The significant development of Egyptian aquaculture in the present goes back to 1980s/1990s. Among the major events which took place during the early development was capacity building as represented in a 6-month training course which was conducted on El Zawya fish farm, Kafr El Sheikh Governorate, Egypt in 1980. The 21 participants enrolled in this course played a key role in aquaculture development then after. This course was organized with the support of UNDP through FAO whereas Mr. Pedro Padlan (FAO) supervised the technical component of the course while I (Abdel Rahman El Gamal) acted as the national counterpart.
The colored photo shows Mr. Padlan (left) and me (right). The photo shows piles of cow dungs spread on the pond bottom while water depth was about 20-30 cm. The practice targeted to enhance the decomposition of organic manure and so the growth of plankton. Organic manure used to stay in such shallow water for several days before spreading the moist pile over a wider area around it before filling the pond to its normal depth of about 100 cm. During the training program and on-farm training, farmed fish was mullet (Mugil sp.), tilapia and common carp (Cyprinus carpio) whereas the nutrition system relied on natural food as developed through the organic manure and supplemented by rice wheat and/or rice bran.
The black and white photo shows the trainees and the project team (Mr. Padlan and I) bare feet in the pond.
The productivity of that system was about one ton/ha compared to an average of about 5 ton/ha in earthen pond aquaculture in the present.
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