The Government of Malaysia, assisted by the United Nations Development Programme and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, are engaged in the Coastal Aquaculture Demonstration and Training Project (FI:DP/MAL/77/008), with the main objective to assist the Government in introducing coastal fish farming.
As part of the operation of the project, FAO assigned the Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory of Columbia University (LDGO) of New York to provide consultant services in geochemistry and microbiology to the project at Gelang Patah, Johore Bahru, Malaysia. Three members of the LDGO staff, Dr James Simpson (geochemist), Dr Bruce Deck (geochemist) and Dr Hugh Ducklow (microbiologist) worked at the Gelang Patah facility during the last week of November and the first ten days of December 1981. Two other aquaculture facilities in the region were also visited briefly, a new private project in southeastern Johore State and a government research station in Thailand near Bangkok, to obtain soil samples for laboratory comparison with samples from Gelang Patah. Summarized in this report are the findings of the field chemical and microbiological studies, as well as subsequent laboratory work at LDGO.
The primary purpose of the consultants' work was to elucidate the geochemical and microbiological factors which contribute to the low yields of shrimp and fish at the Gelang Patah facility which has been in operation for three to four years.
