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Utilisation of internet for digitisation of spatial fishery database
Sanjeev Kr Srivastava and A G Ponniah National Bureau of Fish Genetic Resources Canal Ring Road, P O Dilkusha Lucknow-226002
Abstract
India has got vast water and fish germplasm resources. There has been no effort to prepare georeferenced, easily updated, comprehensive and accessible information system of all the aquatic and fishery resources of the country on a spatial scale With the advent of Internet, it is now possible to link people and information together like never before. The challenge now is to apply this technology to fully utilise the wealth of important biological information that currently exists in hundreds of different government agency databases, universities, museums and other institution throughout the country. As many developed countries have developed very comprehensive information system on aquatic bodies for their country, through Internet it is possible to have an idea about the methodology required for developing such information system. Also information generated by some organisations on aquatic resources of India is available on Internet facilitating determining the source of data for arranging it on spatial scale. The information available on Internet can be utilised for collecting information on aquatic resources of India, getting methodology of data compilation and mapping procedures and for applying the available databases for specific fishery resource management issues. Introduction India has got vast water and fish germplasm resources. There has been no effort to prepare georeferenced, easily updated, comprehensive and accessible information system of all the aquatic and fishery resources of the country on a spatial scale. Besides published papers, most of the information on aquatic resources and fauna of India is scattered, available with a number of organisations and in grey literature in the form of unpublished reports, Ph.D. thesis as well as proceedings of the symposium. With the advent of Internet, it is now possible to link people and information together like never before. The challenge now is to apply this technology to fully utilise the wealth of important biological information that currently exists in hundreds of different government agency databases, universities, museums and other institution throughout the country. When all these data are mapped it will be possible to develop spatial map having information about fish distribution and to develop hypothesis of the relation between the fish and the water bodies. This type of spatial analysis is possible with the use of maps created by geographical information system (GIS). This information will provide managers and policy makers with the tools to evaluate the relative importance of various aquatic resources and to prioritised areas that need to be conserved as well as implement development plans on a eco-friendly sustainable manner. Therefore there is an urgent need to develop a system having georeferenced database of fish and fish habitat, which covers all aquatic bodies. As many developed countries have developed very comprehensive information system on aquatic bodies for their country, through Internet it is possible to have an idea about the methodology required for developing such information system. Also information generated by some organisations on aquatic resources of India is available on Internet facilitating determining the source of data for arranging it on spatial scale. The National Bureau of Fish Genetic Resources, Lucknow is playing a leading role to digitise the scattered data on fishes and arranging it on an aquatic spatial map. For accessing the information on the existing databases in other country and to understand the methodology used by other countries, NBFGR, Lucknow is utilising the Internet. Some of the important web sites used by NBFGR, for this purpose can be broadly divided into
http://www.Irn.org This is the site of International Rivers Network (IRN). IRN supports local communities engaged in protecting their rivers and watershed. It works to halt destructive developmental projects on rivers and to encourage equitable and sustainable methods of meeting the need for water, energy and flood management. The site gives information about environmental impact of large dams. The site also contains list of all the existing, ongoing and proposed hydroelectric projects of India. http://www.Irn.org/basics/db050.shtml The site contains more than 300 bibliographic collections on dams. http://www.Irn.org/basics/dbweb.shtml Links to more than 50 other water resources related web sites are available. http://www.Irn.org/basics/dbjournal.shtml Details of more than 70 relevant journals, newsletters and newspaper tiles on rivers are available. http://www.Irn.org/programs/india The environmental and anthropogenic impact of Sardar Sarovar project, Maheshwar dam and other dams under construction on Narmada river are discussed at the site. http://www.search.eb.com At this site one can find Encyclopędia Britannica Online. The Britannica Encyclopaedia contains lot of information on the rivers of India, which includes, their origin points, end point, approximate length etc. The information on big rivers like Ganga and Bramhputra is enormous and includes physiography, climate and hydrology, plant and animal life, irrigation, navigation, hydroelectric power and bibliographic collection on the river. (Ganga River, 2000) http://www.indiaexpress.com/embassy/indnepre12.html The above-mentioned site gives details of agreement between India and Nepal on water release and construction of dam over the Maha Kali river, which flows at the border of India and Nepal. http://www.cgrer.uiowa.edu/servers/servers_references.html The site of Centre for Global and Regional Environmental Research, University of Iowa is an introductory guide to many of the maps and references available on WWW. List of more than 800 sites are there including a link to site having miscellaneous maps of India. Web site on methodology of Data Compilation and mapping procedures. http://www.Irn.org/pubs/wrr This site under International River Network has different editions of World River Review, a news letter having information on effect of deleterious developmental activities on the rivers through out the world. http://www.fisheries.org The above web sites is of American Fishery Society is an important starting points for fisheries professional interested in jobs and career development, software, internet guide. The site provides information about various fishery related electronic mailing list with details of subscription and E-mail addresses. The list of fishery related software and databases are also found on this site. http://www.mesc.usgs.gov The web site of U S Geological Survey contains lot of information on effect of hydrological parameters on the aquatic flora and fauna of rivers. The information on interaction between riparian zone and stream is also available. Various software for predicting microhabitat conditions in river as well as the function of stream flow, software for predicting stream water temperature from stream geometry, meteorology and hydrology data are available. The site also contains links to many other water related sites on the web. The information available on this site will be useful for quantifying the minimum water requirement for different life stages of different fishes that will be helpful in sustaining fish biodiversity after water diversion for other non fishery uses. http://www.web.pac.dfo/gc.ca/FHIP/mpo The site contains full information on Fisheries Information Summary System (FISS), which is a georeferenced summary level fish and habitat database for water bodies throughout the province of British Columbia, Canada. The site contains procedures about data compilation and mapping. http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/ric The site contains maps of geographical distribution of fishes of British Columbia Canada. The site contains methodologies on aerial photography for fish habitat, freshwater biological sampling, field key to freshwater fishes, fish collection methods and standards, fish and fish habitat inventory methodologies, photo documentation of aquatic inventories and standards for fish and fish habitat maps. http://www.nwrc.gov The web site of the National Wetland Research Centre contains lots of information on habitat suitability index for various fishes found in USA, about methodology of wetland and deepwater habitat classification in USA as well as the life histories and environmental requirement of coastal fishes and invertebrates http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/faoinfo/fishery/fishery.htm The web site of Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has lot of databases on marine, inland and culture fishery, information on fishery resources; situation; outlook and policies are also available on this site. The software is classified as education software, software for programmer and other software for biological studies. Information on various useful specific online field biology software can be found on this site. http://www.utexas.edu/depts/tnhc/.www/fish/tnhc/na/naindex.html The site contains taxonomically structured distribution maps, images, and general information on freshwater fishes of North America. http://www.mvk.usace.army.mil/edh/graphs.htm Information of river stages basin wise, hydrographs for current year, district rainfall maps, navigation report on the Vicksburg district of USA are available. http://www.nbii.gov/ The site of National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII). USA, NBII is an Internet based federation of biological resources data information product and data analysis tools from many different sources. The NBII focuses at providing online access to experts and has directories of experts for various biological science disciplines. Web sites indicating applications on fishery resource management http://www.Irn.org/pubs/wrr The site under International River Network having different editions of World River Review, a news letter giving information on effect of deleterious developmental activities on the rivers through out the world. http://www.creativelinks.com/recreat This site gives information on the different locations for sports fishing. This site gives detailed flow, weather and fishing conditions in different rivers of USA. Information on the type of bait to be used at different depth of water for different fish species is also included. http://www..dfw.state.or.us/ODFWhtml/InfoCntrFish The site contains information about sizes of fishes found at various locations in the state of Oregon, USA for use of sport fishes. The site also contains the FAQs about fly-fishing in the state of Oregon. This contains collection of questions and answers on fly-fishing. The questions are asked through E-mail on fly-fishing and answered by experts. At this site many anglers have expressed their view on the technique of fly-fishing. The age determination methods for Northwest Atlantic fish species are given at this site. The site contains ecological methodology software. The list of desirable attributes which might be of use to programmers and reviewers of eco-software, as well as other users are also given. The site for aquaculture network information centre having information about various aquaculture fish species and other related web sites. Detailed information about different life stages of various fish species along with availability of their eggs/fingerlings, feed materials, techniques for handling of eggs and publications on aquaculture are available at this site. The site contains software and learning system for the analysis of fish migration through culverts. The software can be downloaded from the site along with its help files, and literature on fish passage through culverts. The web site of Stream Technology Centre under United States Department of Agriculture, USA having information on improving knowledge of stream systems and processes, developing operational operational tools for quantifying channel hydraulics. The newsletter " Stream Notes" published by the centre is also accessible through this site. http://www.ecostats.com The site of Ecological Software Solutions contains software for analysing spatial and temporal data from biogeographical and ecological studies including wildlife, fisheries, plant and animal ecology. Conclusion The WWW contains huge repository of data. However most of it has not been reviewed by an independent panel of experts as in the case of papers published in journals. Also most of the information available on Internet is partial in nature. Therefore it is the responsibility of the user to assess and utilize the volume and variable quality of Internet information. Also libraries are still the major repositories for scientifically sound information and references that are systematically organised (Porter, 1999). References: "Ganga River" Encyclopaedia Britannica Online. HYPERLINK "http://www.search.eb.com/bol/topic?eu=119610&sctn=1" http://www.search.eb.com/bol/topic?eu=119610&sctn=1 [Accessed 19 February 2000] http://www.Irn.org http://www.Irn.org/basics/db050.shtml http://www.Irn.org/basics/dbweb.shtml http://www.Irn.org/basics/dbjournal.shtml http://www.Irn.org/pubs/wrr http://www.Irn.org/programs/india http://www.search.eb.com http://www.indiaexpress.com/embassy/indnepre12.html http://www.cgrer.uiowa.edu/servers/servers_references.html http://www.Irn.org/pubs/wrr http://www.mesc.usgs.gov http://www.web.pac.dfo/gc.ca/FHIP/mpo http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/ric http://www.nwrc.gov http://www.creativelinks.com/recreat http://www..dfw.state.or.us/ODFWhtml/InfoCntrFish http://www.gorp.com/gorp/interact/guests/will_ans.htm http://www.smallstreams.com http://www.fisheries.org http://www.wh.whoi.edu/fbi/age-man.html http://www.euronet.nl/users/mbleeker/progl/soflis_e.html http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/faoinfo/fishery/fishery.htm http://aquanic.org http://www.utexas.edu/depts/tnhc/. http://www/fish/tnhc/na/naindex.html http://www.mvk.usace.army.mil/edh/graphs.htm http://www.stream.fs.fed.us/fishxing http://www.stream.fs.fed.us/ http://www.ecostats.com http://www.nbii.gov/ Porter, M.D. (1999) Fishery Professionals on the Internet: Is It Worth the Trouble and Hype? Fisheries Vol. 24, No. 5 |