Quảng Ninh: “Sustainable marine farming development conference – Perspectives from Quảng Ninh” attracts over 400 delegates

The “Sustainable marine farming development conference – Perspectives from Quảng Ninh,”  was held in the morning of April 1st by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) in association with the Quảng Ninh province.

The conference welcomed over 400 delegates who engaged in discussions, exchanges, and sharing of experiences regarding environmental improvement outcomes, resource exploitation for the development of aquaculture in Quảng Ninh province in recent years.

Quảng Ninh boasts a coastline stretching over 250 km, with more than 40,000 hectares of tidal flats, nearly 19,000 hectares of mangrove forests, 20,000 hectares of sea straits and bays… presenting great potential for the development of aquaculture.

The province has so far planned over 45,000 ha of sea areas for aquaculture, with a total area under aquaculture exploitation reaching over 42,300 hectares, following high technology, environmentally friendly approaches, integrated with the development of tourism services, industry, and safeguarding maritime sovereignty and security.

The province has successfully transitioned from small-scale, scattered economic production models to multi-stakeholder value chain linkage models, integrating production with deep processing and product consumption.

Over the past 10 years (2013-2023), the province’s aquaculture output has increased from 89,000 tons to over 175,000 tons. The province has effectively utilized its advantages in the tourism market with over 20 million visitors annually for the consumption and on-site export of seafood products.

Quảng Ninh is also the first locality in the country to issue standards for the use of floating materials in aquaculture. By the end of 2023, the province had successfully converted 10 million foam buoys to HDPE plastic buoys for environmentally friendly assurance, while maintaining a mangrove forest cover rate of over 55%, making it the province with the largest mangrove forest area in the North.

In his opening speech at the conference, Secretary of the Quảng Ninh Provincial Party Committee Nguyễn Xuân Ký stated that the province’s perspective is to develop a blue economy, sustainably utilizing marine resources to drive economic growth, improve livelihoods for people, ensure the health of marine and ocean ecosystems, without trading environmental resources for growth, and the development of the blue economy.

VFM