Fish Angle
Bangladesh is both a riverine and sea-bed country in a natural endowment mix that places her on the top-side of the world's fish resources map. But largely and very persistently has it been a story of unexploited largesse for her: mostly bragged about and that too in naively uninformed guesstimates. Hardly ever did we make any serious and sustained attempt to survey our sustainable and potential fish resources, both inland and marine. From this precarious perch, the government seems now laudably up and about in determining the state of the country's fish resources extending over to the 363 km Exclusive Economic Zone. The survey will be undertaken in the current Annual Development Plan period. In addition to all sorts of nudges behind this maiden venture, the need is great for a motivational swing to make the survey in a comparative setting with some island countries, not quite as riverine as us, which nonetheless literally thrive on their fish resources.
We are for a three-legged strategy for pulling this sector out of half-way houses it is stuck with. Let there be more of self-employing pisciculture projects and fisheries cooperatives as group ventures to attract bank financing and other input supports.
This may be part of the huge Fish Culture Entrepreneurship Project in the private sector envisaged under the Fifth 5-year Plan. It better be undertaken with effect from the next financial year. The time for all this seems propitious when viewed in the context of water management planning being facilitated by accords with India. If salinity intrusion from the sea is checkmated by a swell in the rivers, fish will grow in superabundance. And as part of a scientific fish cultivation programme the stubbornly indiscriminate use of pesticides in farmlands should be over and out.
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