshwater production, since the production from the marine sector is almost constant. If whole of the 2.36 million ha is utilized efficiently then the production will be quiet enough for export and food supply to the world. For increasing the production the genetically improved fishes has to be cultured. More than these there is need of doing semi-intensive and intensive culture to increase production. Other sectors are brackish water and marine water sources. Since there is almost constant production from marine sector. If the production from marine sector is being increased then the overall production will also increase. Mari culture is one of the best initiative towards increasing production from the marine sector. Culture of marine fishes are at sea, in cages is good from production point of view.

In 2013, fish accounted for about 17 percent of the global population's intake of animal protein and 6.7 percent of all protein consumed. Moreover, fish provided more than 3.1 billion people with almost 20 percent of their average per capita intake of animal protein. In addition to being a rich source of easily digested, high quality proteins containing all essential amino acids, fish provides essential fats (e.g. long chain omega-3 fatty acids), vitamins (D, A and B) and minerals (including calcium, iodine, zinc, iron and selenium), particularly if eaten whole.

India is getting about 7.2 billion US dollar from export. Most of the exported material we got, is from brackish water. If the export is from the freshwater sources then we may get more revenue from it. As the population is booming up and it is estimated that the world population, up to 2050 will be about 9 billion. If the production will not boom in the proportion of population outbreak then there will be starvation along with other nutritional and food related problems.

Maintenance of sustainability is very- very important for this. If the sustainability is not maintained then the fishery source will deplete and at last the source will end. New researches, maintaining or trying to maintain the climatic conditions is very critical in all these aspects. So ultimately we have to increase production in proportion of increasing the population to feed the fore coming population from the aquaculture products. It is as important as agriculture and food for the future.