CIFRI Awards
ICAR-Central Inland Fisheries Research Institute has organized an awareness cum demonstration program on ‘Application of Drone technology in Inland Open Water fisheries’ at 4 No Bheri and Sardar Bheri, Kolkata, West Bengal on the 16th and 17th of April 2024, respectively. The program was organised under the ICAR-ATARI drone project to create the awareness among the fish farmers about the potential applications of drone technology in automating various activities of fish farming aiming to precision fisheries. Drone (UAV-Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) based application has great potentials to monitor and manage some of the most pressing problems faced by agriculture. In Inland open water fisheries also, drone technology can be effectively used for precise and periodical monitoring of waterbody heath status, spraying of insecticides, disinfects, medicine and feed distributions over large water areas with less time, input material and human resources.
At 4 No Bheri, a total of 32 farmers including 14 women and 18 men participated in the programme, while at Sardar Bheri 48 farmers including 18 women and 30 men participated in the programme. The program was led by Dr. B.K. Das, Director, ICAR-CIFRI, Barrckpore. He addressed the gathering and enlightened the fishers on several areas such as sustainable fish farming, fish disease and health management, application of drone-based technology for evenly spraying of liquid medicine, disinfects and feed distribution to reduce time and manpower and management of exotic fish, especially crocodile fish in East Kolkata Wetlands. He also assured the farmers that CIFRI will provide the drone based technology and other facilities in near future for better management of the wetland fisheries. Later, Dr. S. Samanta, HoD, FRAI Division, ICAR-CIFRI addressed the gathering and motivated the farmers on ecosystem management of the wetland area and better management practices in the fish production system. 
Dr. Chayna Jana, Scientist interacted with fishers and highlighted the role of the different advanced technologies like drone based application in fisheries and ecosystem management. The technology could be effectively used to map different wetlands of the regions and apply medicine, disinfects, feed when necessary in a very short span of time. Dr. Vikash Kumar, Scientist sensitized the fishers about the sewage-fed fisheries and the outbreak of various diseases in fish. He also provided various management options to control diseases in fish. Mr. Kausik Mondal, Technical Assistant demnontrated the drone technology for spraying CIFAX, a fish medicine and broadcating feed material all over the wetlands. The program was coordinated by Mr. Asim Kumar Jana and the research scholar Meghnath Haldar.
