The government should give better attention to aquaculture in order to supply the volume of fish needed by the country that could not be provided anymore by offshore fishing.

This was urged by Dr. Westly Rosario, chief of the National Integrated Fisheries Technology and Development Center (NIFTDC), noting that the decline could be due to the continued bullying by Chinese Coast Guard on local fishermen in the West Philippine Sea. NIFTDC is a research arm of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) based in Dagupan.

Rosario said that in order to improve aquaculture, there is a need to improve the country’s more than 100 fishery schools whose some graduates may yet be unprepared to hurdle the examinations being given by fishery board of the PRC. He hinted that fishery education throughout the country may still be inadequate as gleaned from a number of graduates who fail to pass the fishery examination. He said the country can boost aquaculture production better if only the existing fishery schools are improved so that they can produce quality graduates that will soon carry out the burden of continuing with various aquaculture projects in inland and brackish water throughout the land.

Source: Northbound Philippines News Online. Read the full story here.