WorldFish Center
Encyclopedia
The WorldFish Center an organization dedicated to reducing poverty and hunger by improving fisheries and aquaculture
. It is an international, non-profit research organization that focuses on the opportunities provided by fisheries and aquaculture to reduce poverty, hunger and vulnerability in developing countries.
The WorldFish Center is one of the 15 members of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), a global partnership that unites the organizations engaged in research for sustainable development with the funders of this work. The funders include developing and industrialized country governments, foundations, international and regional organizations.
WorldFish is committed to meeting two key development challenges:
WorldFish employs 228 staff, including 36 Ph.D. scientists, based in 8 countries across Asia
, Africa
and the Pacific.
Working in partnership with private and public sectors and civil society, WorldFish develops pro-poor sustainable aquaculture that supports the Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs). All services and solutions developed by the Center are internaltional public goods that are made freely available to all.
WorldFish takes a comprehensive, multidisciplinary research approach that acknowledges the complex and multi-faceted problems that face fisheries and aquaculture. Failure to embrace this complexity has led to piecemeal efforts in the past and undue faith in single technology or development approaches. The Center prioritizes its research efforts to include those areas in which it will have the biggest impacts, and assumes the role of broker and catalyst of research among the full range of development partners needed to close the gap between research and development action.
Why Fish?
The world’s bottom billion are falling behind in the war on poverty and hunger. Traditional staple foods alone cannot feed the world while fisheries and aquaculture have tremendous potential to provide the poor with more food, better nutrition and increased incomes.
Fisheries are a source of high-protein food: they provide more than 1.5 billion people with almost 20 percent of their average per capita intake of animal protein, and 3 billion people with at least 15 percent of such protein. In some countries they provide up to 70% of animal protein -affordable, high-quality animal protein- that is particularly important for mothers-to-be and young children.
Catching, processing and trading fish provide a source of income and livelihood for millions of men and women, the overwhelming majority of whom are associated with small-scale fisheries. In fact, of the 70% of the world’s total fish catch that comes from developing countries, over a half of this comes from small-scale fisheries.
The Challenges
Small scale fisheries have failed to keep pace with demand for food and employment in developing countries and urgently require attention to technology, health, economics and reform in management and governance. Over 20% of the world’s 38 million full-time fishers are among the world’s poorest people, earning less than US$1 per day, but most wild-fish stocks are reaching the limits of their productive capacity even as many have stabilized or declined because of overfishing and other causes. While the capacity needed to maintain wild fisheries must be amplified in the face of these constraints and pressures, development of aquaculture is also necessary as it provides the only option for substantial increases in fish production.
Climate change poses additional challenges that will affect the productivity, distribution and seasonality of fisheries and the quality and availability of the habitats that support them while a further global threat comes from degradation of coral reefs. Seventy-five percent of coral reefs are currently under immediate and direct threat from local sources, which include overfishing, destructive fishing, coastal development, and pollution.
WorldFish Research
WorldFish expertise in Policy Economics and Social Sciences, Natural Resource Management and Aquaculture and Genetic Improvement work together to provide a wide range of research and analysis to meet complex challenges like these.
Impact and innovation
WorldFish, with its partners, has raised incomes for millions of poor people (and reduced suffering of HIV/AIDS-affected families) by integrating aquaculture with agriculture and has empowered poor communities to participate in the sustainable co-management of their fisheries. It has helped countries cope with disaster and conflict by restoring fisheries, provided nations with tools to improve the planning and management of major river basins and developed widely-consulted global databases and strengthened national capacities for fisheries management.
Three areas of work have generated particularly large impact:
Aquaculture
Aquaculture, also known as aquafarming, is the farming of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, molluscs and aquatic plants. Aquaculture involves cultivating freshwater and saltwater populations under controlled conditions, and can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is the...
. It is an international, non-profit research organization that focuses on the opportunities provided by fisheries and aquaculture to reduce poverty, hunger and vulnerability in developing countries.
The WorldFish Center is one of the 15 members of the Consortium of International Agricultural Research Centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), a global partnership that unites the organizations engaged in research for sustainable development with the funders of this work. The funders include developing and industrialized country governments, foundations, international and regional organizations.
WorldFish is committed to meeting two key development challenges:
- To improve the livelihoods of those who are especially poor and vulnerable in places where fisheries and aquaculture can make a difference.
- To achieve large scale, environmentally sustainable increases in supply and access to fish, at affordable prices, for poor consumers in developing countries.
WorldFish employs 228 staff, including 36 Ph.D. scientists, based in 8 countries across Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
, Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
and the Pacific.
Working in partnership with private and public sectors and civil society, WorldFish develops pro-poor sustainable aquaculture that supports the Millennium Development Goals
Millennium Development Goals
The Millennium Development Goals are eight international development goals that all 193 United Nations member states and at least 23 international organizations have agreed to achieve by the year 2015...
(MDGs). All services and solutions developed by the Center are internaltional public goods that are made freely available to all.
WorldFish takes a comprehensive, multidisciplinary research approach that acknowledges the complex and multi-faceted problems that face fisheries and aquaculture. Failure to embrace this complexity has led to piecemeal efforts in the past and undue faith in single technology or development approaches. The Center prioritizes its research efforts to include those areas in which it will have the biggest impacts, and assumes the role of broker and catalyst of research among the full range of development partners needed to close the gap between research and development action.
Why Fish?
The world’s bottom billion are falling behind in the war on poverty and hunger. Traditional staple foods alone cannot feed the world while fisheries and aquaculture have tremendous potential to provide the poor with more food, better nutrition and increased incomes.
Fisheries are a source of high-protein food: they provide more than 1.5 billion people with almost 20 percent of their average per capita intake of animal protein, and 3 billion people with at least 15 percent of such protein. In some countries they provide up to 70% of animal protein -affordable, high-quality animal protein- that is particularly important for mothers-to-be and young children.
Catching, processing and trading fish provide a source of income and livelihood for millions of men and women, the overwhelming majority of whom are associated with small-scale fisheries. In fact, of the 70% of the world’s total fish catch that comes from developing countries, over a half of this comes from small-scale fisheries.
The Challenges
Small scale fisheries have failed to keep pace with demand for food and employment in developing countries and urgently require attention to technology, health, economics and reform in management and governance. Over 20% of the world’s 38 million full-time fishers are among the world’s poorest people, earning less than US$1 per day, but most wild-fish stocks are reaching the limits of their productive capacity even as many have stabilized or declined because of overfishing and other causes. While the capacity needed to maintain wild fisheries must be amplified in the face of these constraints and pressures, development of aquaculture is also necessary as it provides the only option for substantial increases in fish production.
Climate change poses additional challenges that will affect the productivity, distribution and seasonality of fisheries and the quality and availability of the habitats that support them while a further global threat comes from degradation of coral reefs. Seventy-five percent of coral reefs are currently under immediate and direct threat from local sources, which include overfishing, destructive fishing, coastal development, and pollution.
WorldFish Research
WorldFish expertise in Policy Economics and Social Sciences, Natural Resource Management and Aquaculture and Genetic Improvement work together to provide a wide range of research and analysis to meet complex challenges like these.
- Policy Economics and Social Science division focuses on social and economic analysis of the aquaculture and fisheries sectors; connecting the fisheries and aquaculture sector to poverty reduction initiatives at local to global scales; policy and institutional analysis for the improved governance of aquatic resources; assessing the potential impacts of climate change on fisheries and adaptive measures that can be taken; and human health consequences of fisheries, reducing risks, and fisheries options that benefit health-impaired populations (HIV/AIDS and malaria). WorldFish also works with communities to manage their fisheries.
- The Natural Resources division produces integrated assessment and management technologies for small-scale fisheries, designs and manages global information systems on aquatic resources(FishBase , ReefBase), studies post-disaster livelihood recovery in fisheries-dependent regions, assesses impacts of built structures on aquatic resources in river basins and analyses external drivers such as climate change on livelihoods of fishery-dependent households.
- The Aquaculture and Genetic Improvement division is dedicated to developing methods for breeding improved fish strains for aquaculture; aquaculture technologies for the poor, including women and the landless; integrating aquaculture with terrestrial small-scale agriculture; developing strategies and options for aquaculture production and national action plans; connecting small-scale producers to markets and developing technologies that improve water productivity while protecting environmental flows.
Impact and innovation
WorldFish, with its partners, has raised incomes for millions of poor people (and reduced suffering of HIV/AIDS-affected families) by integrating aquaculture with agriculture and has empowered poor communities to participate in the sustainable co-management of their fisheries. It has helped countries cope with disaster and conflict by restoring fisheries, provided nations with tools to improve the planning and management of major river basins and developed widely-consulted global databases and strengthened national capacities for fisheries management.
Three areas of work have generated particularly large impact:
- The breeding of much higher-yielding tilapia fish varieties (GIFT), widely used in aquaculture across Asia, greatly raising productivity and incomes: $170 returned for each $100 invested per annum.
- Integrated aquaculture-agriculture in Malawi that has sharply increased incomes and reduced childhood malnutrition, and helping HIV/AIDS-affected families cope; $115 returned for each $100 invested per annum.
- Fisheries co-management in Bangladesh, which is increasing biodiversity, raising incomes by 100% and fish catches by 30%, particularly by empowering women. The Science Council commended co-management as an “eminently replicable model for contemporary rural development.”