During the past three decades, the Freshwater Fisheries Research Center of Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences (FFRC) has provided training to a large number of foreign officials and technicians, disseminating China's fishery technology to the world.
In 1978, the expert team from FAO made an inspection on China's aquaculture industry, giving high comments on China's sustainable development of fishery and its cost effective aquaculture technology. The team found China's relevant technology was worth extending to other developing nations. As a result, upon the proposal of the expert team and the approval of the Chinese Government, the Asia-Pacific Regional Research and Training Center for Integrated Fish Farming (IFFC) was established with FFRC as a platform to conduct research and training on fish farming.
IFFC's training course started in 1981, with trainees from all nations in the Asia-Pacific Region, providing an important channel to extend China's fish farming technology to the other parts of the world. In 1992, the Center was incorporated into China's system for foreign aid, committing to training technicians and management personnel on fish farming for other developing nations. After the China-Africa Cooperation Forum in 2004, the Center has enhanced the training for trainees from African countries under specific cooperation and training programmes. In the past three decades, over 1,300 technicians from more than 80 countries have been trained by the Center, a rare achievement for a training institution in China.
China has led the world in aquaculture technology, with constant improvement in the past three decades. IFFC has aimed at extending practical technologies, combining classroom lectures with field practices to help the trainees apply what they learn in the courses to production.
Meanwhile, the Center has also sent experts to recipient countries for technological guidance winning high praises. In total, more than 50 terms of training courses have been conducted to produce management personnel and technicians of fisheries to the whole world.
