Accra, March 29, GNA - A three-day technical workshop to map out strategies to increase the production and management of fish stocks in tropical rivers in Africa opened in Accra on Tuesday.

The workshop is part of an international initiative called "Challenge Program on Water and Food", which was launched in 2002 to promote food and environmental security by increasing productivity of water used in agricultural related activities while securing essential ecosystems services and biodiversity.

The projects are currently being carried out in nine river basins Worldwide, including those of the Nile, Limpopo and Volta in Africa. Dr Eddie Abban, Head of Fisheries at the Water Research Institute (WRI) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), said the Project was looking at how to improve fisheries productivity in the reservoirs aside their primary purposes of hydroelectric power generation, irrigation farming and flood control.

"We are working currently on how to maximize such gains in the Volta and Nile reservoirs within a common framework," he said. Dr Abban said the workshop would develop new initiatives that would help to increase the productivity of the Nile and Volta and also enhance current management efforts.

Dr Charles Biney, Director of WRI, said Ghana had developed a draft national water policy to ensure an integrated approach to water resources management through access to safe drinking water and sanitation facilities, availability of water in sufficient quantities for cultivation of food crops among other things.

He expressed the hope that the Programme would take note of existing opportunities available in the water sector to improve on the quality of life for the ordinary African.

Experts from primary inland fishery research and management institutions in Egypt and Ghana are attending the workshop.