Community-based fish culture in seasonal floodplains and irrigation systems

The overall objective of the project was to enhance fish production from seasonally flooding areas and irrigation systems using a collective approach to fish culture. The project sought to examine the institutions necessary to support community-approaches to fish culture in a range of social, cultural and economic conditions, in Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Vietnam and Mali. Technical designs for fish culture were also tested, building on successes achieved in earlier trials in Bangladesh, with an emphasis on adapting the model to develop locally appropriate culture systems. The project showed that the model is able to generate important benefits for communities in Bangladesh, China and Mali, and may have the potential to so in other countries. However, it was found that introducing fish culture into complex and dynamic institutional contexts, whereby open access waters lie over private property required a range of social, environmental and economic conditions to be in place for the adoption and continuance of the fish culture model

Institutional Arrangements in seasonal floodplain management under community-based Aquaculture in Bangladesh

Seasonal floodplains under private and public ownership in the Indo-Ganges river basin provide food and income for millions of people in Bangladesh. Floodplain ownership regimes are diverse, covering the whole spectrum from public to private ownership. The paper compares community-based fish culture projects in these floodplains and analyzes the institutional arrangements of three different Floodplain Management Committees (FMC). The paper aimed to understand the complex institutional relations that govern ownership, access, and control of the floodplains under community-based fish culture (CBFC) to increase fish production and the livelihoods of the poor. We followed the stakeholders representing the various institutions and organizations such as the Department of Fisheries (DoF), Department of Land (DoL), and FMC. Other important stakeholders were the lease-holders of public water bodies in the floodplains, private landowners, seasonal, and professional fishers. The analysis demonstrates a significant increase of benefits to all stakeholders, including the poor, through the sharing of benefits derived from their involvement in the project. The willingness of different social classes to work together, the adoption of new technologies, and the societal embeddedness of local government institutions appear to be important inputs for policy making

Change and diversity in smallholder rice-fish systems: Recent evidence and policy lessons from Bangladesh

Efforts to unlock the genetic potential of both rice and fish, when combined with improvements in the management of rice-fish systems, can potentially increase agricultural productivity and food security in some of the poorest and most populous countries in Asia. In Bangladesh, estimates suggest that the country's potential rice-fish production system encompasses 2-3 million hectares of land. But despite three decades of research on biophysical and technical aspects of rice-fish systems, this potential has not been fully realized due to insufficient attention given to the social, economic, and policy dimensions of rice-fish system improvement. This paper provides a characterization of the diverse and changing nature of rice-fish systems in Bangladesh to shed new light on the economic viability of different rice-fish systems and recommend policy and investment options to accelerate the development of appropriate rice-fish technologies. Data are drawn from a novel subdistrict-level survey of fishery officers, a household/enterprise survey, focus group discussions, and a meta-review of the literature on aquaculture in the country, all of which were conducted in 2010-2011. Findings indicate that concurrent rice-fish systems, alternating rice-fish systems, and collectively managed systems offer considerable potential for increasing productivity and farm incomes in Bangladesh. Findings also suggest that while innovation in these rice-fish systems is being driven by households and communities, there is need for more supportive government policies and investments to enable further innovation. Policymakers need to develop effective regulations to promote feed and fish quality and quantity, for example. More rigorous analysis of the intended and unintended impacts of these policies and investments is also necessary. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved