Buea: Fish farmers, livestock breeders drilled

A three days workshop with the goal of developing and harnessing skills towards poverty alleviation and sustain income generation sources through fish farming and livestock breeding have closed up in Buea. The workshop organized by the World Bank West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development, CORAF/WECARD, took place from the 17th to 19th of March 2016 in Buea. Opening the workshop within the context of fish cum rice and poultry production, the Vice Chancellor of the University of Buea, Dr Nalova Lyonga disclosed that the workshop was aimed at developing integrated fish farming techniques by farmers. This to Madam Lyonga involves fish farming alongside livestock and agricultural crops in order to obtain effective resource and by-product utilization and farm space management. 

The project focuses on the development of a viable and sustainable integrated aquaculture system with agriculture production for rural farmers which included the development of suitable integrated fish-rice poultry production technology through participatory research,market access and quality of aquaculture products improved and also an institutional strengthening and integrated capacity building of all stakeholders. By and large, the project is expected to improve the ability of most rural farmers to be self employed thus reducing high rate of unemployment in the project area. Another major focus is to significantly increase the income levels of the project communities as well as stabilizing food security through increase in production and nutrition level of the people in the project community. It was discussed during the workshop that adequate training, production and distribution of improved seeds of fish, rice and poultry to the resource poor farmers in order to ameliorate livelihood in the prevailing fish culture plagues was worthwhile.

The course will see 200 fish farmers acquire sufficient knowledge for a three years period on methods of fish cum rice and poultry/piggery production. It was spotlighted during the workshop that the CORAF/WECARD Integrated Aquaculture Farm, University of Buea, which currently markets the African catfish(Claria gariepinus), Oreochromis niloticus(tilapiine fish) and pork meat to the university community and the public, meets the ever growing challenges of availability of the species in Cameroon. The fish farm rooted within scientific and meticulous acceptable standards is hitherto raised in the clean waters of the CORAF/WECARD/UB integrated aquaculture farms with diets that enhances natural qualities as well as maintained their firm, lean and white meat.

To the cream of experts who presented brilliant submissions during the three days workshop,fish farming is indispensable and evokes modern technology to tackle agricultural ousting issues. Since the inception of fish farming in 1948, decades down the lane, the sector according to one of the resource person, Dr Oben Pius has encountered a good number of problems.

The projects which spans through Nigeria,Cameroon and Sierra Leone is expected to demonstrate and disseminate technology of sustainable integrated fish-rice poultry and pig farming to about 1200 integrated fish farmers. The two pilot sites are the South west and North West Regions. The workshop in Buea brought together more than 800 farmers.