'Blue Revolution’ to Revitalise India’s Fisheries Sector

The Government, with a renewed focus on the fisheries sector, is set to launch the ‘Blue Revolution’ to further revitalize the industry. Drawing from the past success of the Green Revolution, the envisaged Blue Revolution has the potential to usher in rapid transformation in the sector, which will enhance productivity, improve breeding and feeding practices as well as improve human resource training. This focus on aquaculture is also timely, as the country is currently struggling with inflation of protein-rich food items.

India is the second-largest player in the global fisheries sector; producing around 90.4 lakh MT of fishery-based resources annually. Exports from the fisheries sector reached an all-time high of USD 5 billion in 2013-14, illustrating its high potential in contributing to India’s trade economy. The sector contributes close to 1% of India’s GDP and around 4.6% to the agricultural GDP and also employs nearly 14 million people.

ASSOCHAM recommends the following measures to be part of the Blue Revolution for sustainable development of the sector:

• Immediate impetus to address infrastructure bottlenecks such as upgrading and planning fishing harbors, integrated export-oriented processing clusters and country wide domestic fish marketing infrastructure.

• Updating food safety protocols to meet global quality specifications, thereby mitigating export rejections and ensuring regular trade and livelihood for fishermen.

• Skill development and training activities to be undertaken for ornamental fish culture, deep sea fishing and marine aquaculture activities, in an effort to create additional employment opportunities.

• The introduction of the new exotic shrimp variety, Lvannamei, has brought new dynamism to the fish processing industry. Frozen shrimp contributes to more than 64 percent of total Indian marine export earnings. More domestically-cultured species need to be introduced at regular intervals by the scientific community to benefit farmers and provide momentum to the aquaculture sector in India.

• Overhauling the processing industry to export value added products, thereby increasing per-unit export value.

Sincerely,

Rana Kapoor

President, ASSOCHAM