SAIME Initiative
Source: The Hindu
GS II: World Geography and Indian Geography; GS III: Food and Agriculture 

Key points discussed under SAIME Initiative?

1. Sustainable Aquaculture In Mangrove Ecosystem (SAIME)

Why in News?

Shrimp farmers are taking care of the mangroves around their farms as part of the SAIME programme, which aims to restore the distinctive ecology of the Sundarbans.

Background

• The Sundarbans forest spans around 10,000 square kilometres of Bangladesh and India, with 40% of the area located in India.
• About 15,000 to 20,000 hectares of India’s unique ecology are used for shrimp farming.
• One of the main occupations in the Sundarbans, a complex system of rivers and low-lying islands that experience twice-daily tide surges, is fishing, notably shrimp farming.
• After clearing significant areas of the Sunderbans’ mangrove forests, environmentalists and specialists have raised concerns about unsustainable aquaculture, notably shrimp harvesting.

Sustainable Aquaculture In Mangrove Ecosystem (SAIME)

• The initiative, launched in 2019, has created a collaborative ecosystem that brings together a number of essential stakeholders from government agencies, academic institutions, and research centres for the co-creation and comprehensive progress of this project.
• Shrimp farming has begun on 20 hectares at Chaital in West Bengal’s North 24 Parganas and 10 hectares at Madhabpur in the neighbouring South 24 Parganas as part of the Sustainable Aquaculture In Mangrove Ecosystem (SAIME) programme.
• However, they are also contributing to the restoration of the mangroves.
• NEWS, Global Nature Fund (GNF), and Naturland Bangladesh Environment and Development Society (BEDS) are developing a community-based programme for sustainable shrimp farming.

  

• In partnership with the Centre for Excellence in Blue Economy (CoE-BE) of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Kolkata, a research programme on the role of mangrove leaf litter in the nutritional dynamics in SAIME ponds has been launched.
• The effort has shown a range of 30-50% in the survival rate of planted mangrove seedlings, which was typically 5-10% before.
• 42 shrimp farmers are taking part in the trial project, and most of them claim that their earnings have increased during the previous years.
• They are also growing native species of shrimp, such as the giant freshwater prawn (P. monodon) and the black tiger shrimp (M. rosenbergii).

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