Malaysia is the world's major producer and exporter of ornamental fish, contributing 9% to the global trade and taking the second position after Singapore. Because of their artistic appeal and tremendous commercial value for international trade, ornamental fish recently gain rapid importance for foreign exchange and as a source of employment. While ornamental fish production is growing, there is an increase in infectious diseases, resulting in high fish mortality with significant economic loss. Bacterial disease is a serious problem for ornamental fish industry. Bacterial species surveillance in diseased freshwater ornamental fish from an aquarium shop reveals that Aeromonas hydrophila is the most dominant bacteria isolated. Consequently, Malaysia is stepping up its efforts by implementing the Economic Transformation Program and other biosecurity steps to address the aquaculture issues and encourage the regrowth of the ornamental fish market. Chemotherapeutic medications, phytobiotics, probiotics, yeast extracts, vaccines, and disinfectants can be used in controlling bacteria. Further studies should be done to find new antibacterial agents from natural sources to combat bacterial fish diseases and reduce fish mortality rate in sustainable aquaculture farms. This review summarizes the literature on ornamental fish industries and aquaculture production in relation to A. hydrophila-associated diseases and ornamental fish health management in Malaysia.

Crops are being damaged by several plant pests. Several strategies have been developed to restrict the damage of cultivated plants by using synthetic pesticides and repellants. However, the use to control these insects is highly discouraged because of their risks on humans. Therefore, several alternatives have been developed from plant extracts to protect crops from plant pests. Accordingly, this review focuses on outlining the insecticidal and repellant activities of Southeast Asia plants towards insect pests. Several extracts of plants from Southeast Asia were investigated to explore their insecticidal and repellant activities. Azadiracha indica (neem) and Piper species were highly considered for their insecticidal and repellant activities compared to other plants. This review also addressed the investigation on extracts of other plant species that were reported to exert insecticidal and repellant activities. Most of the conducted studies have been still in the primarily stage of investigation, lacking a focus on the insecticidal and repellant spectrum and the identification of the active constituents which are responsible for the insecticidal and repellant activity.

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One week of study was conducted to observe the potential of ginger crude extract in the treatment of tiger grouper (Epinephelus foscoguttatus) infected by a pathogenic bacterium in aquaculture, Aeromonas hydrophila. A total of 135 fish were injected intraperitoneally with 0.1ml of A. hydrophila (106 CFU ml−1) and stock in 15 aquaria (13L). Four concentrations of ginger extract (0.4g/L, 0.8g/L, 1.2g/L and 2.0g/L) were used as the treatment and the control is 0g/L. Water parameters such as dissolved oxygen, pH, temperature and salinity of the treatment tank were in the range of (4.05 – 4.20 ppm), (7.2 – 8.2), (25.6 – 28.8°C) and (22-25ppt) respectively. The extract’s potential as a treatment agent in the infected fish was recorded in terms of fish survival and physical condition such as the sign of bacterial infection and swimming behaviour. The results show infected tiger grouper treated with a concentration of ginger extract of 0.8g/L can improve the survival rate of fish by 89%. It can be concluded that crude ginger extract can enhance the survival rate and has the potential to be used as a chemotherapeutic agent in bacterial infection of tiger grouper fish.