AWARD FOR COLOMBIAN CHAMPION (Premio para el campeón colombiano)

AWARD FOR COLOMBIAN CHAMPION (Premio para el campeón colombiano)

The story of Ruth Uribe Quintero in aquaculture began in 2007. Through her passion, training and hard work Ruth became the president of the association AMENM (Asociación de Mujeres Esperanza Nueva La Murraposa) (Women’s Association the Murraposa Nueva Esperanza).

AMENM began as an initiative of 60 rural women in the city of Ibagué, Tolima, Colombia, aimed at improving the quality of life of the members and their families by generating revenue through the implementation of aquaculture projects.  This Association promotes value added tilapia aquaculture in the rural Tolima Region of Colombia, and is a platform for other aquaculture family farm producers (with limited resources) to increase farming capacity and process, income and nutrition. This is a women only project with fish ponds and one building for processing.  They created a collective and include other producers in the Tolipez region.

First Award for Latin America

Veronica Esquivel Medina

Aquaculture without Frontiers is very pleased to announce that Veronica Esquivel Medina from Mazatlán, Mexico is our Woman of the Month for July. This is the first such award presented to anyone in Latin America.

A current leader for all women who are working in the fisheries and aquaculture sector in Mexico, Veronica is an example of hard work, honesty and collaboration. She is always involved in young professionals’ career development and everyone seeks her out for her advice.

The Ultimate Sacrifice

The AwF Women’s Network decided to break with the regular Woman of the Month Award for June and dedicate the June 2015 award to Paula Kantor, someone who has made the ultimate sacrifice in her untiring efforts with WorldFish on the gender transformative approach and specifically through work in Bangladesh and Zambia.

We appreciate the link with aquaculture is somewhat tenuous but our Network was greatly saddened to read about Paula’s death on May 13, in the aftermath of a terrorist attack on the hotel where she was staying in Kabul, Afghanistan. Authorities said she was staying at the Park Palace Hotel when it was stormed by Taliban gunmen, sparking a siege that left 14 people, including nine foreigners, dead.

We therefore announce this special posthumous award in lieu of Woman of the Month.

Celebrating Buddha’s Birthday

Aquaculture without Frontiers has a big week being an affiliate of World Aquaculture Society and heavily engaged in WA2015 which starts on 26 May in Jeju, an incredibly beautiful and popular island in South Korea.

We happened to have arrived in Jeju at the beginning of South Korea’s 4-day birthday celebrations for Buddha. There are many quotable sayings from Buddha but perhaps we will focus on “Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” This epitomizes the AwF spirit.

The AwF week in Jeju starts on 27 May with our involvement in the session on The Women in Aquaculture/Fisheries session which includes AwF/WAS-APC Travel Grant awardees Nantaporn Sutthi, Gladys Ludevese Pascual, Mya Zin Oo who will be involved in a panel session with Jennifer Cobcroft, Maymyat Noelwin, Bibha Kumari, Arlene Nietes-Satapornvanit, Pui Amornat Boochuay et al and this will be followed by Presentations by AwF for Women of the Month Awards to Dr Jennifer Cobcroft (Dec 2014); Dr T.V. Anna Mercy (Feb 2015); May Myat Noe Lwin (March 2015) and Ass Professor Arlyn Mandas (May 2015). Unfortunately Dr Flower Ezekiel Msuya (Apr 2015) will not be in attendance. At this event we will also announce the June 2015 winner.

Award for Filipina Champion

Arlyn with fish farmers

Professor Arlyn Mandas has been selected as the AwF Woman of the Month for May 2015. We honour Arlyn in working with the Aquaculture Department, College of Fisheries, Mindanao State University in the Philippines for the last 20 years, engaging with the aquaculture students and assisting the rural and urban people whose livelihood is fish farming.

Arlyn works with the objective of helping the fish farmers attain continuous improvement in both production and profit. Through the Consultancy for Agricultural Productivity Enhancement (CAPE) Program of the Government of the Philippines-Department of Science and Technology (DOST), Arlyn has helped over 250 fish farmers in Region XII alone, excluding her involvement in other regions of the country. Constantly and actively involved in the on-going aquaculture research of the United Nations-Food and Agriculture Organization (UN-FAO) in the Philippines as a national consultant Arlyn is ‘making a difference’.

Travel Grant Selection Finalised

Three well deserving female candidates are now planning their trip to Jeju as a result of this excellent competition but regrettably many other excellent applicants missed out.

The applications roared in and the judges completed their task. Their report states “We all remarked on the high standard of all applications making the contest extremely close and thank all those who entered as they made our task as Judges extremely difficult.”

The two students selected were Nantaporn Sutthi and Gladys Ludevese Pascual and the mature age person selected was Mya Zin Oo. 

Flower for April

Lecturing to students and teachers in seaweed farm area in Zanzibar, Tanzania

April is either spring or Fall/Autumn depending on your hemisphere. Either way the period has a strong connection with all species of flower and it so happens that this month AwF can celebrate a very remarkable Flower – Dr. Flower Ezekiel Msuya.

This month we honour our first African continent Woman of the Month, Dr. Msuya from Tanzania, for the work she has done consistently for many years in research and promotion of aquaculture, especially seaweeds.

Flower started working as a Research Officer with the Tanzania Fisheries Research Institute in 1986-1988 and is now working as a Senior Researcher at the Institute of Marine Sciences of the University of Dar es Salaam in Zanzibar, Tanzania.

Unique, Refreshing and a Very Special Person

The month of March is a special time as we get to enjoy and promote International Woman’s Day (8 March) and so it is with great pleasure and pride that we announce that Aquaculture without Frontiers (AwF) Woman of the Month for March is May Myat Noe Lwin, known affectionately as Noe Noe.

Both supporters of the nomination Professor Kevin Fitzsimmons and Dr Antonio Garza d’Yta were unanimous in their praise for the enormous efforts of this young lady who has a burning desire to assist her birthplace country, Myanmar, to embrace and engage Aquaculture as a major primary activity.

Nicki Holmyard and Jenny Cobcroft (December Woman of the Month) were both encouraged to go to Myanmar over the last few months by Noe Noe and she has been one of the main instigators in gaining recent projects for the country.

Travel Grants for Jeju

Aquaculture without Frontiers is pleased to announce the opportunity for females engaged in aquaculture to apply for travel grant funding kindly provided by WAS-APC for their members.* This is the opportunity to attend World Aquaculture 2015 in Jeju 26-30 May 2015.

There are three (3) grants available x USD1500 which are aimed to cover accommodation and travel and WAS-APC will organise registration at the event. Two (2) of the grants are expressly for female students and the third is for a mature age female who works in aquaculture.

The applicant must be willing to serve and assist at the WAS-APC Booth – rostered as per arrangements and to be prepared to be part of a panel involved in the Women in Aquaculture & Fisheries session at WA2015. This panel will discuss experiences of women in the aquaculture/fisheries area.

Applications close on Friday 3 April (close of business) 2015 and can be made via Application APC-AwF-Jeju.

*WAS-APC Membership

AwF on the move for the next period

‘AwF on the Move for the Next Period‘ has been published in the March 2015 edition of the World Aquaculture Magazine.

It has been crafted as a follow-up from the excellent article written by Michael New which explained the important first ten years of AwF.

There was a need to explain to those involved in the early days of AwF that whilst the modus-operandi has changed from the those days, the Mission and Vision for the organisation has not.

We are working on a new sustainable model and hopefully this article goes some way to explaining the concept .