Vijayawada: AP has natural advantage in aqua sector, says Indira Dutt

Vijayawada : President of Andhra Chamber of Commerce Dr VL Indira Dutt participated in a seminar on ‘Entrepreneurship, Empowerment in Aqua Industry’ here on Wednesday.

The objective of the seminar was to bring awareness of the potential of the industry in Andhra Pradesh which has a long coastline of 974 kms.

Speaking at the seminar, Indira Dutt said that AP has a natural advantage in the aqua sector. However, the waters have to be maintained without pollution and safeguards to be put in, to leave a good environment to our future generations. The industry has the potential to turn wastelands to wealth-lands. Opportunities abound and with a controlled culture, this is considered to be the sunrise industry.

Deputy Director of Marine Products Exports Development Authority (MPEDA) Dr Manoj Kumar TG said that reduction of post-harvesting losses and improvement in domestic consumption of fish, prawn and other marine products must be encouraged. He emphasised on going beyond just cleaning and skinning the fish for exports and adopting international practices for value-addition to the current export products which adds value by 4 to 5 times the current revenues from non-value added raw products.

Senior scientist, Central Institute for Freshwater Aquaculture Dr Ramesh Rathod said that the production costs in the feed by using pellets instead of traditional mixed feed, will greatly reduce the cost of the feed which is a substantial portion of the production costs.

Dr P Rammamohan Rao, retired deputy director of State Institute of Fisheries Training, Dr Koteswara Rao, retired additional director of Fisheries Dept, Dr B Madhusudhan Rao, principal scientist of Central Institute of Fisheries Training also spoke.