2nd Working Group on
SIPAM System Design Development
Nantes, FRANCE.     Nov. 29 – Dec. 2, 1994

Denis LACROIX - Othman BEJI

MEDRAP II/SIPAM
Mediterranean Regional Aquaculture Project
System of Information for the Promotion of Aquaculture in the Mediterranean

Abstract

SIPAM project has progressed in accordance with the workplan proposed in 1993 and revised in April 1994 in Reme at the end of the first working group. Seven conutries attended this second meeting (Cyprus, Croatia, Egypt, France, Greece, Turkey and Tunisia) which demonstrated that governments involved in this experimental phase now trust in this project. Indeed, the review of the status of aquaculture in the various countries revealed the SIPAM project was an excellent mean to stimulate and improve existing data collection systems.

The study of the 10 main existing databases allowed first, to better explain the consistency of the system and second, to clarify the choice of parameters and to collect the suggestions from the country counterparts. The experience of software use showed to be a key factor for a better understanding and improving of the system.

The SIPAM software will be then modified in order to benefit of all the improvements decided during the meeting and it will be sent back to the countries for ultimate test. (February 95) before its final adoption (early April). Then, this fylly operational software called “mulleto” will be used as the interim system as well as a training and demonstration tool while its adaptation into WINDOWS system will be undertaken.

The provisional budget is divided in two parts: the first one is limited to a minimum activity cost to ensure only basic functions of SIPAM. The second one is related to SIPAM applications and remain depending on country members decisions inside the GFCM management board.

This project shows to be already attractive and useful at this present time. Its development potential is huge. However, SIPAM network will secure its efficiency and its sustainability only thorough a second phase which will activate technical, financial and human means. This important second step is crucial for its evolution and maturity.

Résumé

Le projet SIPAM poursuit son évolution conformément au plan de travail prévu en 1993 et revu en Avril 1994 à Rome, lors de la réunion du premier grope de travail. Sept pays ont participé à cette seconde réunion (Chypre, Croatie, Egypte, France. Grèce, turquie et Tunisie) ce qui montre que les pays engagés dans cette phase expérimentale ont désormais confiance dans ce projet. En effet, la revue de la sitruation de l'aquaculture dans les pays a montré que le projet. SIPAM EST d'abord un excellent moyen de stimuler et d'améliorer les réseaux de collecte de données déjà en place dans le secteur de l'aquaculture.

L'étude des dix principales bases de données a permis d'abord, de mieux démontrer la chérence interne du système et ensuite, de clarifier le choix des paramètres au cours de l'analyse de propositions émises par les correspondants du SIPAM dans les pays. L'expérience de l'utilisation concrète du logiciel est apparue comme un facteur essentiel de compréhension et de progression du système.

Le legiciel sera done modifié pour intégrer toutes les améliorations proposées durant la réunion, puis il sera renvoyé aux correspondant nationaux (Février 95) avant son adeoption défintive prévue début Avril 1995. Ce logiciel opérationnel appelé “mulet”, sera alors disponible comme outil intérimaire de démonstration et d'entraînement, en parallèle de sa transformation sous WINDOWS.

Le budget prévisionnel distingue deux niveaux: le premier est limité aux activités indispensables au fonctionnement minimal du SIPAM; le second est fonction de l'importance des applications (réunions de travail, lettre de liaison, cartes,…) et reste dépendant des décisions des pays membres au sein de la structure de coordination du CGPM.

Ce project a démontréson intérêt et son utilité dès la premilère phase. Son potentiel de développement est considérable. Cependant, ce réseau ne pourra assurer son efficacité, son développement et sa pérennité que si les moyens techniques, finaciers et humains nécessaires sont, mis en place rapidement. Aussi, cette seconde phase est cruciale pour la maturité du projet.

MEDRAP/SIPAM Ministère de l'Agriculture c/o DGPA
32, rue A. Savary 1002 Tunis. Tel: 216 179 01 19 Facs: 216 1 79 39 62

I. Introduction

The second working group on SIPAM system design development organised by MEDRAP II project in collaboration with FAO (FIRI) was held from November 29th to December 2ns, 1994 in IFREMER centre in Nantes, France. This meeting was attended by representatives of SIPAM in seven countries: Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Tunisia and Turkey. Were also present:

Annex 1 gives the list of participants and corresponding address.

The meeting was opened by M. Ph. Ferlin, national coordinator of MEDRAP networks for France and director for International Relations and Cooperation in IFREMENR. He welcomed all participants and explained the choice of Nantes centre to host this meeting as it is located in a region where aquaculture has a long history (mainly bivalves production). Moreover, this centre has a library specialised in aquatic living resources which is of strong interest for SIPAM network. He underlined the fact that SIPAM is a key-system for the three other specialised networks and consequently it has to become quickly operational. He is aware of the possible adherence of Spain to SIPAM through IEO (Instituto Español de Oceanografia) for 1995. He passed the floor to M.H. Akrout.

As MEDRAP coordinator, M. II. Akrout thanked IFREMER for hosting SIMPAM working group and FAO for its permanent and efficient support to this project.

The officials of the meeting were then designated as follows:

The preliminary agenda was adopted with some modifications (see annex 2).

II. SIPAM system development

II.1 Situation in the pilot countries

As relations between SIPAM countries and SIPAM head office in Tunis were more difficult than expected, an exhaustive overview of the situation of the project in each participating country was necessary. D. Lacroix showed on a table the follow-up of diskette and user guide mailing to all countries: the diskettes were sent in mid-augutst and the new user guide one month later. They were received within 1 to 4 weeks later, with few misunderstandings about software installation procedure. Conclusion was that good follow-up requires a special care in mailing (right address, rapid post procedure) and in regular information from both sides about work progress.

Croatia

Mr. Vlado Dadie received the diskette and manual quite late. Some bug in the software did not allow him to enter data about import/export statistics. Anyhow, the experiment of this software was very fruitful for two reasons: first, it led to imagine several improvements in order to make the software more efficient and clear; second, it gave an interesting methodology of data collection and synthesis process which could be applied in various sectors especially in oceanography. He added that the data manager mission in Croatia in October had been also helpful to better understand the goals of the network about aquaculture and to improve data selection.

Cyprus

Mrs. Daphnee Stephanou complained about mailing problems (user guide and filled diskettes sent two times). Several problems and questions had been solved through fax and phone relations between Cyprus and Tunisia.

Confidentiality about productions and condification about import/export remain the only major problems. The fact that annual activity licence for producers depends on regular data delivery to the Ministry of Agriculture is an essential factor for the reliability of updating.

Egypt

After some trouble in software installation, Mr. Magd El Bawad was able to test the system. He succeeded to fill all databases except. “production” for which he was hampered both by lack of precise data about several important productions (carps, mullets) and by the structure of the database.

France

Mr. Ch. de la Pomélie received the diskette on the first September. He had some problems for installation until direct explanation from Tunis solved them. Actually, the major problem was the lack of time as several urgent tasks were asked from him at this time. Confidentiality, poly-activity of farms and confusion between products from aquaculture and fisheries in import database were the main problems faced in the use of the software. He had summarised all its observations and suggestions in a memorandum sent to Tunis in December. Those observations may be discussed during this meeting when databases will he studied one after another.

Greece

Mrs. Maroudio Kendouri expressed her pleasure to participate to this working group as her institute (IMBC in Iraklion, Crete) is already involved in data collection from sea bass and sea bream producers in the Egean sea. She received diskette and user guide together on the 21st of September. The general impression on software is that it is powerful but difficult to manage. Some tables are not precise enough especially about “food”. Import/export database is difficult to fill because of the mix of certain species (trout for example).

Tunisia

Mr. Zouhaier Saghrouni highlighted the good cooperation between the Ministry of Agriculture and SIPAM office in Tunis which allows to save time and improve efficiency. He notified that there is no import of any product from aquaculture in Tunisia (except food). He met some problems in research and development programmes definition as the tunisian administration is preparing a new organisation of research for this sector in relation with the development plan of aquaculture which is on the way to be published.

Turkey

When testing the sotware, Ms. Oya Ersan was hampered by the lack of data as aquaculture in a recent activity in Turkey. There is no obligation of data collection and transmission by the private sector to administration. For this reason TUBITAK (research and development organisation for Turkey) is preparing a specific inquire with an adapted form in order to regularly collect data from the producers. This explains why the contribution of Turkey to the network remained limited up to now. But significant progress are expected from near future.

MEDRAP / SIPAM

MEDRAP reports (41 reports from 1991 to 1994) have been partially recorded in the MEDRAP database. Missing reports will be soon added to the database.

Few national aquaculture reports had been sent to Tunis by member countries. It is necessary to obtain a complete collection as soon as possible. The updating of those national reports is an important task of each SIPAM representative. The collection of the national reports of one country will allo interesting opportunities of trend analysis about several items: production, research policy, consumption, balance between fisheries and aquaculture or import and expect, etc…

II.2 General observations on SIPAM project.

II.2.1 general overview from FAO expert

Mr. Coppola reminded then the organisation of the network and the characteristics and relations of the differend sub-systems. The national sub-system, will provide SIPAM with direct access to national databases. However, this option will be available only for those countries where a national information system exists and the national coordination staff areable to develop the appropriate communication protocols. Alternatively, this module will contain the same software as the Regional Module managing data at a lower level of aggregation and having all the typical functions of data entry. This option National Write Read Use DB (NWRUDB) is reserved for the country's own use and management, it will reside only in the National Module of SIPAM given to the countries. For the prototype development, it will be similar to the regional one (RWRUDB), but in the second phase countries will be invited, and possibly assisted, to expand the data coverage to be closer to their realities and at the same time be colloquial/compatible/comparable with SIPAM. However, it is worth noting that this will be entirely at the choice of the countries.

The regional sub-system is a corporate system which summarises the information supplied by countries according to a give methodology. It is a collection of all the selected databases, customised to allow all the typical retrieval functions: Select, Search, Print, Save, Export, Configure. Two types of system are foreseen: (i) Regional Road Only Use (RROU). This version will resider in the Regional Module of SIPAM distributed to the countries. Its content will be an aggregated database made up from all the National once that are received in SIPAM on time. It will contain all the retrieval/output functions of the application. It does not contain the data entry procedures. (ii) Regional Write Read Use (RWRUDB). This version will reside in the Regional Module of SIPAM installed at SIPAM Hearquarter and at FAO Rome. It is very similar to the previous one (RROU) but will contain all the functions available, including data entry. The data Uploading/Downolading and data security functions will be performed under a different system segment.

The FAO sub-system will contain some of the officially published software and databases obtainable from FAO HQs and relevant to SIPAM. Most of them are part of the FAO Computerised Information Series.

The Extended Module will contain an abstract prepared by SIPAM of information collected through the linkage with world-wide commercial and non-commercial networks. As far as networking with remote sources is concerned, this task is foreseen in the second phase and finalised in the third. Also, SIPAM will contract access and authorisation to redistribute data.

The Analytical Module will contain various programs for the analysis of the data/information processed through SIPAM or gathered from other sources specifically obtained or developed to assist in the technical and financial management of aquaculture production projects.

The Data Processing Module will enable the user to process and critically analyse the information retrieved through SIPAM. In fact, one of the characteristics of the system is that it will not be dependent upon pre-determined models. This module will therefore contain all the commercial software which the user might need to carry out the analytical studies (word processor, spread sheet, DBMS, project management tool, graphicss, statistical package, etc…).

The System Configuration Module will assist in configuring SIPAM according to the different hardware/software platforms where it is installed. It will also contain and manage the overall codification system based on prefixed Referenece File System.

Each of the databases contain the following basic functions:

The databases included in the prototype are the follwing:

All these databases have to be now discussed in order to collect all observations and suggestions made by pilot-countries and improve the SIPAM databases structure and their content as well. Finalization of Legislation and pathology databases was postponed in order to consult FAO Rome.

II.2.2 Complement observation on SIPAM project

Information supports distribution met difficulties in some countries. Rapid post procedures and FAO pouch opportunity should solve those problems for the future.

• An active participation of the SIPAM representatives is necessary to build a good tool (SIPAM software) and to answer to the urgent needs of the Meidterranean countries which are willing to develop aquaculture.

• The problem of the confidentiality of some data was discussed (centre of production, production cost, conversion rate, etc…). The solution could be to classify the production centre by their size in four categories (see production centre characteristics data file) and to let optional the production of the farm (quality and value).

• Some problems are expected when filling import/exports databases as new European Union regulations will allow a free circulation of products between this countries.

• Concerning the evaluation of different data coming from various sources, a methodology will be soon discussed and adopted during the next SIPAM working group in order to standardise the validation process for uncertain data.

• The relations between SIPAM and others specialised networks have to be clearly defined in order to secure the maximum of efficiency and avoid overlapping.

• The problems of copyrights, relation between SIPAM national coordinators and end users etc, have not been clarified. The Legal Office of FAO must be consulted in order to prepare precise proposals to GFCM.

II.3 Main improvements in selected topics

II.3.1 Improvement samples int he datbases

Concerning the tables in SIPAM software several modifications have been introduced. It is not possible to list them. Few examples may be presented:

• adding another table for Mediterranean SIPAM countries classified in an alphabetic order;

• the table of “product” must take in charge all the species produced by aquaculture including ornemental fished and other groups;

• in the table “type of facility” it was recommended to add library and E-mail connection;

• the content of the table “strueture of culturef” must be revised to standardise the terminology of this table with the trminology of FAO;

• the table “presentation” has been simplified as all the young stages of fish and crustacean were gathered under fry.

• A long discussion took place on the distribution of the different categories of food. At the end, it was decided to gether them under the item “food”.

Concerring the “tools” used by the SIPAM software, the main changes have concerned : “Modify-Search-and output”. They have been adapted to facilitate the manipulation and to answer to the requirements.

II.3.2 Aquaculture national report

The participants agreed to standardise the structure of the yearly Aquaculture National Report planned to figure in SIPAM regional module. This report must indicate the following items :

-   Country:

-   Year:

-   Summary: (20 line maximum with normal interling)

1. Introduction : it is a brief descriptin of the sector in which one can find:

   • the production statisties for fisheries (catch0 and aquaculture with their value etc…;

   • import fish statisties (quantity and value0etc…;

   • apparent consumption of fish (kg)/habitant/year:

     

2. Description: this part summarises the actual status of aquaculture in the country in comparison with the situstion in the previous year:

   • new projects and technologies;

   • research programmes;

   • recent legislation and new laws including incentives, code of investment

3. Constraints and problems (diseases, markets, standards, etc…)

4. Future: major trends, discussion and evaluation;

NB : This report has to be written in english, although other versions in different languages may be available. It should not excess 5 pages with normal interline;

II.4 Development strategy

It may be organised in two phases named phase 2 and 3 as phase one is now ending.

Phase 2: The second phase is characterised by five independent and parallel activities which at the end should originate a single product.

The prototype developed during the first phase, from now on called “Muletto” (little mule), will be the starting point for this phase.

Activity 1:

-   Revise the Muletto to the eight countries which participated in its develpment and where collection of all the data requested for all the years in question will be initiated.

-   Nationalise the elementary detabases. SIPAM will be responsible, where possible, for restructuring the elementary data bank of the national module to cover the needs of each country. This operation, undertaken at therequest of the countries and involving direct collaboration with the national programmers and coordinators, will gurantee a major interest in the system and will increase the level of consistency of the data and their accuracy also through a mechanism of cross checking.

Regionalisation of the data and beginning of the collection, verification, and dissemination of the regional sub-system.

-   Provision to all national centres of finalised FAO software and of the summary of remote databases.

-   Use of the Muletto as a working tool, data entry, retrieval, documentation, etc…

-   Continuous monitoring of the system, revision and immediate distribution.

-   Installation of the system in other countries of the Mediterranean which request it.

The budget for this activity is now totally secured.

Activity 2 :

-   Equip the SIPAM workstation with WINDOWS software.

-   Design and develop SIPAM in WINDOWSO with provision for on-line data communication beginning with the structure of the Muletto. Among other things, this advanded system wil have:

• graphic interface with the possibility for GIS utility;

• expert mode data/information rerieval aand document processing including free texts, tables, graphs, figures, objects management, etc., and e-mail facilities;

• assisted mode data/information retrieval and document processing including free tests, tables, figures, graphies, objects management, etc., and e-mail facilities. Assisted Query definitions and linkages;

• totally sutomatised pre-established format document processingthrough direct linkages to source databasses and data files;

• production and diffusion of a regional electronic bulletin.

This activity will ba carried out mainly in FAO-HQ with the assistance of a consultant.

Activity 3 :

Installation and configuration in all participating countries of INTERNET both for e-maail facilities and for FTP (File Transfer Protocol0 procedures. Establishment of a “Postmaster” for an electronic conference agreement. Train the project staff in the use and management of INTERNET.

This activity will be carried out, with the assistance of a consultant, mainly in SIPAM HQ, in FAO HS, and in the countries concerned.

Activity 4 :

At the end of this phase, assemble all the procedures under the advanced system WINDOWSO , download all the data from the DOSf version, test the system and repropose it to the countries as the new advanced system.

-   distribute the advanced system to all interested countries;

-   establish network procedures.

This activity will be carried out mainly in SIPAM HQ with some assistance from the consultant who has worked for the advanced system.

Activity 5 :

This is a purely consultative and managerial activity which will be undertaken by the organisation of and participation in threemeetings:

1. Participation of the SIPAM coordinator at the GFCM Board of Directors meeting. It is under thsi activity that, from time to tiem, the technical/legal situation and the context in which SIPAM operates and will continue to operate will have to be defined;

2. organisation and conduct of an anual meeting of aquaculture and informaties experts for a constant monitoring of the developement of SIPAM, to propose new applications, changes, raising funds, etc…, and

3. organisation and conduct of an annual seminar-type meeting, for end users, potential end users, donors, etc., for training, promotion, discussion, etc. In this cotnext the Aquaculture Planning Simulator (APS) and other analytical tools should be presented and discussed.

Phase 3: In this phase, the final configuration of SIPAM will be decided. Activity 5 of phase 2 will be institutionalised.

III. Workplan

A workplan for the next 8 months had been discussed and approved:

December 94–January 95:

-   SIPAM software reprogrammation

-   2nd version of user guide including all improvements adopted in Nantes.

Mid-February 95:

maling last version of SIPAM (software and user guide) to countries.

Mid-February–end March:

-   Data entry in the new software.

-   Study of data collection process and methodology and identification of possible sources of error.

April (possible 4–7th, in Portugal):

-   Working group meeting for final adoptin of the prototype.

-   Stydy of data collection methodology in order to secure reliable data.

April–June:

-   Exhaustive date entry in each country.

-   Use of Muletto as working tool.

-   Search of new databases according to national and networks priorities.

June (possibly middle of June in Cyprus):

Working group on software evolution and improvement.

IV. Budget

As the working group of Nantes had taken place befor the MEDRAP Steering Committee meeting, the participants had not the elements from the different contributions involved in SIPAM such as tunisian government contribution as bosting country, GFCM/FAO as coordinating institutions, the members of SIPAM and the donors to elaborate a detailed budget for SIPAM. Discussion was limited tot he structure of the budget, which was divided in two components.

1. Minimum cost for the survival of SIPAM

   1.1 Fixed costs

   • Hosting the regional centre and its maintencance (electricity, water, cleanin,…);
   • Senior Research Aquaculturist;
   • Programmer;
   • Secretary;
   • Factotum;

   1.2 Variable costs

   • Communications (telephone, fax, E-mail)
   • Maintenance of the equipment;

   • Office small supplies.

2. Cost related to SIPAM application

   • Newsletter, updated maps of aquaculture;
   • Documentation centre (including one librarian)
   • Internet cost;
   • Consultaney;
   • Complement and improvement of hardware and software;
   • Meetings (workshop, training course,…)

   Those activities are very important for any information system

   Their realisation depends on funds availability.

FAO contribution to this budget could be:

• backstopping for the system development
• Cost for the SIPAM coordinator to attend to the management boar meeting;
• Some support according to available resources for the installation of SIPAM in new countries.

V. Conclusion

SIPAM project has progressed in accordance with the workplan proposed in 1993. The seven member countries actively participated to the Nantes workshop about the adoption of the prototype. The analysis of the status of aquaculture in those countries demonstrated the usefulness of SIPAM and the conclusiveness of its objectives. The review of the status of aquaculture in the various countries revealed that SIPAM project was an excellent mean to stimulate and improve existing data collection systems.

This project shows to be already attractive and useful at this present time. It development potential is huge. However, SIPAM network will secure its efficiency and its sustainability only through a second phase which will activate technical, financial and human means. This important second step is crucial for its evolution and maturity.

It is interesting to underline that SIPAM was designed and is being realised with a futuristic view of a world network for aquaculture in order to allow “twin” systems operating in different nations and regions to “converse” with each other.

From the point of view of investment of human and technological resources assigned to this project and characterised by its unique approach, it should be emphasised that it is a low-cost financial project with a high level of coordination and backstopping.

Annex 1

Working Group Meeting on SIPAM
Prototype System Adoption
Nantes 29 Nov. 3 Dec., 1994

List of Participants

Annex 2

Adopted Agenda

Tuesday 29^th November

10:00–13:00

• Welcome address, by Mr. Ph. Ferlin (IFREMER/DRCI)
• Designation of Officials
• Adoption of the agenda
• State of the art in SIPAM project
• Problems faced by the countries for data entry and software use.

15:00–18:30

• Analysis of the problems
• Integration of the national data in the regional module (data quality and validation)

Wednesday 30^th November

9:00–13:00

• Welcome address, by Mr. H. Durand (Nantes centre manager)
• SIPAM overall system design
• Review of existing databases
• Definition of the standards

15:00–18:30

• INTERNET presentation
• Review of the definitions in the user guide
• Procedures of data collection in the countries and interaction with SIPAM
• Finalisation of the prototype architecture

Thursday 1^st December

9:00–13:00

• Proposals of new databases and potential synergies with SIPAL
• Prototype newsletter presentation
• SIPAM workplan for 1995 and budget structure

15:00–18:30

• Final synthesis and proposition of the meeting plan report
• Adoption of the workplan, budget and SIPAM prototype
• Conclusion and recommendations

Friday 2^nd December

9:00–17:00

• Visit tour in Noirmountier island turbot farm (France-Turbot) and IFREMER research centre of Bouin (shellfish intensive culture and study on aquaculture impact on environment)

Annex 3

Visit to Turbot farm and IFREMER research center

(Friday, December 2nd, 1994)

1. France-Turbot

France-Turbot is a farm located on the island of Noirmoutier, about 100 km in the South-west of Nantes, along the Atalantic coast of Vendée.

It belongs to the ADRIEN group which is a diversified holding in agro-industry.

1.1 Hatchery

Site is remarkable as it benefits of a stable source of water which temperature is stabilised at 15°C all yer round. This water is filtered naturally as shown on following drawing:

Figure 1 : Geological structure of Noirmoutier Island

This water has to be treated as it is too low in oxygen and too high in CO² (300%) and N² (150%)

Breeders are kept under controlled conditions in 16 tanks which light and temperature are strictly controlled. Natural spawning starts in mid-May and ends in mid-July with 7 to 10 spawning per season. Only one third of the larvae are kept after selection bases on morphological and color criteria.

Feed sequence is classic : algae (Tetraselmis) Artemia (without selco) and rotifers.

Rearing accurs at 25 larvae/liter at. 18°C. Water quality is strictly controlled in order to ensure a reliable flow of 100 m³/hour.

Fingerling production reached 1,4 millions units in 94 which is interesting to compare with the 0,16 millions produced 5 year ago. This production represents half of the total production of fingerlings of turbot in France.

1.2 Grow-out

The production cycle lasts about 28 months:

• 4 months from 1g to 10 g;
• 2 years from 10 g to 1,3–2 kg;

Feed in expensive (15–18% of the production cost) because its high level in protein (55%).

ADRIEN owns two gow-out sites, one in Noirmoutier in tanks (250 t/y cap.) and one in cages in North Brittany (300 t/y). Water is a mix of marine and earthen sources in order to ensure 19°C all year round. Density is ranging from 50 to 75 kg/m². FCR is about 1,25 with a global survival of 90%. Pure oxygen is regularly added.

1.3 Processing

The yield in flesh of the turbot is relatively low. Flesh is usually vacuum packed and sold fresh or frozen. Research has started about boneless and steak fillets in order to try to increase the yield.

1.4 Research

Research is active in 3 fields:

• closed systems;
• genetics (triploids, all-female sex-reversed population);
• zoo technics.

1.5 Economics

France-Turbot is a technical success (no fish had ever been lost for technical reason) but financial results remain half-successful. Indeed price of fingerling dropped from 2,5 to 1,3 USD in a year and wholesale price for adult never exceed 9 USD/kg. Cost structure can be summarised as follows:

Financial success in marine fish aquaculture in France is difficult for two main reasons: high labor / service costs and risks of extrema in temperature (especially Frost in winter). Nevertheless, excellent productivity and reliability of production can partly balance those constraints. But profitability remains highly dependent on permanent improvement from research.

2. IFREMER Research Station of BOUIN

IFREMER is conducting research on shellfish culture, mainly japanese oyster Crassostrea gigas, in the centre of BOUIN (80 km South-west of Nantes) as it is located in the heart of the major producing region of France for shellfish.

Recent efforts have been devoted to better understand the effect of the watershed input on the quality and productivity in the shellfish producing bays of the seashore. This problem is complex as it involves a huge number of various activities which type and intensity are difficult to identify exhaustively.

The main research program is now about the final fattening of oyster few weeks before sale in order to ensure the best quality product as regards to the sanitary requirements and also to provide a special “walnut” taste which could be labellised on the market.

This can be done through intensive culture of algae on which adult oysters are fed for some weeks. Technical problems are now solved. Economic and financial analysis is planned for the near future with the cooperation fo two farmers and with the support of service of economics of IFREMER (SEM). This region is strongly depending on shellfish culture as few alternative are available for the marshes. sociologic studies had shown that profitability is decreasing while mean age of farmer increases. Therefore, new options have to be proposed to professionnals in order to avoid socio-economic problem in the future.