The Grouper fishery of Andhra Pradesh, Bay of Bengal coast of India during 2017-2023

Muktha, M and Akhilesh, K V and Varghese, Eldho and Sreepriya, V (2024) The Grouper fishery of Andhra Pradesh, Bay of Bengal coast of India during 2017-2023. Marine Fisheries Information Service No.261. pp. 19-22. ISSN 0254-380X

Text MFIS_2024_M Muktha.pdf Download (1MB)

Abstract

Groupers belonging to the Perciformes/Serranoidei are one of the world’s most commercially important marine finfish resources, distributed mainly in tropical and subtropical waters. Groupers form the essential component of the “Live Reef Food Fish Trade” for which many species were significantly overfished (Kam et al., 2024). Globally, there are 537 available species and 176 valid species of groupers (Fricke et al., 2024). In India, there are at least 95 species of groupers, with 39 species from the genus Epinephelus (Akhilesh et al., 2021). India has a minor but valuable groupers/rockcods fishery forming 1.95% of total marine landings of the country in 2023 with 69099 tonnes as indicated by the National Marine Fishery Resources Data Centre (NMFDC) of the ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI-FRAEED, 2023). The estimated annual grouper landings have been sharply increasing, from the range of 12,000 to 25,000 tonnes per annum from 1995–2010 (decadal average of approximately 13,000 tonnes from 1991–2000 vs. approximately 20,000 t from 2001–2010) up to nearly 40,000 tonnes from 2011–2019 and 50,388 tonnes 2020-2023 (http://eprints.cmfri.org. in/).

Actions (login required)

View Item