History of marine research in Lakshadweep

Abstract

The Lakshadweep consisting of a number of islands, islets and submerged reefs lie scattered in the vast Arabian sea on the west coast of India. This geographic isolation has been a major impediment to maintain status quo with the progress and developmental activities on the mainland. Of recent, the stress has been to achieve a conduce growth of the economy of the islanders so as to improve their standard of living. Besides agriculture the traditional source of livelihood of the islanders is fishing which plays an important role in the economy. Since the land area is limited, the scope for large scale development of land based industries and agriculture is meagre, the future programmes have to be centred on the exploitation of marine living resources. Ever since human settlement in these islands a variety of marine living resources available in the lagoons and in the surrounding oceanic waters have been in different state of exploitation, mostly in a primitive way. Significant strides have been made in the field of fisheries thanks to the various developmental activities carried out by the Department of Fisheries, Lakshadweep. The Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute also has played a key role in research, development and management of the fisheries. Now, the various activities in research, development and management are anxious to break out of the introversion displayed so far.