Aquatic Ecosystems and Development

The EU funded FISHSTRAT project on a holistic approach to sustainable reservoir and lacustrine fisheries in three tropical Asian countries. It encompasses the broad research context and the projects origin and rationale of research. The study linked three diverse disciplines, namely limnology, fisheries and socio-economic development. The importance of such holistic, catchment-oriented approaches to research and management is increasingly widely recognised The five water bodies considered are: Minneriya, Udawalawe and Victoria reservoirs in Sri Lanka, Ubolratana reservoir in Thailands Khon Kaen Province, and Lake Taal, a natural volcanic lake south of Manila on Luzon Island in the Philippines. These selected reservoirs represent a wide range of productivities and trophic structures of fish communities, as well as a variety of direct and indirect impacts from human activities in their respective catchment areas. This enabled us to understand better the impact of limited biological productivity upon commercial fish yields as well as the extent of any unexploited fish populations. The volume provides a comprehensive overview of the principal research findings and policy conclusions, structured broadly in line with our objectives and the implications of our interdisciplinary and comparative methodology. The 22 chapters following the Introduction are divided into six sections, on the basis of coherence and progressively increasing degrees of interdisciplinary integration and comparative analysis. The Section A (Chapters 1-4) provides gen