Alternate on-campus and off-campus monthly meetings of Innovative Fish Farmers Association (IFFA) are being held under the guidance of College of Fisheries, Guru Angad Dev Veterinary & Animal Sciences University. This month, the meeting was held at the fish 
farm of Sukhdev Singh, Village Chauran. The meeting was attended by Dr. Madan Mohan Singh, Director and Warden, Fisheries, Punjab, Dr. Meera D. Ansal, Sr. Scientist (Fisheries), Dr. Vaneet Inder Kaur, Assistant Scientist (Fisheries) and fish farmers from different parts of the State. Sukhdev Singh, who is doing fish framing for more than 15 yrs and has gradually increased area under fish farming from 10 to 50 acres, shared his experiences with the fellow farmers and encouraged the new farmers to follow best management practices for reaping actual profits from this venture. Queries of the farmers with respect to feed and feeding management were addressed by Dr. Meera D. Ansal. She advised the farmers to follow proper feeding strategies, with special emphasis on feed formulation, feeding method and feeding rate during different seasons.
Farmers discussed various issues related to lease, subsidy, electricity, fish feed, processing of fish for value addition
etc. with Dr. Madam Mohan Singh and he assured the farmers that all the issues are being taken up by the Department on priority basis. He encouraged the farmers to come forward and focus more on self-marketing and processing of fish for higher profits. Jasvir Singh, fish farmer from Village Karodian, who bought a shop in recently constructed ‘Modern Fish Market’ in Ludhiana, was congratulated by the Director for taking an initiative in self-marketing of fish produced by him and other farmers from the district. The president of IFFA, Ranjodh Singh, fish farmer from village Nanokey, district Patiala, requested the director to allot one retail shop in the said fish market to IFFA, so that the farmers get a common platform to sell their produce directly in the market.
The farmers were also apprised of Pangas catfish culture in Punjab. Dr. Vaneet Inder Kaur said that although seed of pangascatfish is not available in the State and has to be imported from other states like West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh, but it is an excellent candidate specie for diversification in terms of productivity, which is more than 3 times as compared to carps and being spine less, has very market demand in the State.
It was unanimously decided by the farmers to hold regular off campus meeting of IFFA at the farms of fish farmers for more practical exposure and experience sharing.
The monthly meeting of IFFA for the month of November will be held at College of Fisheries, GADVASU.
