PESHAWAR: The rising global temperature and weather pattern due to climate change is impacting the aquaculture production activities and affecting the ecological cycle of the rearing ponds as well and the fluctuation of temperature results in stress to rearing living aquatic stock.
The phenomena can cause mortality of stock and financial loss to the entrepreneurs, which may discourage other interested aqua-pruners.
The Provincial Fisheries Departments have to adapt new technologies to address this climate change problem in the long run, which requires collaborative research through academia of Engineering Universities and Biological Sciences with the support of federal and Provincial Fisheries Departments. New and cost-effective methods of mitigating the adverse effect of climate change needs to be addressed on priority basis.
There are number of ecological effects of environmental changes on aquaculture activities in Pakistan. However, these impacts have not been documented on scientific methods on aquaculture in the country, said Omar Hayat Khan, an expert on aquaculture and fisheries sector.
He stressed the need for conducting studies to ascertain the impacts of climatic change particularly the rise of temperature in different regions on productivity of fish through aquaculture production. The other impact is on fish productivity in natural renewable resources of the country whether it are fresh water, brackish water, coastal marine or other marine population dynamic and catch by fishers. No proper study has been carried out on this impact of climate change on the resource base of fish production from natural resources and if it has been affected how much it is impacting economically the fisher’s population.
The outcome of the study will provide an over view of the situation to mitigate the situation for the fishermen of the country. The visible impact of the climate change which is being documented is flood damage to fish farms in different regions of Pakistan.
Loss of fish stock from small dams and fish farms could not be ascertained by Provincial Governments till this time. This aspect needs to be addressed through mitigation measures by providing inputs for rehabilitation of existing fish farms in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab, Sindh and Baluchistan and to
some extent in other areas where flood has damaged the fish stock.
The other loss of aquaculture is the infrastructure of production, which needs to be addressed on engineering point of view by site evaluation for flood vulnerability, where the farm has to be reestablished. They should not be provided any support as this will be waste of money.
However, those fish farms which could be rehabilitated and should be provided with appropriate support to restart the aquaculture business. The initiative will provide encouragement to new entrepreneurs in the fish culture. Support to Aquaculture activities in the country will provide proteinases food for rural population and income to the house hold. This will be in line to the government policy to provide food security of population of Pakistan.
Aquaculture in Pakistan has immense potential to develop as it is not competing with any other agriculture activity. It utilizes waste land, with by-products of livestock and diary and agriculture by products to produce high value fish meat for human consumption.
The inputs of production are cost effective and it is can provide multiple benefits to the economy of the country through import substitution and also income in the rural areas of Pakistan, he concluded.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024