Economic Evaluations in Mariculture

Mariculture has the potential to augment production and incomes through coastal as well as open sea farming. The global aquaculture production increased by a about 25 times in the last 30 years against only seven times increase in capture fisheries production during the corresponding period (Gopakumar et al., 2007). India has vast areas of suitable coastal waters, lagoons and bays which can be utilized for mariculture. Seed production and culture of marine finfishes has been expanding in the recent past in many parts of the world, but in India, it is only an emerging sector. The potential cultivable candidate finfishes are groupers, cobia, rabbitfish, seabass, pompano, snappers and sea bream. Lack of availability of hatchery-produced seed on a commercial scale is the major bottleneck for large-scale marine finfish farming