TRENDS AND ISSUES OF UTILIZATION OF FISHERIES RESOURCES OF WEST BENGAL - AN ANALYTICAL APPROACH

Sustainable Management of Aquatic Resources,Pages 81-93
Edited by: B.K.Mahapatra,A.K.Roy and N.C.Pramanik
copyright@2018,Narendra Publishing House,Delhi,India

Chapter 9:TRENDS AND ISSUES OF UTILIZATION OF FISHERIES RESOURCES OF WEST BENGAL - AN ANALYTICAL APPROACH

Ambalika Ghosh, A. K. Roy and B. K. Mahapatra

Fisheries are next to agriculture in terms of providing employment and food supply. Fish is an important source of quality protein and cheaper in cost compared to another source of animal protein. About 35% of Indian population is fish eaters and the per capita consumption is 9.8 kg whereas the recommended intake is 13 kg. Fisheries provide employment and sustenance to sizeable sections of the society in Rural India, especially weaker sections. On the other side, from the conservation point of view the conservation of fisheries and aquaculture are receiving increasing attention, because of our increasing understanding of aquatic ecosystems. Fisheries are a renewable natural resource, subject to its own dynamics, acted upon by various forces. Open access system of exploitation of the resources lead to overcapitalization, resulting in decrease in the yield rates and unprofitability of operations and threatening the food security as well. The concomitant uncertainties make it imperative that the resources should be scientifically developed, monitored and managed. Development of the resources should comprise measures to augment the abundance level of the resources, strategies to exploit them in such a manner that food security is ensured, the exploitation process being economically viable and the resources conserved at a steady state allowing maximum potential for exploitation. This calls for strategic planning based on scientific assessment of various biological, social and economic indicators.

The paper is based on secondary data available so far on various aspects of fishery statistics mainly published in hand book of Fishery statistics of Government of West Bengal, Govt. of India, and FAO. The raw data is compiled, analyzed, interpreted and presented in the form of tables, graphs, and charts for easy visualization and comprehension for decision making even by the persons unfamiliar to aquaculture. This will pave the way for identification of resources spread around districts enabling optimum utilization of various resources with appropriate measures for fisheries development of the state of West Bengal. Various statistical methods like, descriptive statistics, correlation, regression, test statistics, trend line fitting-test, F-test etc. were performed using SPSS (16.0) and MS Excel, Trend lines with time series data on resources, production, import etc. are also fitted for model building and forecasting.

Key words: Fishery resource, Growth performance, model building and forecasting