REORIENTING APPROACH TO HARNESS THE ORNAMENTAL FISHERIES RESOURCES OF NORTHEAST INDIA

It is well known that Northeast India lies in one of the hot spots of freshwater fish biodiversity in the world. The potential of indigenous ornamental fish from this region has been talked about and discussed since last few decades. However, organised and regulated commercial development of indigenous fish species is yet to be seen. But it is a fact that many of these fish species are being exported to different parts of the world as ornamental fish for aquarium hobbyists. Most of these fishes are collected from wild natural resources in an unorganised fashion without realizing its sustainability. Effort made towards the domestication, large scale breeding for commercialization has been largely unsuccessful. This is mainly due to lack of basic information on biology, population and their natural habitat. Generation of information on hydrological parameters of breeding grounds and biological characteristics of candidate ornamental species will form the basis for their domestication process towards commercial utilization and conservation measures as well. Significant quantities (Table 1) of these fishes are exported mainly through Kolkata, without legitimate guidelines for collection and trade, prompting the need for green certification.

New approach will be to focus on few species for concerted research on domestication and breeding involving farmers. With due consideration, only few fishes like Loach (Lepidocephaitchys  berdmorei, Botia dario),Cyprinid (Pethia manipurensis), Gouramies (Trichogaster labiosua) may be considered for domestication and seed production to formulate package of practices for farmers, breeders and entrepreneurs who can earn their livelihood from this trade. The present paper examines the approach to harness these indigenous fisheries resources which have remained as dormant opportunity for long.