'Pakistan has potential to develop aquaculture on industrial scale'

Omar Hayat, a renowned expert on fisheries and aquaculture of Pakistan, has called for extending support to fisheries sector to enhancement their productivity and income to generate employment opportunities in rural areas of the country.

Talking to this scribe, he said that main issue with the fishers is that they have high post harvest losses due to low volumes of fish catch as our aquatic resources have low production of fish. The other common reason is poor handling of fish catch and its processing, with lack of proper storage facilities in their respective area.

He said that fishers are mostly dependent on fisheries contractor who lacks proper transport technologies for distribution of fish to markets. They face many obstacles in raising their productivity and income levels, due to limited knowledge and available of appropriate inputs of harvesting fish from the natural aquatic resource.

He said that fishers either employed in small scale operation or in any other related work are prone to occupational hazards. To overcome these hazards, mobile health facilities are required while improvement in support from the government will attract new work force towards fisheries for gainful employment.

He said that aquaculture is a source of earning livelihood for rural population due to the extensive number of pre-harvest, harvest and post harvest activities associated with the fish. Jobs range from the production and sale of inputs to farming and harvesting, processing and marketing and distribution of fish.

Omar Hayat, who has served over a period of over thirty years on different assignments, says that fishing and aquaculture operations could be carried out informally and on small scale as well as highly organized and industrial in nature.

Pakistan has potential to develop aquaculture on industrial scale wherein workforce can be gainfully engaged in different activities of fisheries and aquaculture. The main constraint is lack of human resource such as aquaculture engineers, aquaculture managers in the public and private sectors that could provide support to private sector in their endeavours to establish commercial aquaculture infrastructure and operations on business model.

The country has the potential to export trout fish if it is developed on scientific lines and the fish farms established as an enterprise. Lack of capacity of fisheries departments of the provinces and working in isolation is not bringing in the change required for aligning the activities towards export.

Our country has the natural aquatic resources to produce more than 50,000 metric tons of trout fish for local consumption and exports valuing million of dollars. Gilgit-Baltistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Fisheries Departments do not have proper planning to achieve these attainable targets within a period of three to five years.

They require preparation of proper feasibility study based on ground realities for capacity building of human resource in private, public sector plus infrastructure, operational inputs requirements and technical evaluation of existing hatcheries for enhancement of their fish seed productivity.

The proper planning and development of fisheries and aquaculture sub-sector of agriculture, he said would help secure sustainable fresh water resource management, also contributing to economic and social development of respective region.

Improvement in aquaculture working conditions will further enhance response of the private sector for investment and enhance response of market demands resulting in improved businesses through increased production of trout fish for export and also local market access.

Estimating existing jobs in fisheries and aquaculture in Pakistan is a complex, due to extensive number of pre-harvest, harvest and post harvest activities associated with fish value chain. Jobs in aquaculture range from production and supply of production inputs of seed, feed, equipments, etc, to the farming, harvesting, processing, marketing and distribution of fish.

The enhancement of production of trout fish in hilly rural area will improve productivity of work force and income level as well. When production of trout fish increase processing units will be established by the private sector which will create employment opportunities to rural poor women in these remote areas of Pakistan.

The national economy, poverty alleviation and food security issues can be improved which is much needed politically and financially. The role of fisheries and aquaculture can be measured with its contribution to national economy to the tune of GDP ratio and the employment generated in its activities.

The value-added multiplier can indicate the representative increase in gross domestic product corresponding to a one unit increase in aquaculture value-added.