ISRO’s Assistance in finding Rich Fishing Areas

The Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS), reported that Oceansat Satellite data from Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) are used to prepare the Potential Fishing Zone (PFZ) advisories on the potential rich fishing areas and provide to the sea faring fishermen in all states.

• The Potential Fishing Zone (PFZ) as a proxy to potential shoals of fish aggregation will benefit the fishing community to reduce the time and effort spent in searching the shoals of fish, thus improving the profitability and hence, the socio-economic status.
• About 7 million people living along the Indian coastline, spanning over 8100 km, are depending on fishing for their livelihood. Locating and catching fish is always a challenging task.
• Often, the search for fish ends up in spending considerable time and resources, thus increasing the cost leading to low profitability.
• A reliable and timely advisory on the potential zones of fish aggregation will benefit the fishing community to reduce the time and effort spent in searching the shoals of fish, thus improving the profitability and hence, the socio-economic status.

What is OCEANSAT

• IRS-P4 (OCEANSAT) is the first satellite primarily built for Ocean applications, weighing 1050 kg placed in a Polar Sun Synchronous orbit of 720 km, launched by PSLV-C2 in 1999.
• Oceansat-2 satellite mainframe systems derive their heritage from previous IRS missions and launched by PSLV-C14 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in 2009.
• Oceansat-2 is envisaged to provide continuity of operational services of Oceansat-1(IRS-P4) with enhanced application potential.

The methodology:

• ISRO has developed the methodology for the generation of fishery advisories and transfer to INCOIS since 2002 as an operational service for providing PFZ advisories.
• This service utilizes data on chlorophyll concentration (Chl) obtained from ISRO’s Oceansat-2 satellite and the sea surface temperature from National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA / USA satellites).

How PFZ advisories can help

• INCOIS has reported that a study conducted by National Council for Applied Economic Research revealed that the emission of carbon in the environment is reduced due to the savings in diesel consumption and reported a carbon credit equivalent to an annuity of Rs. 36,200 crore.
• Another study, conducted the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) in Maharashtra during 2013-14, under National Agricultural Innovation Project (NAIP), reported that a fishing village of 32 fishing boats in Maharashtra could save 70,000 litres of diesel in a month as the PFZ advisories helped them in avoiding the unwanted search for fish shoals.