Improving the efficiency of aquaculture extension activity in the southeastern provinces of Southern Vietnam.

Abstract

The Faculty of Fisheries of the University of Agriculture and Forestry (FoF-UAF) in collaboration with the Aqua Outreach programme of the Asian Institute of Technology has implemented since 1994 farmer-managed on-farm trials in two different agroecological (rainfed and irrigated) areas of four provinces (Tay Ninh, Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc and Long An) to develop fish culture in ponds of small-scale households in the southeast region of southern Vietnam. Baseline surveys carried out prior to the trials have pointed out problems of fish culture of farmers in the two selected areas, e.g. pond preparation, cultured fish selection, stocking density, and water quality management. After 3 years implementation of the on-farm trials, appropriate recommendations of low-cost fish culture for small-scale farmers in the two agroecological areas have been produced. The average fish yield of 56 project farms in three provinces (Tay Ninh, Binh Phuoc and Long An), has increased around 40, 25 and 70%, respectively. Since 1996 the project staff have collaborated with Agricultural Extension Centres (AECs) of the three provinces to train about 700 farmers on fish culture based on the proven recommendations. Moreover, three sets of leaflets on fish culture in ponds for different agroecological areas based on appropriate techniques have also been designed to support extension activities of the provincial AECs. To improve the efficiency of the AECs on aquacultural technique transfer, the FoF-UAF has organized several short training courses to upgrade knowledge and skills for AEC staff. In 1996, 64 extension staff of the three provinces were trained on integrated fish culture and extension methods and 41 extension workers have been trained on methods of fish culture on-farm trials and extension material production to date. The fish culture on-farm trials have been shown to be an efficient method to produce appropriate recommendations for small-scale farmers. However, some difficulties in implementation of the trials need to be overcome for further expansion.

Economic contribution of fish culture to farm income in Southeast Vietnam

“…Because of the adjacency of three study sites and the emphasis on the difference between farmers' involvement levels in UAF-AOP activities, which were also extension practices for aquaculture development in the area, differences between the provinces were neglected to avoid possible overlaps between this study and a previous work of Tu and Giang (2002) in the same area. The provinces thus serve as blocks in the statistical tests.…”

“…The yields of trial farmers were meaningfully higher than those in 1997. Their average yields in 2000 were 3.21, 5.06, and 8.62 ton/ha, respectively for Long An, Binh Phuoc, and Tay Ninh provinces while the ones in 1997 were 2.70, 3.50, and 3.66 ton/ ha (Tu and Giang 2002). The effectiveness of AOP-UAF support can also be seen in the CI for fish production among the investigated groups in which the trial group achieved the highest CI of 1.17 while the trained and spread-out groups had lower CIs of 0.97 and 1.03, respectively.…”

“…Phuong et al (2002) proposed a step-by-step approach and farmer-managed trials to assure the success of aquaculture extension programs in its target area. The success of the UAF-AOP in Southeast Vietnam was due to its application of such an approach during the implementation of the program, which consisted of a baseline survey to understand the advantages and constraints of an aquaculture development program in the target area and on-farm trials to test the appropriateness of the recommended technologies alongside upgrading the capacity of provincial extension agencies with farm visits, training courses, and study tours (Tu 1999;Tu and Giang 2002). Excluding two nonproject households who practised monoculture of hybrid Clarias catfish, the 118 remaining households practising polyculture achieved quite high yields in fish culture in 2000-2001.…”

“…There are some studies on the impact assessment of rural aquaculture programs that describe the efficiency of the dissemination processes of fish culture techniques in the Vietnam (e.g., Luu et al 2002;Edwards et al 2002;Phuong et al 2002;Tu and Giang 2002;Duc 2002). However, all of these are only descriptive documents and have no appropriate statistical analysis.…”

“…Development of aquaculture is now helping the country in many ways through contributing to the national budget with exported aquatic products as well as improving rural farmers' livelihoods. Consistent with the goal of improving livelihoods for the poorest groups in rural areas, one development project in South Vietnam, the University of Agriculture and Forestry-Aqua Outreach Program (UAF-AOP), was launched in 1994 (Tu and Giang 2002).…”