Sri Vijaya Puram, Nov. 21: The Department of Fisheries, A&N Administration celebrated World Fisheries Day today at Fisheries Training Centre, Marine Hill flagging the national theme ‘India’s Blue Transformation: Strengthening Small Scale and Sustainable Fisheries’. Shri Vishwendra, DANICS, Secretary (Fisheries) was the chief guest on this occasion.
Shri Vishwendra wished the gathering on this occasion and explained recent developments undertaken in Mariculture, Brackish Water Aquaculture and Cold Chain sectors of the Islands. He also emphasized the need of involvement of small scale fishermen and fish farmers in implementation of fisheries and aquaculture policy objectives for promotion of entrepreneurship and income generation in the sector. He informed the gathering about the proposal of creation of Modern Fish Market and Cold Chain infrastructure for the use of Dignabad fishermen community and the model adopted will be the best of its kind and will be replicated in other places also.
Earlier, Ms. Jagtap Kalyani Rajendra, DANICS, Director of Fisheries welcomed the gathering and highlighted the importance of celebrating World Fisheries Day and detailed the recent initiatives of Department of Fisheries to support the small scale fishermen community of the Islands. She also stressed the need of adopting various financial assistance scheme of Govt. of India for uplifting of the community by setting up of fishing and aquaculture infrastructures to support the direct seafood export from the Islands.
During the programme, exceptional contributors in the field of Fisheries and Aquaculture were felicitated and honored by the chief guest in various categories of nominations like best performing fisherman, best performing fish farmers, best performing fish traders, best performing fisheries entrepreneurs and best field level officials of the Department of Fisheries. The Secretary fisheries congratulated all the award winners and advised to scale up their existing activities for better earnings considering the fisheries potential and scope of direct export of seafood products of the Islands.
Shri. S.U. Maheshwar Rao, Governing Body Member, NFDB, Hyderabad also shared his gratitude for the continued support of Department of Fisheries in improving the livelihood of the local fishermen community of the Islands. The programme concluded with the vote of thanks by Dr. K Gopal, Joint Director (Fisheries).