Worldfish officials visit BAR

1 July 2008
Ma. Eloisa E. Hernandez

Key officials of the WorldFish Center, Regional Director for East and Southeast Asia Maripaz Perez, and Assistant Scientist Len Garces visited the Bureau of Agricultural Research (BAR) for a possible collaborative work on 1 July 2008 at the BAR Conference Room, RDMIC Building, Visayas Avenue, Diliman, Quezon City.

The WorldFish Center is an international, non-profit organization with a mission of reducing poverty and hunger through research-for-development initiatives to improve the small-scale fisheries and aquaculture sector.

BAR's initiatives are focused on eight priority programs, one of which is the Institutional Development Program. BAR envisions developing the core competence in fishery R&D system, through Human Resource Development Program (HRDP).

With this, BAR, through the leadership of Director Nicomedes P. Eleazar, has linked up with WorldFish Center for a capacity building program intended for BAR staff and Regional Fisheries Research and Development Centers (RFDRC) managers. This will cover retooling, trainings, and study tours to successful Worldfish projects in Penang and its regional sites.

Perez presented the WorldFish Center portfolio and its three key areas of competencies. On the natural resource management, Dir. Eleazar noted some of the post-disaster livelihood recovery and management programs in fisheries-dependent region as one of the recent major concerns of the Department. In this area, DA, together with The WorldFish Center, could develop management programs and projects before, during, and after disasters for the fisheries sector.

Meanwhile, Garces presented the proposal on "Strengthening Governance and Sustainability of Small-Scale Fisheries Management in the Philippines: An Ecosystem-based Fisheries Management Approach." This is to identify successful governance arrangement for small-scale fisheries using an ecosystem-based management approach, Garces said.

Dir. Eleazar committed to support the conduct of stakeholder consultations and provision of technical assistance of The WorldFish Center to the RDRFCs, and other key partners. This will also cover the supply chain analysis and management for fish and fish-based products.

Other areas of interest for possible collaborative work are on country adaptation of vulnerability assessment which includes setting-up of suitability maps and an information system development on invasive species.