Environmental Consequences of Intensive Aquaculture Practices at Moyna Purba Medinipur West Bengal India with Special Reference to Carbon Footprint and Carbon Sequestration.

Abstract

Moyna of Purba Medinipur district is widely known as an aquaculture hub of West Bengal, India. Though very good production is achievable from this fish culture system, management practices are inappropriate, which could create the sustainability problem of this culture system. The present study was thus undertaken for the estimation of plankton population, water quality, carbon footprint and carbon sequestration of this intensive aquaculture practices. Information on spawn to fry, fry to fingerlings and grow-out culture were collected through the structured questionnaire from the fish farmers. The plankton density, primary productivity, carbon footprint and carbon sequestration were analyzed using standard procedures. The phytoplankton, zooplankton and primary productivity were maximum at the stocking period and minimum during the middle of culture period. The lowest feed conversion ratio (FCR) was noticed with the minimum amount of feed applied in the pond. The CO2-e emission ranged from 0.56 to 4.89kg CO2-e/kg fish (av. 2.13) for the production levels of 5.0 to 10.7 t/ha/yr. The pond water developed salinity and ammonium-N increased from 0.01 to 0.50mg/l. The ponds with high feed loading (28 to 32 t/ha/yr) had the highest average sediment accumulation rate (11.0 ± 3.0cm/yr) and carbon sequestration (704 ± 30g C/m2/yr).