Jayashree and Arunachalam  have analysed

the impact of fish re$earch in India

among th e global scientific

community and reported that majority

of publications, particularly those from

the central research laboratories, are

published in non-Science Citation Index

(SCI) and non-Journal Citation Reports

(JCR) journals of low impact with poor

visibility. They have concluded 'fish

research in India appears to be mediocre

in general' 

Vivekanandan, E

CMFRI Digital Repository

CORRESPONDENCE 2. 3. 4. 5. IS92 Emission Sanarios, Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, 1995, p. 337. Bouwman, A. F .• Report No . . 773004004, National Institute of Public Health and Environmental Protection , Bilthoven. 1994. Mosier, A. and Kroeze. C .. [GBP Newsl., Stockholm, 1998, p. 24. Bouwman, A. F .• Nature, 1998. 392. 866- 867. Mosier. A .. Kroeze. C .. Nevison, C .. Oenema, 0 .. Seitzinger, S. and van Cleemput, 0 .. Nutr. Cyc/. Agroeco.ryst., i998.52.225-248. 6. Mosier. A. R., Duxb ury, J . M., Freney, J. R. o Heine meyer, O. and Minami. K., Climatic: Change, 1998, 40,7-38. Pathak. H., CurT. Sci .• 1999. 77. 359-369. 7. 8. 9. 10. Ball, B. C., Scott, A. and Parker, J . P., Soil Till . Res., 1999.53,29-39. Falkenmark, M. et 01., Ambio, 1998. 27. 148-154. Sahrawat. K. L. . in Nitrogen Economy in Tropical Soils (ed. Ahmnd, N.), Klu-wee Academic Publishers , Dordrecht, 1996. pp. 379- 388. 11 . Seneviratne, G., Ambio, 1999. 28,378, GAMINI SENEVIRATNE Biological Nitrogen Fixation project, Institute of Fundamental Studies. Hantana Road. Kandy. Sri Lanka e-mail: gaminis@ ifs.ac.lk Mapping fish research in India - Missed opportunity Jayashree and Arunachalam 1 have ana-lysed the impact of fish re$earch in In-dia among the global scientific community and reported that majority of publications, particularly those from the central research laboratories, are published in non-Science Citation Index (SCI) and non-Journal Citation Reports (JCR) journals of low impact with poor visibility. They have concluded 'fish research in India appears to be mediocre in general ' . The fish production in our country in-creased by more than five times2 and the contribution of fisheries to the GOP of India increased by nearly three times3 during the last 5 decades , a growth ar-guably one of the highest among the food production sectors. Thi s growth would not have been possible without an effective research support . A few examples of research-supported fish production are as follows : (i) The then Central Inland Fisheries Research Insti-tute (Barrackpore) published the first paper on the success in induced breed-ing of carps in 1957 (ref. 4). Subse-quently, technologies on induced breeding and larval rearing were devel-oped for a number of species of carps, all of which were published in non-SCI journals. These research developments paved the way for the current annual carp production of > 1 mill ion tonnes. (ii) The Central Marine Fisheries Re-search Institute (CMFRl) , Kochi devel-oped the hatchery technology of penaeid 118 shrimps in 1973 (ref. 5), and by 1978, larval ' rearing of several shrimps was successfully developed and docu-mented. All these achievements were published in the Institute's non-SCI journals. In 1999-2000, the country has exported farmed shrimps worth US $ 0.8 billion. (ii i) The CMFRI devel-oped hatchery and mariculture tech-nologies for the pearl oyster6, edible oys ter, mussels7 and clams. All these technologies were, and are being docu-mented in non-SCI journals since 1973. Of these, pearl culture and mussel cul-ture have made significant impac ts among the entrepreneurs and fi shermen. (iv) The Bay of Bengal Programme (FAO). Chennai designed a high open-ing trawlnet with the help of gear ex-perts in India. The design, which revolutionized the capture fisheries sec-tor, was published as a BOBP working paper in 1980 (ref. 8). In two decades, all the trawl nets (150,000 in number in. 1998) in the country are of high opening type. These nets now produce 1.2 mil-lion tonnes of fish/year. (v) Several special publications and bulletins of the central fisheries institutes have helped the Supreme Court, Parliamentary Standing Committees and the maritime sta te governments in framing several policy documents such as the Aquacul-ture Authority Bill, Deepsea Fishing Policy and Marine Fishing Regulation Acts, which are milestones in the devel-opment of fisheries sector in India. There are many more examples, which paved the way for , what is hailed as 'Blue revolution' in India. The growth of the fisheries sector, to a very large extent, is due to the im'pact of research on the fish farmers, fi sherfolk, fisheries planners and managers. The mandate of the central research institutes is to develop technology packages and transfer them to the bene-fi ciaries to increase/sustain fi sh produc-tion. Publications in hi gh impact journals will not help in meeting the objective of directly reaching the bene-ficiaries. The philosophy of Garfield!.! has not considered the importance of this kind of production-oriented re-search, which is crucial for developing countries like India. By following the methodology commonly adopted for measuring the quality of publications of physical, chemical and biological and several other disciplines of science, Jayashree and Arunachalam l have missed a good opportunity to evolve a specialized methodology for proper assessment of the impact of fi sh-eries research (and for other food production researches as well). Scicn-tometrics has to perhaps redefi ne and reorient its methodology and evolve a meaningful tool for quantitatively measuring the output of science and scientists. l. Jayas hree, B. and Arunachalam. S., Curro Sci .. 2000. 79. 61 3-620. CURRENT SCIENCE. VOL. 80. NO.2. 25 JANUARY 2001 1.. Devaraj. M. and Vivckanandan, E., Curro Sci .. 1999. 76. 3 14- 112. 3_ Vivekanandan, E., in Proceedings of the Fisheries for Nutritiona l Security (ed. Pandian. T. 1.). National Academy of Ag-ricultural Sciences, New Delhi and Madurai Kamaraj University, Madura], 2000 (in press). 4. Chaudhuri . H. and Alikunhi, H., Curro Sci .. 1957,26,381-3&2. _f,1I2 014, ('II'" . 5. Rao, P. V. and Kathirvefr;U~ ma/.Jl.lM r"'",j~+n.,p,,d£llll!a,,) ___________ _ J. Fi.~h . , 1973, 20 , 228-250. E. VIV EKANANDAN 6 Alagarswamy, K. and Qasim, S. Z., Indian 1. Fish., 1973, 20, 533-550. 7. CMFRI Spl. Pub!., 1978.2, p. 51. &. Pajot, G. and Crockett. J., BOBP/WP, 1980, p. 23. 9. Garfield, E., Curro Contents, 1979, 46 , 313-318. Madras Research Centre. CenIral Marine Fisheries Research Institute , 68/3 Greams Road, Chennai 600 006, India e-mail: chcmfri@md3.vsnl.net.in Seismic wave amplification - Similarities between West Bengal (India) and Seattle (USA) basins As detailed earli er l success of natural hazards and disaster management de-pends on a combi ned input from sys-tematic scientific research, proper extensional education, organized train-ing and involvement of common man. As I was contemplating to formulate a comprehensi ve research programme for detailed seismic surveillance in the West Bengal basin, I came across an article in £05, Transactions of Ameri-can Geophysical Unioll'!, with signifi-cantly similar but more detai led findings as in the case of the West Ben-gal basin}. The high reso lution seismic refraclion coverage in the Seattle basin, Washington (USA) has revealed that seismic shots in Seattle even though small ( 180 kg or less) , were much more energetic than expected and were felt by Seattle res idents as far as 4.5 km from shot points . Similarl y, in the case of the West Bengal basin a shot charge of only 125 kg during seismic refraction survey in 1988, has produced unexpectedly considerab le surface vibrations, result-ing in panic amongst Burdwan popula-tion. It is aLt ributed that this energy propagation'! could be both due 10 the well-coupled detonation of the explo-sions within the water table and trap-ping of the seismic energy by low-velocity surficial units within the basin. It is further stated2 that there is a strong correlation between the geometry of the basin fill ed with sediments and the amount of amplification of the seismic waves. It is stated2 that the amplifica-tion results from either focusing associ-ated with the entire basin, or resonances and trapping of the seismic energy within the specific layers in the basin, probably the uppermost lower velocity quaternary deposits , whose geometry may measure the geometry of the entire basin. The finding that the seismic wave amplification was confined 10 the Seat-tl e basin and nothing unusual has been noticed in the surrounding Olympic mountains region cou ld be ascribed to a major extent even to the West Bengal basin, but for the differences in the ge-ometries of the two basins. The seismic refraction studies-l. confined to the adja-cent crystalline part, near Seliator, pro-duced no amplified signal, as in the case of shots closer to Burdwan. In the West Bengal basin as detailed earlier3, in simil ar geologic terrain all the phenomena noticed in Seattle basin were observed . As in the case of Seat-t1e2, determining the origin of the ampli-fication of the seismic waves within the West Bengal basin needs to be taken up CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 80, NO.2, 25 JANUARY 2001 as a priority research topic, as a part of detailed surveillance package thal includes stress st udi es, three-dimensional tomographic imaging of the area in and around Burdwan and close seismic surveillance network to record even micro tremors of magnitude 2 2. These observations emphasize the need for a detailed study in the West Bengal basin as it is well established 2 that crustal faults and sedimentary ba-sins could pose seismic hazards in re-gions like lhe Seattle basin. I. Reddy, P. R., Curro Sci" 2000, 79. 1045-1046. 2. Bracher, T. M. ef al., EOS Tr().fls. Am. Geophys. Ullion, 2000,81,545- 552. 3. Reddy, P. R., Curl'. Sci., 2000,79, 1144-1145. 4. Kaila, K. L, Reddy, P. R., Mall, D. M .. Yen kateswarlu , N., Krishna, Y. G. and Prasad, A. S. S. S. R. S., Ge(}l'hy.~. 1. lilt .. 1992. 45-66. P. R. REDDY National Geophysical Research Institute, Hyderabad 500 007. India e-mail~I.OJtmasl@csnxri.ren.lI ic.in 119 

Mapping fish research in India - Missed opportunity

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Mapping fish research in India - Missed opportunity

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