The proposed Regional Information System, SIPAM, originated mainly from four factors:
the strong demand for corporate information from the many scientists and administrators involved in planning the promoting aquaculture activities and evaluating projects at the national and regional level;
an urgent need of private and public investors, producers and suppliers for regional and international information, specifically (or especially) for this sector, in order to promote the import/export of aquaculture products and equipment; training possibilities, prices, national and international rules and standards, legislation, feeding and pathology, etc., are also part of the above needs;
the conviction that both public and private institutions possess an enormous quantity of data/information useful to administrators in the sector which, for various reasons, remain unused or only partially used because they are not appropriately complied, processed or disseminated. This makes it difficult and often impossible to integrate and/or associate this data/information with other information of a different nature and source, and
the constant requests from the public and private sectors for dedicated software to formulate and analyse research, planing and investment projects. This System will contain the instruments appropriate to this need using the databank content of the component as the comparative source of information and data.
The outcome will produce a continuous flow of information which could be used for evaluating, measuring, maintaining and controlling events and performance in aquaculture.
The current widespread availability of reasonably low-priced computers and micro-computers of great capacity makes possible a project for incorporating a large amount of such multi-disciplinary information into a Desk Information System which is the final target of SIPAM.
It is worth mentioning that a similar experience is under way in Latin America (SIPAL: Sistema de Informacion para la Planificacion de la Acuacultura en America Latina) under the activities of AQUILA II Project.
