Odisha’s Fish Pond Scheme

The Odisha government has launched a state-sponsored scheme called “Fish Pond Yojana” to promote fish farming, especially freshwater aquaculture, and to enhance farmers’ incomes in 2017–18. The scheme aims to cover waterbodies of about 2,200 hectares under fish farming with a budgetary provision of ₹96 crore and a subsidy amount of ₹25 lakh from financial year 2018–19. Apparently, the state government has planned to reduce the import of freshwater fish, like the Indian major carp, and boost food and nutritional security in the state.

The scheme has received policy attention as the state has freshwater aquaculture production potentiality of about 4.5 lakh metric tonnes (mt), against the present level pegged at 3.01 lakh mt, according to the Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Odisha. Culture-fisheries (ponds/tanks) can potentially contribute to 3.8 lakh mt with an average productivity of 3 tonnes per hectare.