WA Department of Agriculture and Food

A project initiation and planning meeting was held in Nha Trang in August 2009, where all project participants attended and discussed implementation of the project. Following the project planning meeting, the first of a planned series of annual Regional Aquafeed Forums was held at the University of NhaTrang.
Follow-up visits by Dr Brett Glencross and Dr David Smith have taken place in November 2009 and March 2010, respectively, to address any arising concerns of the project partner participants.
During the November 2009 visit Dr Glencross was joined by a leading Australian feed extrusion consultant to begin the planning process for a series of training workshops to be held in Vietnam in 2010 and 2011. This opportunity was also used to provide direct extrusion advice on processing and feed formulation to Vietnamese feed companies.
Consistent with the project objectives, protocols have been developed for a series of information gathering exercises:
- Socioeconomic surveys of marine-fish, Mudcrab and Spiny Lobster farmers to understand the real and perceived limitations to the adoption of pelleted feeds.
- Feed mill survey to characterize the feed production industry and raw material options available locally in Vietnam
- Production survey and sample collections to underpin the development of growth models for each of the project core species (Asian seabass, Cobia, Grouper - Epinephelus coioidies and E. fuscoguttatus, Mudcrab and Spiny Lobster).
The protocols have been developed by the leader of the socio-economics component of the project (Dr Elizabeth Petersen) in close consultation with each of the collaborating partner country institutes. These protocols/survey forms have then been translated from English into Vietnamese by the lead institution (Mr Dinh Van Trung).
Progress in Vietnam in implementing these surveys has been delayed due to the late signoff of the project, but began in May 2010.
Work has begun on each of the components of the project that have been earmarked activity in Australia:
- To identify barriers to feed technology uptake by aquaculture sectors
- To define the protein and energy digestibility of suite of locally available and/or key raw materials
- To explore mechanistic elements of fish nutritional modelling systems
Several fish farmers and feed manufacturers have already been canvassed regarding the issues affecting fishmeal replacement technology in Australia for the production of diets for marine species. The outcomes of this survey will be used to guide the research priorities to address the issues that are most pertinent to each sector.
Two experiments have been conducted already to evaluate the nutrient and energy digestibilities of a suite of raw materials. The acquisition of digestibility data for these ingredients was identified as being highly desirable by the feed production sector in Australia during discussions with the Project Leader. These studies have also been used to add additional data and strength to NIRS calibrations so as to be able to use NIRS to estimate protein and energy digestibility of both ingredients and feeds.
The basis for a mechanistic model, that represents actual discrete biochemical processes in fish, is in the process of being constructed. This component of the project will require a range of empirical experiments to measure critical growth parameters of barramundi . The first of these experiments is due to begin in late 2010.

The aquaculture industry in Vietnam has grown rapidly since the country began its transition to a market economy, such that it is now a significant player in the world market for certain aquaculture products. As a result, it is addressing increasingly complex quality and food safety requirements from export markets as well as domestic concerns over the sustainability of the industry and its impacts on poverty alleviation.
Within its portfolio of aquaculture research in Vietnam, ACIAR has funded projects on developing low-cost diets for catfish and tilapia (FIS/2002/068) and mud crabs (FIS/2000/065). A third project focused on sustainable tropical spiny lobster aquaculture (FIS/2001/058). An extension of the lobster project is expected to include development of low-cost diets. All three projects focus on technical aspects of diet formulation. The overarching objective of this project is to examine the policy, institutional and economic constraints to the adoption of low-cost formulated diets developed in these technical projects.
In summary, the project is currently in a data collection phase. This phase is expected to last from March to July 2009, after which the project will focus on data analysis, economic modeling and report writing. A draft report for the project is expected to be completed in early October 2009, after which feedback from project participants will be sought and a final project workshop in Vietnam will be held to discuss and validate the project findings. The project is due for completion on the 31 December 2009.
Specific progress of the project can be measured against each of the project's five activities. The first activity is value chain analysis, where prices, costs and margins at each stage of the value chain will be analysed to indicate where the policy or institutional environment may be creating distortions. Initial value chains for the three fish species of focus (lobster, mud crab and tilapia) have been drafted, and data is currently being collected to extend and validate these draft value chains.
The second activity is whole-of-household economic modelling, based on the benefit cost technique. These models will be used to assess the cost-effectiveness of potential pelleted diets formulated in the ACIAR-funded technical projects compared with current diets, and to analyse the economic impacts of potential policy and institutional constraints on adoption of these diets. Draft whole-of-household economic models have been drafted for each focus species. Data is currently being collected to inform the model.
The third activity is project workshops. The first project workshop was held in Nha Trang, Vietnam in December 2008. Over twenty people attended the workshop, including 15 people from different regions within Vietnam, as well as Australian project partners. The workshop contributed significantly to debate about the potential policy, institutional and economic constraints to the adoption of ACIAR's project outcomes, and set direction for the future activities of the project. A second and final project workshop is expected to be held in late November/early December 2009 in Vietnam to present, discuss, validate and improve on the draft findings of the project.
The fourth activity is household surveys. Approximately 160 households will be surveyed to generate information on the economic viability of potential ACIAR-developed diets in a whole-of-household framework. It will also generate data on issues associated with the allocation of land and marine areas, and current and potential quality, food safety and environmental protection constraints to production. Three household questionnaires have been piloted and finalised (one for each focus species). The questionnaires are currently being administered, with the 160 household survey due to be completed in June 2009.
The fifth and final activity is the development of four case studies. The first three case studies are focussed on the potential impacts of various policies and regulations on the adoption of ACIAR-developed formulated diets. These case studies will focus on business environments, extension networks and trade. The fourth case study will analyse the catfish industry - specifically, how the catfish industry developed from small to large-scale production so that the drivers of this development can be identified and compared with potential development of the lobster, mud crab and tilapia industries. The semi-structured interview questions being used for the four case studies have been finalised and are currently being administered.

The issue of scale has become paramount for the effective evaluation of watershed development (WSD) programs. This study examines the effectiveness of WSD at meso-scale (1500-10000hectares) in Anantapur and Prakasam districts in Andhra Pradesh. The project enjoys the active support of the AP Department of Rural Development (DRD).
The project has taken the first steps to providing an integrated evaluation model including hydrologic, agronomic, environmental, economic and social equity issues. It is designed to have a number of stand alone input models and to deal with scale from the household to the village and through to the broader watershed scale. The full structure of the model can be obtained from the project team (geoff [dot] syme [at] ecu [dot] edu [dot] au). This model will guide future research and will be iteratively revised as our understanding of the multifaceted, interactive processes evolves and data collection and analysis continues.
Data are currently being gathered of watershed variables in the area, land use, groundwater and surface water resources, population characteristics and so on. A community survey has been prepared to establish WSD outcomes in terms of physical, natural, social, human and financial capitals, and how these change over time in response to climate variability and other drivers. The questionnaire is also designed to assess community resilience and address perceptions of equity and scale.

A] Socio-Economic Progress
Technical and socioeconomic pilots (intensive and extensive field visits) have been conducted in identified or selected districts of Kurnool, Anantapur and Prakasam districts. Two hydrological units were identified for the study. The sample villages were identified in each hydrological unit for carrying out the detailed socioeconomic and livelihood survey. Three program villages and one control village from each unit have been identified i.e., a total of 8 villages spreading over three districts (Table 1).
Villages have been selected at the Upstream; Mid-stream and Down-stream and a matching control village has been selected (Table 2). Qualitative and quantitative tools have been developed- Focus Group Discussions and a survey. Two questionnaires (one at the village level and the other at the household level) have been developed.
The field Instruments were piloted and revised to suit the integrated model and the socioeconomic data. Qualitative information was elicited using the Focus group discussions - four FGDs in each village i.e., a total of 24 FGDs The first round of data collection has been completed in all the sample villages covering 566 households. Data entry is complete.
[B] Hydrology and Land Use
Data on general information, land use, number of water harvesting structures, bore-well water levels and discharge volume, daily rainfall and crop water budgeting for the villages of the selected Hydrological Unit Networks has been procured from the NGO - BIRDS.
NGRI team has just completed the fieldwork at Prakasam and the Anantapur watershed. This included a complete well inventory, water level measurements as well as geophysical logging in the abandoned wells, interviewing people about the scenarios from the
last 15-20 years. The same data has been collected from the second watershed in Gooty. The pre-monsoon (minimum) groundwater levels have been collected and the post-monsoon (maximum) groundwater levels will be collected during the last part of this year. The team is working with DEEPA to clarify apparent data anomalies. Preliminary crop and water use data suitable for the Bayesian Network modelling has been collected.

[C] Integrated Outcomes
An integrated model is being developed that will incorporate crop production and water use and hydrological (surface water and groundwater) models in addition to knowledge gained from extensive household surveys in villages in two case study catchments. The integrated model is expected to link hydrology models with seasonal outputs from crop models. The outputs from the hydrology and crop model feed into socio-economic models together with relevant socio-economic data for the villages. Measures of equity and resilience will be developed to assess differences in outcomes between villages (e.g. upstream, downstream) and within villages (e.g. income groups, gender, land ownership, etc) and changes that over the modelled time period in response to (e.g.) hydrology scenarios. A schematic of the links and scale of the model components is shown below

All parties officially approved the project in late February 2009 whereupon the first tranche of funding was made available. Starting after this and working around the Indian General Election, the first inception meeting was held in May 2009, in Hyderabad. The meeting was used to establish a dialogue between the Andhra Pradesh Department of Rural Development (APDRD), NGOs operating in the sphere of Watershed Development (WSD), representatives from the Department of Primary Industry (Victoria) and the research team.
The meetings included the Special Commissioner, Rural Development, Dr. Tirupatiah, Mr Sri S Kishan Das, Joint Commissioner, Department of Rural Development, Ms. D.Kalpana, Asst.Project Coordinator,TSU, Office of the Special Commissioner, Rural Development, Ms. Damayanthi, Collector, Mahaboobnagar District, Mr Samuel, Asst. Project Director, District Water Management Agency (DWMA), Mahaboobnagar. The meeting included a detailed visit to the Jainallipur Watershed and village in Mahboobnagar District and an extended briefing and dialog at the DWMA office, Mahaboobnagar with the District & Mandal officials.
Interaction with APDRD and other state and local government groups provided insights into the most recent reforms to WSD including the extensive association and support to the program from the National Rural Employment Guarantee (NREG) scheme. The officials re-emphasised the urgency for institutional analysis in this field. Representatives from the APDRD expressed the view that the project should help inform the design of institutions required to deliver against the new national WSD framework. In that context the direct impacts of the project and the adoption pathways are likely to be more overt than originally planned.
To date, and with the assistance of APDRD, the research team has established a sampling frame for assembling case data. A range of other tasks have been distributed amongst the research group to progress the higher-order analysis of policy and its interpretation and implementation by state agencies.

The project is broadly on track with the original work plan. Some variation has occurred with more in-depth work on particular tasks. More time and effort was spent undertaking detailed case studies of a diverse sample of watersheds. This is expected to lead to a thorough understanding of the experience and the institutional processes and will thus be highly beneficial to the subsequent parts of the project. . The design of the survey instruments and the survey proper were postponed until the case study work was completed. The initial exploration for the case studies showed considerable diversity in the Watershed Development (WSD) program and its implementation. Accordingly, it was adjudged best not to deploy the wider empirical survey without a more detailed understanding of the nuances of each facet of the WSD program.
The project work started with meetings, presentations and field visits in Andhra Pradesh in May 2009 along with the AP-Department of Rural Development (APDRD) and the Indian and Australian researchers. This resulted in good working contacts and understanding.
A detailed set of case studies was completed in early 2010 and this formed the basis of a series of meetings, workshops and field visits held in Australia to enhance the knowledge and understanding of the institutional issues in watershed development for further study.
The invitees to these activities comprised the following:
Mr. K.Vidyasagar, I.F.S, Special Commissioner - Rural Development, AP
Mr. S.Kishan Das, Joint Commissioner - Rural Development, AP
Ms. M.Janaki, I.A.S - Project Director, DWMA, Chittoor, AP
Mr. M.Surender - Project Director, DWMA, Kurnool, AP
Dr. Alok Sikka, National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA), New Delhi
Prof. Vasant Gandhi, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad
Mr. Vaibhav Bhamoriya, Doctoral Student, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad
Dr. Floriane Clement, International Water Management Institute, Hyderabad, AP
The visit and meetings culminated in a symposium that formed part of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics (AARES) conference in Adelaide in February. In addition to providing a vehicle for interaction with Australia agencies and researchers (e.g. Murray-Darling Basin Authority; State water and catchment management agencies), the visit assisted in refining areas of overlap between Indian WSD policy and Australian policies in NRM and water. Representatives of sister ACIAR projects were also involved
Important synergies include the difficulties of enumerating natural resource outcomes against specific activities and gaps in the knowledge about institutional arrangements that deliver the best return for public investment in NRM. In this regard recent developments in the funding of catchment management organisations in Australia and the development of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan around ecological outcomes offered a useful basis for comparing WSD and sharing lessons in institutional design.
In addition to considering the efficacy of lower-order institutions (e.g. catchment and farmer groups in the Australian milieu) the project is also designed to include the impact of higher-order institutions in WSD in India. During the reporting period initial interviews with state and federal WSD offices were undertaken and this is presently being refined into a detailed report that focuses on potential gaps and weaknesses in the institutional hierarchy. This part of the work has been slightly delayed due to the ill-health of a core member of the IWMI research team.
The Andhra Pradesh Department of Rural Development (APDRD) remains intimately involved in the project and committed to the outcomes of the work, especially given the imperative for APDRD to implement WSD under new guidelines in the coming months. At the national level, the National Rainfed Area Authority (NRAA) was well-represented at the meetings in Australia and continues to strongly support the project.

Most elements of the project are on track although some delays have been experienced with particular components of the work. The collaboration with Indian Government officials and a strong working relationship with representatives of the AP government is a hallmark of this project. Accordingly, there are grounds for being optimistic about the adoption and integration of findings within the broader policy approaches to Watershed Development WSD)
Attempts have been made to synchronise the work with other projects funded by ACIAR in this domain. Coordination across projects remains a challenge, especially in light of the absence of dedicated resources to devote to this task and the differing work schedules.
An extensive data set comprising over 500 beneficiary households has now been assembled. The sample covers 3 districts in AP and 18 villages in total. Purposeful sampling has ensured that the data also cover differing WSD programs. These data capture the on-ground dimensions of different manifestations of WSD. Data input has been completed and preliminary empirical analysis commenced. Analysis of these data is expected to provide valuable insights to inform policy implementation as new guidelines are in the process of being executed.
The higher-level analysis is being managed by IWMI with oversight from the Project Leadership group. The activities assigned to IWMI under the project relate to Objective 2. Progress against this objective was delayed in 2010 in large part as a result of the ill-health of key personnel. Nonetheless a concerted effort has been made since November 2010 to expedite work and bring the work plan back to schedule. The draft of the report on high level institutions based on a comprehensive review of literature and official documentation has been completed and will be finalized by May 2011. A methodology for the analysis of watershed institutions has been developed. This method is based on the framework by Clement (2010). This approach is specifically tailored for analysing the governance of natural resources outlined in an article titled 'Analysing Decentralized Natural Resource Governance: Proposition for a "politicized" IAD framework Clement, F. (2010) 'Analysing Decentralised Natural Resource Governance: Proposition for a "politicised" IAD framework', Policy Sciences, 43, (2), pp. 129-156.
. The methodology will be appropriately modified and documented as an output on research methodology of this project.
Efforts pertaining to the Australian components of the work have been slightly modified, in response to emerging policy challenges. Originally, the project was expected to hone in on the institutional dilemmas attending natural resource management generally and the related federalism issues faced by regional catchment management organisations. While this remains an important focus, the research team has also sort to apply institutional design principles, specifically in the context of environmental water and the Murray-Darling Basin Plan. This is likely to have strong synergies with the WSD program where the question of nested governance arrangements is still unresolved. In the case of the Murray-Darling Basin the key issue is the extent and manner in which federal, state and local authorities can effectively deliver on-ground improvements to natural assets via environmental watering. In addition to adding to the currency of the project, this approach has also provided a wider audience for the WSD project. More specifically, the interest in the MDB Plan has provided opportunities to bring other researchers into contact with the WSD policy approach in AP.