During the First Stakeholders Meeting held in Brussels on 22 March 2007 fish breeding challenges for the future were defined by Hervé Chavanne from Istituto Lazzaro Spallanzani. Hervé defined the current focus of breeding activities as growth, fillet quality, external appearance, sexual maturity, processing traits and disease resistance.
Hervé defined the emerging challenges as:
- Include new traits in the selection indexes
- Develop robust animals suited to farming conditions
- Reduce the environmental impact of farming
- Raise the public awareness of breeding practices
- Integrate genomic tools in new selection strategies
- Appraise genetic gain through benchmarking
The Aquabreeding project involves 6 industrial representatives and 5 research organisations representing the major European aquaculture species. The Aquabreeding website includes an array of excellent resources including recent information on breeding and genetics for the major fish species farmed in Europe.
The species reviews provide breeding information and give an overview of knowledge gaps for each major species in order to define industrial research priorities. Typically 10 -14 pages, the species reviews provide state of the art of breeding and reproduction for major aquaculture species. Each review contains a list of references. The species covered by the reviews include: Atlantic Salmon, Rainbow Trout, Seabream, Seabass, Common Carp, Charrs, Atlantic Cod, Brown Trout, Turbot, Tilapia, Wrasse and Sturgeon.
People interested in the work conducted through this project can sign up to receive additional information as the project progresses.
Hervé’s presentation from March 2007 may be viewed here.
