Integrated Agriculture–Aquaculture Systems and Governance for Sustainable Aquaculture Development

A very good afternoon to our distinguished uh speaker, respected colleagues, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of uh food and agriculture organization of the United Nations, FAO, uh the Asan University Network for Agriculture and Food Security, AU EFS, uh the Asan University Network, AUN and University Malaysia, UPM. Uh it is my great pleasure to welcome all of you to uh to today's session uh of the FAO technical lecture series 2026. Uh we are honored to welcome all the participants uh from universities, research institutions, uh government agencies, industry and international organizations across ASEAN and beyond. Uh we sincerely thank you for taking the time uh to be with us today and look forward to be uh to a productive and engaging uh program. Uh before we begin, I would like to share a few housekeeping announcements uh that this will be next be recorded. Uh the recording will be made available after the session and the access link also uh will be shared in the zoom chat box. Um and we encourage you to send the for future reference and also throughout the lecture uh kindly keep your microphone muted to ensure the best audio quality for everyone and we encourage uh everyone to participate by submitting your uh questions through the zoom chat box. Uh and at the end of the presentation I will facilitate the question and answer session. Um should you experience any technical difficulties during the webinar so please uh contact the organized committee via the zoom chat. All right without further ado let us begin today with a lecture on the uh integrated agriculture agriculture systems and governance mechanism for sustainable agriculture development. Uh as for introduction uh aquaculture continues to be one of the fastest uh growing food uh production sectors globally and as demand for aquatic food uh increases there is a danger need to ensure that aquaculture uh development remains sustainable environmentally responsible and also economically viable. uh integrated agriculture aquaculture system offer uh innovative approaches uh that improve uh the resources efficiency while uh strenging the food security and also overall livelihoods. Um today expert today uh lecture will bring the FA expert on uh who will share experience in agriculture governance fishes management and also integrate the production system. All right. Uh it's now my great pleasure to introduce our uh distinguished speaker. Um unfortunately that two of them uh um are not available with us today but we have uh Mr. Aloay uh he is an aquaculture and integrated agriculture aquaculture specialist with the fisheries and aquaculture division of FAO. uh he supports the management of global aquaculture initiatives uh including the promotion of the AO guidelines for sustainable agriculture GSA and he has coordinated uh projects and contributed um to programs across Assia in Africa. uh promoting the development of integrated agriculture aquaculture uh also investigating the feasibility of black soldier fly as authentic fish uh feed ingredient and providing technical support for aquaculture enterprise development. I think he's been doing a lot of task here. Okay. So his work promotes technical uh support for aquaculture um roles in high diets and also agri food system transformation and resilience. So ladies and gentlemen, I now invite uh our discussion P Mr. Fi uh to commence the presentation. The floor is yours. >> Thank you so much for the presentation. Uh I will quickly share my screen. Just a moment. I hope you can see my screen. Oh great. So uh every uh lecture series and uh I'm very pleased to join you today and I and I warmly welcome all the students participating in this lecture series governance. I would like to for this discussion within FO's broader work. You know FO's fisheries and aquaculture division support countries to make aquatic food systems more productive, sustainable, inclusive and resilient. This connects directly to FO strategic framework and the fours the better production better nutrition a better environment and a better life leaving no one behind. uh transformation sits under beta production and guides FO's work on fisheries, agriculture and aquatic value chains. Uh this slide uh explains why blue transformation matters. The message is simple. Uh aquatic foods are no longer a side issue in food systems. They are central to nutrition, livelihoods, trade, uh environment and environmental management. Uh the first uh it has three main pillars. The first is the sustainable aquaculture intensification uh and expansion uh so that we can produce more aquatic foods without damaging the ecosystems. Uh this is followed by the fisheries management so fish stocks remain healthy and livelihoods are protected. And the third is on the upgraded uh value chains so that aquatic foods are safe, affordable, traceable and able to reach consumers with less food loss and waste. Um uh in this slide uh this slide help us to think about the destination itself. So transformation is not only about producing more fish. It is about making aquatic foods available, accessible, safe and nutritious for all. It is about supplying enough food for a growing population, strengthening food systems and improving rights and incomes for people who depend on fishes and agriculture. So when we talk about transformation, we mean practical change, better policies, better institutions, better investments, better data collection and uh better uh data uh diialysis and better outcomes for people and the environment. uh aquatic foods have grown significantly over time as uh properly introduced by our uh moderator and of course agriculture has become one of the fastest growing food production sectors but the growth story also comes with responsibility. I hope uh everybody will agree with me on this because uh the more we grow we need to also look at sustainability and of course as agriculture expands country needs to ask important questions where should production continue to happen and uh who benefits what environmental safeguards are needed and how do we ensure that expansion cont continue to contribute to food security and livelihoods and this is especially where Governor becomes very important and governance is what turns this sector growth into sustainable development. So uh having a me introduced us to the broad uh program priority area of fishes and uh of the fish fishes and agulture division I also want to now go uh in depth into our lecture series for today. Our lecture series is divided into two parts. the governance mechanism for sustainable culture development and the integrated agricultural culture system. So I will first go for the first uh first part of the lecture uh unfortunately my colleague uh Mr. Pier Mesi who's supposed to uh is currently is unable to join us today to give us this uh lecture on a project governance. So I'm stepping in for him to deliver this part of the lecture. So um before I delve into this I just want to quickly uh talk about uh governance itself. Uh you know when we talk about governance sometimes it could sound quite abstract in nature but in reality it is about everyday decisions what rules apply how investments are approved how farmers are supported how risk are managed and how results are revealed. And I expect that by this by the end of this lecture I hope you'll see governance not as just a paperwork but as a system that makes sustainable agriculture possible. Uh please kindly follow me through this uh this uh lecture on agriculture governance. And then um by the end of this I I expect that four things you should uh be you should understand from this lecture as as students. uh you'll be able to explain aquaculture governance in simple and practical terms and also be able to identify some of the main FO instruments and tools that support sustainable aquaculture. be able to distinguish between uh what policy, strategy, plans, laws and and institutional roles mean within the governance mechanism and of course understand why agriculture uh governance must always be adapted to country contexts. So um agriculture governance matters because the sector is growing rapidly um not just growing but growing in scale in value and importance because it contributes a lot to food production. It contributes to employment. It contributes to uh different development objectives of any country. In 2024, farmed aquatic animal production surpassed 100 million tons for the first time and currently agriculture provides more than half of aquatic animal production. I mean between capture fisheries and aquaculture and even of course larger share of aquatic animal food outputs for human consumption. This growth creates opportunities but also pressure. Without governance, growth can become fragmented. it could become poorly regulated and could also become environmentally risky. So with governance growth can be properly planned, will be properly financed, could be monitored and made beneficial for people economies and also to ensure environmental sustainability. So uh when we talk about culture governance, it's also about how decisions are made and how actors are held accountable for this for these decisions. With this we can ask five basic questions. Who decides and that is about mandates and coordination. Who decides the mandate and who coordinates agriculture governance? What is allowed? that is about rules, licensing, safeguards, environmental safeguards and what have you. And uh of course we can also ask the question where and how should agriculture develop to what scale and then this is about special planning. It could also be about production systems. There are different types of agriculture production systems. Which one and which area should this be um should this be situated and which area should this be fully promoted? And then there's a question about who benefits and in terms of food, in terms of jobs, terms of markets, in terms of livelihoods, in terms of other development objectives that the country may have and of course how can the performance be reviewed and be uh updated or be revised to make it more beneficial for the people. And then we talk about the indicators of progress the reporting and how to have cost correction to ensure that uh the sector grows sustainably. So having said this governance is not only just about the government involved in this alone. It also involves public authority. It involves producers. It involves investors, communities, researchers, development partners and even it involves virtually everybody. through the participatory approach system. So um this particular slide breaks governance down into some main domains. We need to start with looking at the policy direction which gives the sector a vision. Laws and regulations provide the rules. Institutions clarify who does what. Evidence helps countries make informed decisions in investment turns priorities into bankable opportunities and investment product uh investment opportunities including public private partnerships and partnerships as I mentioned brings producers, communities, scientists, researchers, students of course even that are more involved in research even and also private sectors into the process in a participatory approach systems and accountability is quiteant important to ensure that results are tracked and cause correction are applied where applicable. Um I'll close this part by saying that uh a weak governance system usually fails because one of these dimensions is missing. So uh a strong system needs to need to connect all these different dimensions to ensure that uh the process is well coordinated and the expected outputs are achieved. So uh I want to drill a little bit on this uh on this slide and I also want us to look at it properly. So uh within the FO uh approach it connects different global guidance with country level actions uh at the global level F supports principles standards and intergovernmental dialogue and um in fact I would uh yeah I want to introduce u the recently released FA guidance for sustainable aquaculture which translates sustainable agriculture principles into clear guidance for policies, institutions, innovations, investments and uh implementation at country level. At the end of this lecture, I will uh give us uh um a back code so that we can uh look properly into the guidelines for sustainable aquaculture uh document itself. So uh having said this uh at the global level yes FA supports principles standards and intergovernmental dialogue and at the technical level FO develops guidance and tools to help countries apply these principles and at the country level support must be adapted to national priorities. This is quite important and the final step is to review and learn. Uh so uh this is not the governance is not just a onetime document. It is a cycle of planning, implementation, monitoring, adjustment and of course also uh improving the whole system itself. So uh the global guidance itself they sets the common principles and standards. Um I've mentioned earlier uh where we have the CCRF article 9 which is um what the code of conduct for responsible fisheries article 9 which focuses on agriculture components. It provides the core FAO reference for responsible aquaculture development itself and um I've mentioned the blue transformation in my introduction and the Kofi and the Kofis committee on aquaculture. These are the intergovernment uh mandates that help to shape aquaculture developments. So um I will speak more about the country implementation plan uh in subsequent slides. So uh a national governance system actually needs three connected levels. The policy, the strategy and a plan. So policy defines the vision and guiding principles. Why strategy explains the road map which includes the targets, the sequencing, the responsibilities and the financing approach. Uh so this plans turns the strategy into activities into budgets where necessary to uh implement activities of course another the timelines for implementing these activities who is responsible and the monitoring uh arrangements. So the key message is this uh a policy without a plan is actually often difficult to implement. So a plan and of course this links to that a plan without policy direction is also often very difficult to justify. So uh these three components are quite important to ensure that sustainable uh culture governance is developed. So the key message is this that a policy um a plan that good governance actually requires all these three to work together. uh this slide I just want to use this slide to reinforce um the previous slide that uh governance is a system and not just a single document that even if a country have a good policy but if institutions are weak implement implementation may actually suffer and of course a country may have good laws but if procedures are unclear inventors and farmers may actually struggle And a country may have strong production targets but without evidence and monitoring systems it may not know whether this growth is sustainable. So when we access governance we look at the full system the policy the law institutions the data investments participation and accountability. So uh when looking at building the uh national governance systems uh this it's quite important to map the national issues and opportunities that could come with agriculture development and then following uh of course looking at other country examples um uh through maybe s uh and um triangular exchange. Let's look at our own country and Can you still hear me? Please signify if you can hear me. Okay, wonderful. So, and um yes, so uh after studying what works in other country, it could be adapted to the local context of the new of the of a new country. And of course we also look at comparing institution resources and policy instruments within the country and then followed by what lessons could be adapted what what lessons could be transferred and uh then as I mentioned earlier we adapt the process and then we use this to develop the governance culture governance of uh this country. uh here I want to quickly introduce us to some of the FAO tools and resources that are used for uh aquaculture uh sustainable agriculture uh governance development. Of course have several tools that support decision making. Uh NASO provides the national agriculture sector overviews and NALO helps countries understand the legal and administrative frameworks. Fish stats provides comparable fishes and aquaculture statistics. I guess some of the students who are very much interested in aquaculture might have used uh the fish stats uh before. So you might be quite familiar with feats and wi is also uh a very uh important agricultural statistics tool which helps assess agriculture performance and alert uh it supports Lego gap analysis and regulatory reform. UTIDA is used to help assess investment viability, agriculture, investment v viability and profitability which is quite used in supporting countries in developing investment opportunities and uh public private partnership opportunities as well. So the important point here is that uh these tools uh they support specific decision. Some are used for diagnosis, some are used for legal reform, uh some are used for investment preparation and sector review or monitoring. So of course we're going to share these uh powerpoints with you later and you can take your time to go through this website to get familiarized with uh what they entail and of course some are adapted to different countries. You can look at what it is there for your respective countries as well. Uh this slide shows how governance moves from theory to practice. Uh a country may begin by clarifying why agriculture is a public priority. Public priority in terms of development objectives. Is it for food and nutrition security? Is it for job creation? Is it for um youth engagement? Is it for uh different development opportunities? Uh development priorities and then this could be adapted to ensure that aquaculture contributes to this development objective. Then after having this uh public priority then it start to diagnose the sector using evidence using the tools that I mentioned earlier and then it reviews whether the current policy and law are well aligned and if not they uh they could do policy review policy analysis policy diagnosis and identify the key entry points or the gaps to be filled. And of course this also clarifies which institutions uh decide deliver finance and make the reporting. So this is quite important to have key institutional roles and who does what so that there will not be overlapping of mandates between institutions. So and then um this process uh prepares investment proposals that will be feasible to actually promote investment in the sector. And finally uh there's need to also monitor the results and adapt where needed. So this is a practical value of governance to actually turn agriculture growth into investable development. Um I'm bring to a close with this slide but uh with this slide I just want to quickly show uh what often actually goes wrong. You know uh sometimes a policy may be drafted without thorough implementation plan. implementation plan might be not be well uh developed. Maybe because uh at the initial stage the participatory approach was not uh um all stakeholders were not fully engaged and then there might be little gaps. So this could uh impact on um the governance. Sometimes uh institutions may have overlapping or unclear mandates. So it's important to have a clear mandate for each institution and then sometimes another country's model are copied without adapting them appropriately to local or national context. So it's sometimes even also uh in terms of legal reform they might just stop at drafting without having proper procedures budget or staff to implement or to follow through. and uh sometimes investment are promoted before even projects are properly prepared. So uh the response to all these gaps is quence to ensure that uh policy strategy institutions investments and monitoring are well connected from the beginning. It's quite important to plan the process properly from the beginning to ensure that uh the expected results are achieved. Uh let me close with these four takeaways that effective governance requires current policies, clean mandates and institutions with capacity and resources and uh secondly evidence and data are essential for better decisions. Monitoring and adaptive management are necessary to balance growth, environmental sustainability and social inclusion. And lastly, uh, your research as students can actually further amplify what often work and what needs to be improved. As students and future researchers, I would like to encourage you to think not only about how agriculture can grow, but how it can grow responsibly, inclusively, and sustainably. Uh with this I will leave it for uh questions and discussions and uh may I propose to the moderator maybe uh after going through the second lecture we can do the question and answer together. Uh I return it back to you. Thank you. >> All right. Uh so Mr. Fe has just finished with the first session. So you do you have any questions to ask for Mr. FY he will be presenting another topic after this. Before we proceed, do you have any questions rel related to the presentation just now? Anyone? Okay. May type in the uh chat box. Um maybe maybe before they maybe they are finding words to to to write a question maybe I can ask um is there any established country that already uh successfully implemented this uh uh integrated agree and agriculture system I mean the governance do you have any example of the established one? Of course uh there are many countries that are supposed are supported in uh the aquatic governance uh quite a number of them in uh in Africa also in Asia. It's um it's a process of course you know as the as things continue to grow development objectives uh are also expanding sometimes they need to revise to promote further. So uh virtually all countries have a form of apopulture governance and some are also learning from uh other countries through sat and triangular cooperation. So uh these are ex just just so numerous governance and mechanisms across different countries. In fact it's good that you asked the question. So maybe I'm going to post a challenge to the students to also go online check the culture governance of the countries and get themselves familiarized with uh what it is about about their country. They can check the narrow uh uh for their countries on the FO websites. These are quite uh good information of course also the agriculture development strategies of different countries. They're also on the FA website. So you can um also read the overview to get familiarized with uh the aulture development strategy of uh your country. >> There is a question on the Q&A. Um Miss Miss Noah >> um oh wait okay sorry okay and then I'm sorry I'm sorry to cut and if someone of attendees or panelist would like to speak I can also uh allow you to to speak if you prefer. You can raise your hands right so okay let me read the the the question from the Q&A chat box for anonymous attendee uh the approaches presented sounds like a market system development MSD approach. So how uh what I would like to know is if FAO also use MSD approach throughout its investment for sustainability purposes and more private sector sector engagement. Yeah. >> Uh, of course. Uh, when we talk about this, uh, the approach that we use, uh, there's uh, can you still hear me please? I think I'm seeing internet. Uh, can you hear me? >> Yes. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Perfect. >> So, uh, when we talk about the approach, there's no one sizefits all. Um it depends on the context of each country. It depends on um the objectives of the country, the policies, the direction, the visions. Uh it depends on different factors. Uh the most important thing is to adapt to what the country needs, the development objectives of the country, the vision and what the country wants to achieve. So uh whichever approach that is used, it's just all about making sure that the intended objectives are achieved. So um different approaches could be used, different examples from different countries could be used through lessons learned and that is why it's important to have this joint vision in the beginning to ensure that uh the participatory approach to the development uh by involving every stakeholder from the government solutions to producers to cooperatives. so that everybody comes together to develop this process together. So uh this is how it works. So there's no definite uh let's say methodology but uh it has to be adapted to local context. Over to you. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> All right. uh another question if no maybe uh you can also still write uh your question in the chat box however maybe we can proceed to the next presentation s is that okay >> okay very much thank you very much yes so uh having discussed agriculture governance uh we now move from the enable environment to one practical production approach that good governance can actually support uh the integrated agriculture aquaculture systems. Uh in the previous lecture we saw that policies, institutions, regulations, investment and accountability determine if agriculture development is sustainable and inclusive. So this particular lecture will show what that development can look like at farm level. uh integrated agriculture culture actually connects food production with crops, livestock and other farm activities and of course it fully supports the FO4 betters that I mentioned earlier uh in terms of better production, better nutrition, a better environment and a better life that leaves no one behind. So in this lecture uh we will examine I will start calling integrated agriculture culture IA for to make it easier so you can easily follow me. I don't have to say the full words. So, uh this lecture will examine IAA from both a technical and a development perspective and by the end of this lecture I expect that uh all of us will be able to explain what I actually mean and why it matters for agri systems. We look more closely at right few systems at some point as an example as an important example of IIA system and uh you should also be able to assess the benefits constraints and steps required to move from small trials to wider adoption and uh finally I encourage you to identify opportunities I mean why I give this lecture I encourage you to identify opportunities for research innovation and possibly youthled enterprise that could come out of IAS systems and as students uh I believe that your contribution is not just not simply to describe these systems but to also generate evidence and solutions that can make them more practical and scalable now and of course also in the future. I would like to start a slide uh that uh the starting point is that the pressure facing global systems one major uh pressure is food and nutrition and nutrition challenges which remains quite significant. If you look at the uh map by the right side, we could see that nearly one out of 10 of the total global population are undernourished and uh in 2024 children under the age of five, 22 23% of them are reported to be stunted. So this is a this is a very big challenge and at the same time the land water and other productive resources are increasingly constrained. Climate variability is also making farming and aquatic food production more uncertain. This means that uh simply expanding conventional production may not be sufficient or sustainable. The challenge before us is therefore clear. How can we produce more food and more diverse food from the same resource base while also protecting the environment and strengthening farmers resilience. So uh IA provides one practical response to this question by linking different farming activities rather than managing them uh separately. Uh IAA deliberately connects crops, aquatic animals and in some cases livestock. The main principle is that land, water, nutrients, labor and farm byproducts can support more than one productive activity. in a in a land and water footprint that was initially designated for one crop production that is now used for more than one crop production. Uh most often two crop production or sometimes three. For example, uh water from a fish pond may support vegetable production. Crop residue may contribute to pond productivity. Nutrients from apatic production may be reused within the farming system. Uh so this reflects uh the typical circular principles of recycling, reusing, repurposing, regenerating resources. However, uh integration should not be understood as simply placing different activities together. The different components must actually interact in a way that produces practical practical benefits and must adapted to local agricology uh resources and cultural practices. The cultural practices has to be respected and uh this should align with the basic principles of uh what the farmers actually need and what the development objectives is expected to to be achieved. Uh I respond responds to the several pressures that I mentioned earlier at this same time it can produce more food from the same agricultural area. It can also be used to diversify farmers livelihood by generate by generating more than one product and income sources. So farmers who initially are just for example doing rice production they can now do rice and fish and vegetable thereby earning more income. uh past uh projects, past activities that we've done uh indicated that farmers can actually increase their income or profitability by to 25% even up to 450% depending on the scale of integr. So this is quite a valuable opportunity for farmers to diversify their income sources. Um, of course in the face of climate change, uh, where and where there is so many market shocks, of course, even looking at the postcoid situation, um, this kind of a system build resilience into the farming system quite a lot. And of course, it can also be used to improve also diets by combining crops and fish uh uh within the uh the system. For example, um it could be used as a fridge or for instance in situations whereby uh in rural communities where there's uh let's say uh it's difficult for them to have electricity this field the IIA feed could be used to store fish and farmers could go there at intervals to pick fish to consume in the household or sometimes to sell and use this to contribute to uh household food budgets. So uh integration definitely can also improve the efficiency with which water land nutrients and biodiversity are used. So the central message here is that IA is not simply about adding fish to ag uh aquaculture to agriculture. It is about redesigning the farm so that it different components work together more efficiently and then so that they could develop a broader food systems benefits. Um I here I want to I want to just briefly talk about different models of IIA systems. They come in different models. Could be the typical rice fish that I've mentioned earlier could be rice fish vegetable system. Sometimes duck is introduced to the system. Sometimes the fish ponds simply connected to vegetable production or culture as we mentioned. And if you look at this map, I'm not sure if you can see uh the different dots of different countries. These are uh recent places where we've done some IA work globally. Uh of course this is not exhaustive. There are more countries but these are just indicative. So uh the work is growing and um of course uh we are open to I'm open to discussing uh with different students uh their interest in different countries if they want to learn more on what we've done in this separate different countries. Uh here I just want to quickly introduce us to focus on one example of IA system the rest systems which is the most common. So uh this I I don't want to I just want us to read the definition. So that uh it's more like rice fish is a production system in which rice fields are deliberately managed to support rice together with aquatic animals. Uh these animals may occur naturally in the field or may be intentionally stocked. This may include fin fish, shrimp, crabs and other aquatic animals. uh rice and aquatic animals may produce concurrently meaning at the same time or in rotation. After rice harvest then fish is subsequently uh doing this in rotation and then this depends on the farming calendar what availability and local conditions and most importantly the farmers preference themselves. Uh here I just want to show us different types of field design how uh rice feeds are modified or adapted for fish to include fish production. And this is one of the most important technical requirements in uh rice fish systems because rice can tolerate relatively shallow water but fish require sufficient water depth. So uh protection and control movement. So the feed therefore often needs to be modified. refuge and trenches provides deeper area where fish can survive when water level falls and then we have to have raised uh straightened bones. Um these are the trenches. I don't know if uh you can see my uh these are the trenches and then uh the bones are at the extreme end of the uh of the of the field. This uh has different benefits. It could also help to control uh fish escape from the field because they raised and also it helps to control uh flash floods in case of water overflow. These B because the BS are raised they have to break the flow of water. So is this is about building resilence and risk management into the system itself. Of course, you also have the inlet and outlet water uh water parts where uh water can go into the system and where water can be released out of the system uh to balance because during the production system uh the the rice uh requires different water level during the production system from transplanting to where it starts to grow and of course uh the fish also needs water. So there's always a deeper part of the field where uh serve as refuge where fish could stay maybe during the very hot sunny day. So uh this modification is quite important and of course we also encourage to provide screens by the water inlet outlets to prevent predators from entering into the field and also prevent the loss of our stocked fish. So this design of course is often manageable and uh when they done at the initial stage they could serve the farmers for 10 to 15 years. So it's um it's uh the recurring cost is not there. So the moment farmers are able to manage uh adapt their rice field uh in the beginning this will save them for subsequent years. uh rice field systems create value through the biological and ecological interactions. Uh because I know some of us may have experienced this before. So I just want to go through it a little bit that have in the integrated rice fish systems. Fish feeds on insects, lava, weeds and naturally occurring organisms in the rice field thereby reducing the need for pesticide and this a form of biological control in the system. The fish movement also can help circulate nutrients and may also contribute to soil disturbance and irerration thereby reducing the need for chemical fertilizer. Fish waste of course also returns nutrients into the system. So uh of course also reducing the need for chemical fertilizer. So rice plants provide shade and absorb nutrients from the water. So this symbiotic reaction between rice and fish is quite important because they serve each other and then uh with this they have to reduce um the cost of input needed and then of course chemical fertilizer could be eliminated or reduced pesticide could be reduced. So this comes with a lot of uh in the in terms of uh production economic continum it's quite it's profitable in terms of environmental um consideration it's also of great advantage and in terms of ecological interaction it promotes um a lot of ecosystem services within the system. So the farmer is therefore not assessing just rice yield alone. The relevant measure is the combined value of rice and fish that they get from a field that is initially designated for rice production alone. Now they have fish and rice and they can also gather other aquatic animals from this rice field. Sometimes as reported by farmers they could get uh crabs, they could get uh other aquatic foods from this uh from this field because it tends to improve aquatic biodiversity in rice field areas and um we talk about uh the common benefits is also about the inputs that are saved and also food consumption that are generated. So in terms of this system the perspective is essential when evaluating an integrated raffy system that becomes successful. Uh I will still come later to the aspect of research that might be of interest to to us all as students. So um when we talk about developing life systems and integrated systems I want to introduce us to um a promotional trial process that uh we've used before to promote this system. Uh definitely we everybody here will agree with me that a promising technology cannot just move automatically from research to widespread adoption. The process actually would normally begin with understanding the local situation and engaging farmers, public institutions, researchers, extension workers and market actors on how best to proceed, what gaps are there and uh what development objectives are to be achieved. Following this, the system uh is then tested through participatory or promotion trials. These trials should help determine whether the technology is technically feasible, economically viable and socially acceptable. And during implementation, regular follow-ups is important. Farmers should be encouraged to document their adaptations, their lessons and innovations. And successful farmers even may later become mentors or farmer trainers. And then the scaling can then build on evidence can build on uh communication can build on stakeholder ownership as well. Uh in most of our approach farmers are not simply seen as recipients of technology. They're partners in testing in adapting and improving this process. So we are co-developers and then uh everything is often uh uh being developed and directed by the farmers. So um as I mentioned earlier it's important that uh there's need to build the political and stakeholder momentum which is I talk about awareness raising where the situation analysis to understand what uh the current uh production system in the country where the gaps are and where integrated system could help improve the process and uh this of course would involve different stakeholder dialogue and also having an action plan to follow and then this is followed by the promotion trials to test these interventions and to gather the lessons to gather the knowledge where uh they are required and this will also involve mapping existing resources and how to actually resources are available to ensure that this system is properly promoted and could deliver on all the possible objectives uh all all the possible outcomes it could deliver on and then through this process And this is where trainers and mentors are uh develop their human skills and the needed skills. Here we also always want to involve extension services, universities and other collaborators to be engaged in the process of mentoring and training of uh of farmers and of course establish training um components within their institution. maybe also have a demonstration uh process, demonstration uh plot within the university to train farmers and also train students alike. And then uh the last component is about translating this vision into practical change and by extending collaboration and having process of scaling up the entire system. And of course also important to communicate what has been achieved to farmers so that farmers would understand uh uh the benefits farmers to fully understand the ecological uh components and the environmental benefit that it comes with it. For example, we've uh done some work in certain countries where in remote areas some rice farmers they mentioned that it is an eye openener to them that they could actually combine aquaculture with rice production. So they're missing on this kind of great opportunity because um through different trials realized that when fish is combined with rice production the rice production the expected rice yield for farmers doesn't reduce. In fact, in many instances, it actually increases by sometimes by 2%, sometimes up to 5%. So, farmers most time they have nothing to lose uh but a lot to gain. It gives them triple yield benefits of increased yield, increased profitability and of course increased level of nutrition. So um with this this process is always uh adapted to different countries to different context and to different needs of uh different uh communities as well. So uh before I close I just want to say that uh IA presents many opportunities for students in terms of research. Of course, we will need uh stronger evidence biodiversity and conservation in rice fields and uh of course also look at household nutrition, how this is managed, how households manage uh the contribution of integrated agricultural culture to their nutrition and livelihood outcomes. Uh there also important data gaps in soio economic studies uh that is beyond research on G and profitability. uh studies should also compare labor requirements, water use and environmental impacts in and ecosystem services provided by the integrated systems in comparison to the monocropping system. And then uh there's need for continuous and further technical innovations which are needed in areas such as field design. How can we of course to design the field to ensure that the productivity is further improved in terms of stocking densities uh and we also do um different types of poly culture that could be done within the uh integrated life systems. Of course there's a lot on uh catfish lapia uh crabs meeting crabs uh different uh systems but of course can also also want to look at stocking densities in terms of poly culture systems as well. Well, this what I talk about species combinations and of course to look at the local available fees. Let's look at the north systems. We talk about blasia fly lava. It's um generating u um it's generating interest. How can we use alternative feed ingredients in integrated systems and to what extent does this contribute to fish growth and productivity compared to commercial feed production? So there's a lot of gaps that uh research could help us uh to fill. uh research also helped examine the enabling environments which policies incentives extension approaches and institution arrangements can support adoption in new areas and uh I'll close by saying that a strong research proposal should be able to connect specific research question to real problem faced by farmers or institutions or consumers or other value chains. Of course I also want to mention that of course research could also include uh looking at the consumer willingness to pay for integrated agriculture culture products. Uh this also a form of social economic research. So uh there are just a lot of gap where our research interest could be applied in the system. Um I'll conclude with these four main points that IA can produce more and more diverse food from the same resource base while supporting income diversification and it is more than a production technique. It can contribute to nutrition uh resilence and resource efficiency and uh integration must be adapted to local conditions. A model that succeeds in one location should not be transferred elsewhere without testing and adjustment in order to even improve the system in new location itself. And scaling requires more than just technical success. It requires evidence and to ensure that all stakeholders are involved and extension services give proper and adequate uh advice to the farmers and that the stakeholder ownership is promoted and governor systems discussed in the previous lecture is uh is uh uh taken into consideration when creating uh this new system for stakeholder ownership and this is where governance and technology actually meets. that good governance can create the condition for effective innovation to move from trials to sustainable development. So uh uh on that note uh maybe I just close with a few additional words that uh when reviewing integrated uh agriculture systems uh we should try to look beyond the production figures. The production figures are always quite attractive. It's always profitable. is uh in terms of the production economic uh figures. We need to also even examine who participates, who benefits, what resources are used, what risk are created and whether this system can real can realistically be maintained by the farmers. So uh good research should help decision makers and farmers understand not only if an intervention works but where it works and for and at what cost. So these are good research questions that we can think about and uh these are the type of questions that can turn academic research into practical contribution for agos system transformation. I'm happy to discuss this topic further with you anytime. Uh please feel free to write me an email in case you like to discuss uh further anytime. So uh thank you very much for your attention through both lectures. They're quite long. Thank you for your attention and I welcome your questions, observations and comments. Thank you and over to you. >> All right. Uh thank you Mr. Fam for the uh informative sharing on this a very I think this IAA is a very good approach uh to yeah for food safety and also food security in the long term. All right. Uh so if you have any questions uh just type in the box or you can raise your hands that we can we allow you to uh ask yourself. Okay. The questions Mr. IC. However, from the chat box, I I read one question from Savad Miranda. Uh, do you find any research proposal from faculty researchers in the field? Uh, free instructional materials for students taking degree. Would you like to answer that? >> Mr. Could you pick the question? >> Oh, sorry. There's a lightning. There's lightning here. It's going to rain soon. All right. Uh do you find any research proposal from faculty researchers in the field of fisheries and do you offer free instructional materials for students taking a fisheries degree? >> Okay, thank you for the question. Um there are so many free instructional materials that we have uh on the FA website. Um I would encourage you to uh check some of our work on uh farmer feed schools for rice fish development and uh we have some workshop uh report as well that quite uh uh interesting that that colleates different experience from different countries. There was one onological approach to IIA systems. There are other ones on um on uh instructional manual for rash development and there are some on uh strategy development. I kindly encourage you that you can have a look on our website and you can find uh different uh instructional materials and uh guidance uh notes on uh integrated life systems. Sorry, just to complement with this, I put on the chat a list of FAO courses that are certified by us on the FAO e-learning academy and there are many on aquaculture. So if you can go join this courses, take the courses, pass exams, you will get a certificate. Um before moving, can we give the floor to the participant that would like to speak? So start. >> Yeah. I think one is raising their hands here. Yes. Um if you allow me to speak. Uh so I'm following from China. >> Um yes >> I think is his >> then can you hear me? >> Okay. Okay. Yes please. Okay. Thanks. Uh thank you for the opportunity. I'm a young bent following from Shanghai Ocean University in China and I have a very quick question to the family regarding uh the promotion of rice fish farming in different countries as has been shown in the map. So I'm just curious like uh what are some of the response uh what are some of the responses to the adoption of rice fish farming technologies in various uh regions that you've been trying to promote this type of farming systems and uh what are the factors that limit its adoption in these regions if there are any? Thank you so much Raenta. This is a very important question actually uh especially the second part of the question. What makes adoption and scaling difficult? Um I think this is quite linked to the first part of the lecture agriculture governance. Um of course there's been so many trials across different countries promotional trials and uh uh over time we've seen that most of this development are are limited to promotional trials or limited to research institutes and large scale adoption has been elusive in certain countries. Um of course we look at the positive example of China of and not just China alone and most uh Asian countries rat fish has taken off quite a lot because the aquatulture governance supports it clearly and there's uh institutional support uh that promotes integrated life systems but uh in other count in for example in the global south it's we are seeing uh more interests from governments. We're seeing more u more interest in developing the system uh by the government and more social support as well. So uh the face is growing little by little and of course we are not yet there but we are moving towards uh having uh a large scale production as well in uh in uh in other countries as well. So when we talk about the limitations is often uh uh that governor supports where integrated system is also incorporated into policies into strategies into investment plans uh which are quite uh foundational or fundamental in promoting a system like this. So um for example uh we uh we are supporting some work in eastern African countries and uh the interest in terms of governance in terms of policies has been quite interesting has been quite uh encouraging. In fact there's a lot of open uh open channels to incorporate integrated system into the policy and strategies. So I'm I'm positive that in the next couple of years we're going to see a very positive trend a very positive trajectory in integrated uh right systems promotion in uh the global south as well. So it's a process that is moving. Um in the first part of your question I think you uh you you asked about uh the limitations. One other thing is of course the uh the knowledge gap uh in certain context the knowledge gap is a bit wide. I mean know gap in terms of farmers knowing uh how to modify their systems, how to uh how to properly incor uh the the um the cultural practices of integr integrated system there seems to be a knowledge gap for some farmers like I mentioned during my lecture that some farmers see it as an eye openener that they could actually incorporate fish farming into rice production they don't know so there's a need to also increase the communication increase the level of awareness and to work together with extension services to promote this system uh within different countries and for example this even An example of of it is why we are here. We're talking about integrated system is also a form of promotion and of course we continue to work on promotion. We continue to work on creating awareness and of course working on incorporating the system into agriculture governance to ensure that it is being promoted uh in a sustainable manner. Thank you. All right. Uh okay. Uh so any other question from the participants you want to um okay I saw here uh all right maybe I can uh read out the question from the chat box from Kenneth Chibukam. Okay thank you for your lecture. Would you please highlight the challenges of integrated system? For example, in fish come rice farming. It favors rice rice production more than the fish because fish growth is usually impact in the integrated system mostly by altering the water parameters. Yeah, that's a big >> Okay. Uh thank you so much for this question. Uh of course this question relates to the cultural practices that I mentioned earlier. Um when it comes to integrated systems of course uh there when it comes to practical guidance on how to go about it there are different um uh systems across different countries of course it has to be a tailor to local context. So um when it comes to fish growth uh in the integ in the integrated system you know water is quite important you cannot do without water. Fish needs uh water to survive and of course rice needs water to survive. That's why I talk about the field modification and to ensure that uh uh water is available in the trench in the trenches even when the water level goes down fish could be guided into the trenches where there's available water and of course in the dry season for instance uh in the dry season of course due to variability in climate change maybe there's dry spell and there's lack of water there should be alternative water sources maybe tube wells to be made or farm are situated close to lakes or alternative water or irrigation systems and uh for instance in certain instances where the the soil is uh could not hold water maybe there's a leeching of water into the soil they have this adaptation where plastic could be placed uh within the trenches to hold water so we have uh some manuals you can u maybe check our website we have some manuals and u that has been developed uh in the course of time to look at these different mitigation methods where in terms of water management and of course we have some manuals coming up very soon of course for rice fish development in uh eastern Africa uh in the next two or 3 months we should be able to publish this manual we encourage you to look out for this this also this man actually answers your question clearly in terms of uh different water levels in uh the rice field during the cultural practice ices and rice fish development process as I mentioned earlier in my lecture of course when we transplant and the different growth stages of the rice uh the water levels would always have to change but the most important part is for water having enough water for the fish and then the fish could always uh be guided towards uh the trenches where there's enough water. So um to further answer your question in terms of fish growth uh you know the the importance of feeding and having a proper feeding regime for the fish as well. Of course, uh we have the primary production inside the water uh that fish could feed on naturally occurred uh foods in the in the rice field and of course there could also be supplemental feeding to ensure that the fish have enough growth and then the farmers could also determine the length of the production cycle if they want to harvest the fish during the time of rest harvest and if they want to add value to the fish maybe whether by fish smoking or other forms of process. processing or even after rice harvest they want to continue to grow the fish. So there are different ways to ensure that fish growth is sustained and uh that the table size that the farmer needs are achieved. So it's all about farmer preference. So I will encourage you to look forward to um uh to uh uh look into our upcoming manual in the next two three months. uh you're going to you're going to have more information about your specific questions and mitigation measures to different challenges and different cultural practices in integrated refuge development. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you Mr. Fi. So do we have any other question from the floor? >> Yes. >> All right. Please. >> Uh one more question. We find that aquaculture is very lucrative in terms of value of aquatic species comparable to the rice as a product. So and this creates a very big danger to all rice farmers shifting from rice production to aquaculture production which would not be a very good situation for some countries where rice is a very crucial part of food security and economic development. So uh to avoid such incidents, what are the FA doing to ensure that rice farmers do not shift fully to a production? Thank you. >> Uh thanks so much Ben for your question. Um this actually leads to uh um the first part of the lecture again agriculture governance uh the vision the uh querness in vision stakeholder particip participatory approach developing this uh aulture governance including strategies and plans as I mentioned uh as we advise the governments uh of course the government determines what they want uh they are the owners that the custodian of their mandates of their of their uh plan of their strategy and what they want to achieve. So everything depends on the government what they want to achieve. Um ours is just for the government to request our support and we advise the government on uh what's uh the best approach to achieve their develop objective that in which they requested us to uh advise them about. So uh if the government wants uh to balance between rice production, fish production and the direction they want to go uh we advise appropriately based on what the governments are calling the member countries the member countries wants to achieve. So um in this case the balance is always there. It depends on the countries that determines the major outcome. So of course I acknowledge the fact that uh uh in integrated ru system so farmers are more interested in uh uh fish species or crabs that uh develop that give them a lot of economic value. So uh of course policies strategies and uh governors determines this direction in different countries and the government are the custodian of these uh guidance and strategies. So uh uh the countries uh will determine this by themselves. >> I hope I answer the question, Miss Benzup. >> Yes. Thank you. >> All right. Um Okay. So is there any question from the floor? I I just wanted to mention that I post on the chat box the state of war fisheries and agriculture by the director of the fisheries division Manuel Barang. If you click there and you can have a look on this um podcast you will gain bit of knowledge on what is the field doing just uh for for your information. Um before finalizing FI can you please share a bit of your career path to the students and what is needed if they would like to work on the aquaculture sector for the re in terms of research just your personal experience. Thank you so much. Oh, thanks so much Marilyn. And uh of course I cannot talk talk about my story without talking about yours as well cuz uh we joined a field together under a very interesting program uh with the indigenous people's uh uh team uh in uh 2017 I believe. Yes. And um it's uh uh I at the time I was with the nutrition system division. So um my background spans across different uh disciplines. I started with food science and technology and then I did a master's in uh food technology and another masters in organic food systems and organic agricultural food systems with specialization in experimental aquaculture and then I completed that with on um a PhD in aquaculture uh at the Shangap University in China. So um this spanned across uh different years over seven years altogether and I've been privileged to be working in the fish and agriculture division since uh 2018 and then um when we talk about uh research objectives for me I'm very much interested in the IA system um of course and I've always seen a gap in in the research component of it quite a uh there's been a lot of gap in uh the ecosystem services provided by the integrated ru systems in in um most African countries in Latin America and the Caribbean as well. So there is a lot of gap in this and uh it's something that I think could be of interest to students and of course we talk about the um the drivers the pressures the states changes the impact and pressures involved in integrated life systems. uh there's also a gap in this kind of research as well and thinking about integrated systems how much it contributes to food security and nutrition how much it contributes to environmental sustainability how much contributes to ecological interaction I mean uh we have a long way to go in consolidating the knowledge the different knowledge that we have there seems to be a lot of great literature in these areas but when it comes to academic and uh research uh outputs uh uh the gaps are there and we are all here to fill this gap of course if it's of interest to us and uh this something we can always uh work together on and then um uh going back to my to my personal experience and then I also want to encourage uh every student here that um we should always try to uh focus on where the challenges are and if we do research that address these challenges. We could create our own individual visibility in the research arena and uh with this we could always create opportunities for ourselves. So I will leave it there. Thank you. >> All right. I think that's a very good um yeah insightful presentations. Uh I do agree that this integrated is a a very good approach nowadays. uh but still like uh if if in Malaysia also I think that we we are facing the some challenges because um I think in terms of governance you know uh even though uh I don't think that the farmers because uh in Malaysia uh the farmers is individual people so that they not belong to the to the uh to the government I mean it's not top down uh material so that uh when they want to if they want to to to go for this integrated I mean to rise fish push um like you mentioned in the slide there might be a low input at the beginning right so that will be concern for our farmers because they are actually um yeah depending on this uh on this uh rice uh field uh but I think it's a good start we need to start uh somehow uh to that to that to have this uh integrated approach uh I think that if there's no other questions that we come to the end of this session this afternoon uh Ladies and gentlemen, thank you uh very much to our speaker Mr. Aloi Aay for the insightful um valuable insights of this afternoon. And as we mentioned just now, today's discussion has highlighted the importance of integrated culture aquaculture approach in creating more productive resilient and also sustainable uh food uh systems. Um as always uh today's recording will be available through the Google Drive link share in the zoom chat and we warmly welcome you uh to invite you to join us for the final lecture of this FAO uh series on Monday 20 20th July 206 that will be featuring Dr. Lucia Naden who will discuss uh innovative FAO tools for reducing food loss and waste. Uh thank you for joining us and we look forward to seeing you at the final session. Before that maybe we will have a photographer session.