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The Passing of Dr. Mostafa Hossain

Dr. Mostafa Ali Reza Hossain – or Ranu, as he was known to many friends – was born on 16th March, 1967 in the district of Chapainawabgonj in Northwest Bangladesh. Mostafa completed a BSc in Fisheries from Bangladesh Agricultural University (BAU) in 1990, and an MSc and PhD from the University of Stirling, UK, in 1998, where he studied optimal rearing conditions for catfish. He subsequently completed a post-doctoral fellowship on fish biodiversity in Kyoto University, Japan, and a Fulbright Fellowship at the University of Washington, USA, conducting innovative research on microplastics pollution in freshwater ecosystems.

From 1992, Mostafa worked at BAU’s Department of Aquaculture, serving as a professor for much of his career, including 2 years as the Head of the Department of Fisheries Biology and Genetics. During this time, he led or contributed to around 20 research projects, authored close to 100 journal articles, books and book chapters, and supervised numerous Masters and PhD students. He also served as a general secretary of Bangladesh Fisheries Research Forum, and as a member of the committee responsible for compiling the IUCN red list for Bangladesh.

A recent photo taken in Cox’s Bazar. Photo taken by: Nahiduzzaman Md.

Mostafa was one of the foremost experts on freshwater fish taxonomy in Bangladesh. His passion for documenting and sharing knowledge on the fish fauna of Bangladesh led him to establish singlehandedly a Fish Museum and Biodiversity Center on the BAU campus, where one of the main exhibits is a series of beautiful photographs of freshwater fishes that Mostafa painstakingly compiled himself over a period of many years. To help conserve and restore freshwater biodiversity, Mostafa created an experimental fish sanctuary in a branch of the Old Brahmaputra close to BAU campus that successfully enhanced fish stocks in the surrounding area.

Alongside his deep appreciation for and understanding of fish biology and ecology, Mostafa was fascinated by people, including those dependent on fish for their livelihoods and sustenance. His empathy, inquisitiveness, intelligence, approachability, and gentle and dignified demeanor made him an exceptional field researcher, capable of striking up conversation with and eliciting deep information from people from all fields of life. His talents in both technical and qualitative research, along with his wide-ranging interests and intellectual curiosity made him a natural trans-disciplinarian, equally at home and happy thinking and talking about fish biology and aquatic ecology, farm management and fishing practices, or wellbeing and culture.

Mostafa was dedicated both to living a good life, and to improving the lives of others. He helped to set up and raise funds for a night school at BAU campus for orphans and working children. His warmth, energy, enthusiasm, and generosity of spirit also enriched the lives of the many students, colleagues and friends fortunate enough to have known him. He was widely considered a ‘walking encyclopedia’ – the first person to turn to for information in all matters related to fish – but also recognized for his wisdom and good counsel and kindness and care in all other matters. He was someone to be listened to and trusted and learned from and admired and emulated.

The Someshwari, one of Mostafa’s favorite rivers in Bangladesh. Photo taken by: Nahiduzzaman Md.

All these qualities made Mostafa central of the Dried Fish Matters project. His early research on dried fish value chains in Bangladesh with colleagues from WorldFish provided much of the initial inspiration for the DFM project proposal. He was a cornerstone of the DFM Bangladesh country team, as well as a regular and active participant in DFM global, where he was a source of encouragement for many members of the wider project team.

Mostafa’s life was cut tragically short on January 29, when he suffered a massive heart attack on BAU campus. He will be deeply missed by all of those whose life he touched, but his legacy will continue through his work, and the work of the very many people to whom he served as a mentor and an inspiration. He was a beautiful soul in life, and will always be remembered fondly, with great love, affection, and respect.

Obituary written by Ben Belton, Nahiduzzaman Md., Samsul Alam, and Shakuntala Thilsted on behalf of Dried Fish Matters

Mostafa with DFM friends and colleagues on the last day of the Gender in Aquaculture and Fisheries Conference, Cochin, November 23rd 2022
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DFM Student Wins SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship

Our sincerest congratulations to Colleen Cranmer for her success in winning a SSHRC Doctorate Fellowship. Colleen will be conducting research as part of the Dried Fish Matters project in Cambodia. Her current working title is ” The Dried Fish Economy in the Tonlé Sap Region of Cambodia. Understanding How Women Contribute to Rural Livelihood Resiliency in an Uncertain and Changing Environment”.

Colleen’s research will explore the dried fish economy in Cambodia; to understand how household livelihoods depend upon dried fish and what this could mean for their future under changing and uncertain conditions. Her research will use socio-ecological resilience thinking embedded with a gendered analysis to deepen the understanding of how socio-ecological changes affect different groups and the complexity of gender relations, power, and agency amongst resource users. The research will take place at Tonlé Sap Lake and Floodplain,  one of the world’s most productive, fish-abundant freshwater ecosystems. The Lake is experiencing numerous anthropogenic stressors, limiting livelihood capabilities for the millions of Cambodians living in the region. Fieldwork will include interviews with local people currently involved in fish processing, those who have left fish processing, and market questionnaires with those selling dried fish products.

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E-book Prelaunch Announcement

We are pleased to announce the upcoming E-book by the Dried Fish Matters Partnership which will celebrate the cultural value of dried fish as food, alongside its social and economic value for development and sustainability. The volume consists of essays, recipes, stories, and reflections contributed by members of our research partnership. It provides a commentary on why dried fish matters – to researchers, to the communities in which dried fish is produced and consumed, and to the gastronomic heritage of humanity.

The book will be released as part of the TBTI Global Book Series later this year. In the meantime, we offer an appetizer in the form of a video from Dried Fish Matters in celebration of Sustainable Gastronomy Day on June 18, 2022.

Learn more: http://toobigtoignore.net/dried-fish-matters-exploring-the-social-economy-of-dried-fish/

Link to the Sustainable Gastronomy Day video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6woaG8hVME

In addition to the book, we would also like to share a recipe that our colleague over at the Hungrylankan.com, Roshani Wickramasinghe made. Please enjoy the delicious dish, Dried Queenfish with Coconut Milk!

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News

In Memoriam: Paul Onyango

Paul Onyango (1970-2022)

This April, the SSF community lost a dear friend and colleague, Paul Onyango. Paul was a passionate campaigner for the rights of small-scale fishing communities who believed in the power of “invisible presences” in dealing with poverty.

We invite members of the DFM community to celebrate Paul’s memory and commemorate his contributions to the world of SSF research. Professor Svein Jentoft, Paul’s academic supervisor, has written a tribute on behalf of TBTI that you can read here: http://toobigtoignore.net/a-tribute-to-paul-onyango/.

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News Research

Dried Fish: The Journal Article

We are very excited to announce the publication of “Dried fish at the intersection of food science, economy, and culture: A global survey” in the journal Fish and Fisheries. This major literature survey from the Dried Fish Matters project is the result of a collaborative effort to catalogue and analyze more than 1100 publications directly concerning dried fish.

Our survey demonstrates the important and varied nature of the contributions that dried fish make to the food and nutrition security, health, livelihoods, and social and cultural well-being of people around the world. Among the three thematic categories of food, economic, and cultural values that we elaborate in this survey, we find the dried fish literature most heavily focused on food value, followed by economic value. The importance of social relational and aesthetic values of dried fish for consuming populations thus merit much greater attention. Other major lacunae are the ecological relations on which dried fish economies depend and attention to questions of political economy and governance that are required to assure the sector continues to supply adequate, nutritious, and safe foods, in ways that are sustainable and just. Without the sustainability of fisheries as a natural resource, all values of dried fish are undermined.

Thematic clusterThemesExamples of subthemesItems in dried fish sample
Food valueFood scienceFood and nutrition security and healthFood safetyChemical analysisDerivative product development75% (N = 851)
Economic valueValue chains, economy, and labourEcologyInternational tradeLabourValue chainsMicroeconomicsPolitical ecology23% (N = 264)
Cultural heritage valueCulture and social relationsHistory and changeCultureSocial relationsWell-beingFood and cookingGender18% (N = 208)
Thematic hierarchy. Percentages indicate the proportion of all references that are tagged with themes that fall within the thematic cluster. As references may be given multiple tags from across the thematic areas, percentages in this column do not total 100%

This Open Access paper is available to read and download free of charge from publisher website.

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The paper is accompanied by several online resources, including the active Zotero library, full bibliographic dataset for our dried fish sample, source graphs generated by an online query engine, and software tools developed for the review.

Thematic intersections in the literature on dried fish: Major themes and illustrative questions suggested by the literature survey (click to enlarge)

Abstract

Dried fish—here defined broadly as aquatic animals preserved using simple techniques, such as sun-drying, salting, fermentation, and smoking that permit storage as foods at ambient temperature for extended periods without specialized packaging—have received little direct attention in fisheries research. This lack of visibility belies their historical and contemporary importance. Prior to the introduction of refrigeration, dried fish were the main form in which fisheries catches were traded and consumed. Dried fish products remain a core component of production, trade, diets, and cuisines across the world, particularly in the Global South. The dried fish sector provides employment for millions of people, particularly women, who comprise most of the fish-drying workforce in many locations. However, the sector also confronts and creates significant challenges including food safety concerns and exploitative labour conditions. This paper is the first systematic assessment of the global literature on dried fish, comprised of a sample of >1100 references. In contrast to the general fisheries literature, which is dominated by studies of ecology and governance and focusses mainly on primary production, the dried fish literature is dominated by studies from food science and concentrates on the processing segment of fish value chains. As such, it offers valuable reference point for fisheries research, which is becoming increasingly attentive to food systems. This paper uncovers a wealth of insights buried in this largely unheralded literature, and identifies key thematic intersections, gaps and research questions that remain to be addressed in the study of dried fish.

Reference

Belton, Ben, Derek Johnson, Eric Thrift, Jonah Olsen, Mostafa Hossain, and Shakuntala Thilsted. 2022. “Dried Fish at the Intersection of Food Science, Economy, and Culture: A Global Survey.” Fish and Fisheries. https://doi.org/10.1111/faf.12664.

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DFM Infographic

University of Ottawa graduate student Colleen Cranmer created this infographic to present the goals and achievements of the SSHRC-funded Dried Fish Matters Partnership, which will be supporting her research in Cambodia. Thanks to Colleen for building awareness of our Partnership and its impacts!

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Research

Institutional Context of Marine Fisheries in Gujarat

This paper is the first among the series of analytical write-ups that we plan to bring out as part of the Gujarat regional component of the Dried Fish Matters research project. In this paper we review some of the major policies and institutional arrangements that are critical for understanding the social economy of fisheries, especially marine fisheries, in the state. The paper is divided into two sections. In section one, we present a brief overview of the trajectory of the evolution of fisheries sector policies at the national level since they broadly define the context of our discussion. In section two, we will elaborate on the Gujarat case. Our focus here will be to interrogate the broader philosophy that guides Gujarat’s approach to fisheries development in recent years.

Location of Gujarat in India. Wikimedia Commons / File:Gujarat_in_India.svg / CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Gujarat is a major maritime state in India with a long and rich history of trans-oceanic trade relationships. The state has also been a major marine fish producer in India ever since it was reorganized as a separate linguistic state in 1960. It is one of the last maritime states to have enacted the marine fishery regulation focused on the development of the sector. The Gujarat Fisheries Act 2003 provides for the protection, conservation, and development of fisheries as well as regulation of fishing in the inland and territorial waters along the coastline of the state.

The Office of the Commissioner of Fisheries, located within the Department of Agriculture, Farmers’ Welfare, and Cooperation of the government of Gujarat, is the nodal department for the regulation and development of fishing activities in the state. The Department regulates the registration of fishing boats (as per Merchant Shipping Act, 1958) and granting of fishing licenses (as per Gujarat Fisheries Act, 2003).

The Gujarat Fisheries Central Co-operative Association Limited (GFCCA), the apex body of the fishermen cooperatives in the state, is the main agency that implements the fishery development projects in the state and the chief conduit for the flow of governmental and institutional assistance to the fisherfolk.            

An important policy initiative taken by the state government that can positively impact Gujarat’s fisheries industry is the framing of a policy for agro-business development (the Comprehensive Agro-Business (AB) Policy – 2016-21) and the Chief Minister’s Mission on Food Processing. The CMFP mission underscores the importance of food and nutritional security and food safety and promises to add capacities to the system through capital infusion, technology transfer, skill upgradation as also enhance employment opportunities on a wider scale.  This is an opportune moment to get some of the long-neglected concerns of small-scale producers engaged in low-end processing of fish, including curing/drying included in the state’s agenda.

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You can find a list of all reports published by Dried Fish Matters on our “Working Papers” page: https://driedfishmatters.org/pub/dfm-working-papers.html.

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Research

Key locations of dried fish processing and trade in Bangladesh

The DFM Bangladesh team, consisting of researchers from Bangladesh Agricultural University and Jahangirnagar University, has produced a study mapping the key locations for dried fish processing and trade in Bangladesh.

The dried fish sector of Bangladesh contributes significantly to the country’s economy. Processing and trading activities are spread across Chittagong, Cox’s Bazar, Sylhet-Mymensingh-Comilla and Khulna-Barisal-Patuakhali regions. The DFM Bangladesh research team visited each of these sites to identify its overall importance and unique characteristics.  

Key locations include Nazirar Tek (marine processing), Asadgonj (trade), the drying yards of the Sunamgonj Haor basin and Chalan Beel areas (freshwater drying), and Lalpur (the largest fermentation site). These sites were recommended for in-depth research on the dried fish economy in relation to factors including production/trade volume, stakeholders involved, and cross-cutting issues like gender, labour, ecological sustainability, and vulnerability. Dublar Char was recommended for follow-up research due to its remoteness, production volume, and distinct issues of child and bonded labour.

File:DFM RPT BGL-Key-location-report 2022-03 1.png
Key locations of fish processing and trade in Bangladesh

Key findings

There are four general categories of dried fish processing and trading sites in Bangladesh.

  • Drying (marine fish) yards: Marine drying operations are referred to as “Khola” or “Kila”, which often shift based on raw material availability, accessibility, landing facilities, and other physical conveniences. The drying season varies slightly from site to site.
  • Drying (freshwater) yards: Women and children labourers are widely involved in the fish processing process. Many of these workers remain unpaid, especially in the case of household labour supporting dangi owners or managers.
  • Fermenting (marine & freshwater) yards: There are hundreds of women mainly involved in processing puti (cutting and gutting) in Lalpur.
  • Trading (marine & freshwater) centers: Dried fish produced in Bangladesh is traded through a relatively small number of assembly markets.

Unequal power relationships in the dried fish value chain is a significant area of concern to be addressed in future studies. Producers have little to no influence over marketing and supply, which are controlled by large-scale traders, brokers, and supermarket companies. Price distortions in the domestic market, created by these large-scale actors, erode profitability for primary producers.

Marine fish drying on stages in Nazirar Tek. Photo – MH

Reference

Hossain, M A R, Mirza Taslima Sultana, Sayeed Ferdous, Md. Samsul Alam, Rasheda Akhtar, Md. Siddiqur Rahman, Md. Shahjahan, and Mahmudul H Sumon. 2022. “Key Locations: Dry Fish Processing and Trading in Bangladesh.” Working Paper 10. Dried Fish Matters. The University of Manitoba / Bangladesh Agricultural University / Jahangirnagar University. 

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