World Aquaculture September 2018

WWW.WA S.ORG • WORLD AQUACULTURE • SEP TEMBER 2018 7 C H A P T E R R E P O R T S T he Asian Pacific Chapter has become more effective and developed with many exciting plans and engagements with the help of a strong team on the executive committee. We have held monthly meetings to gain more ideas and develop plans for the future. The current decrease in global shrimp prices triggers worry for shrimp producers and exporters in the Asian Pacific region. Respective governments of the countries are addressing this temporary setback and the APC is looking for opportunities to increase awareness of domestic consumption of shrimp in the Asian Pacific region. Every industry experiences growing pains but we must come together to create a unified voice for improving global per capita fish and shrimp consumption. We need to help the public understand the important role that responsible aquaculture will play in addressing food security and a host of other issues related to social and economic impacts in the Asian Pacific region and around the globe. The APC board has agreed to translate a few articles from each issue of World Aquaculture magazine into Chinese and the articles will be available in open access on the APC website. As the top producer globally, aquaculture scientists and other stakeholders in China will benefit from this project. With the help of WAS, we hope to make translations of magazine articles into other regional languages of the Asian Pacific region. The board is making strenuous efforts to foster student participation in the chapter and discussions are underway to announce the M.C. Nandeesha Award for young scientists as an earmark of youth’s contribution to aquaculture. The board is also working out ways to increase support for student participation in APC conferences. As part of this effort, this year we plan to increase the number of student awards and the monetary value of each award as represented by the institutional student community. We aim to make awards as competitive as possible and meaningful (~$1000) in assisting students to offset travel and other related costs associated with attending APC conferences. The Student Activities Committee is also brainstorming ideas on ways to increase connections at APC conferences among students, entrepreneurs, professors and industry. A number of initiatives have been rolled out over recent years and we have come a long way with the chapter. The APC also took a big leap step and signed a discount agreement for WAS members. This will increase WAS membership and improve the number of beneficiaries fromWAS. The Promotion and Membership Committee is working on ways to increase industry participation in the APC and become more engaged with regional aquaculture conferences and meetings. The APC’s contribution in organizing regional conferences will be confirmed next in Myanmar and Singapore. The APC had a booth at the recently concluded TARS 2018 Shrimp Aquaculture –Need for change held August 15-16 at Thailand. The APC sponsored a speaker for the 3rd International Symposium on Fisheries and Aquaculture Education held at Mumbai, India during May. In the same month, the APC was represented at the Offshore Mariculture Conference in Singapore. The APC was also represented at the 1st Annual Asia Pacific regional network meeting organized by GEF LME: LEARN and the IOC of UNESCO Sub-Commission for the Western Pacific (WESTPAC). The APC will be participating in upcoming event such as AquaSG’18 at Singapore and Asian Aquaculture ’18 in Bangkok in the coming months. As I write this column I am preparing for the WAS meeting in Montpellier, France. I am excited to represent APC at this international meeting and to visit France. We will see significant improvement in the coming months and many plans are yet to be discussed during the upcomingWAS pre-conference board meeting. Once approved, developmental plans will be posted on our webpage (www.was- apc.org) . Stay tuned to our website for updates of Asian Pacific Aquaculture (APA’19) in Chennai, India. The Steering Committee is working hard to bring out the next successful event from the APC. — S. Felix, President Asian Pacific Chapter WAS to Form an African Chapter F or many years, World Aquaculture Society (WAS) members fromAfrica have been working withWAS leadership to organize and form an African Chapter. In June 2017, WAS held its first meeting in Africa (Cape Town, South Africa) and participants from the continent enthusiastically supported development of a WAS African Chapter. A lot of planning and effort has been accomplished over the past year, including development of draft African Chapter Bylaws, submission of a formal petition by African members to the WAS Board of Directors requesting formation of an African Chapter, identification of volunteers to serve as InterimBoard Officers until a slate of candidates can be developed and voted on by the membership, and identification of resources to support hiring a Secretariat to help with finalization and operation of the proposed WAS African Chapter. The proposed African Chapter Secretariat will be hosted by the African Union - NEPAD Planning and Coordinating Agency (NEPADAgency). Mr. Blessing Mapfumo from Zimbabwe will serve as the point-of-contact at the African Chapter Secretariat. On 24 August 2018, the WAS Board of Directors approved the petition to form the African Chapter and a follow-up organizational meeting was held at AQUA 2018 in Montpellier on 27 August. On 5 September, ballots were e-mailed to all WAS members who reside in Africa to cast their vote on the approval of the formation of the Chapter. If the members vote to form the African Chapter, the WAS Board will then approve the decision to finalize the process of chapter formation. If you are a WAS member in Africa and have not previously received an email about the vote, please contact WAS Home Office (JudyA@was.org ) to receive your ballot via email.