A Freshwater Aquaculture Trials and Governance Project for Vanuatu was officially launched Monday by the Minister of Agriculture, Livestock, Forestry, Fisheries and Biodiversity, Matai Seremiah, at a ceremony at The Melanesian hotel in Port Vila aimed at combating the impacts of climate change.
Speaking at the launching ceremony, Minister Seremiah, emphasized that the Republic of Vanuatu was particularly susceptible to the impacts of climate change and the country was ranked the most vulnerable country in the world to both geological and climate risks.
“The impacts of climate change affect our people, our prosperity and security. To combat the impacts of climate change on us we need to be active on many fronts,” he reminded attendance.
“We must continually seek to understand what climate change is doing to us and how we can adapt to the challenges that it presents us. We must learn more, enhance our skills and advance the way we are doing things,” he added.
Minister Seremiah believed that these Freshwater Aquaculture Trials and Governance projects will help the people of Vanuatu do this in their way.
The project will design specific strategies that can be adopted at government fish hatcheries and on individual aquaculture farms, he suggested.
“These strategies will advance the development of small-scale fish farming in Vanuatu and if diligently adopted, will ensure that the benefits of aquaculture can be enjoyed by present and future generations.”
The project objectives are twofold: trial and test economically and environmentally sustainable small-scale community-based aquaculture model, integrating successes into a robust national aquaculture governance system; and upgrade the infrastructure of Tagabe Freshwater Aquaculture Center including improving skills of its technicians and enhancing overall planning and management of the facility.
There are also two expected outcomes: environmentally sustainable small-scale, community-based aquaculture models tests; and functional and effective national aquaculture facility upgraded and supporting community-based aquaculture.
Source: Vanuatu Daily Post // Original Article
