APPENDIX 1
THE AQUILA PROJECT

Operations

The FAO-Italian Government Regional Project (AQUILA), which operated from 1987 to 1989, conducted the activities listed at the end of this appendix (page 30). This is followed by a list of published (page 32) and to-be-published (page 33) papers. Figures 1 and 2 illustrate how the project operates as a regional body and its direct or sub-project relations with individual countries. The figures also indicate the information and input/output flows among the various components involved. Figure 3 summarizes the geographical distribution of the main project activities, which are grouped into courses (regional or national), workshops, research and activities related to the Sistema de Referencia sobre la Investigación en Acuicultura (SIRIAC: “Reference System for Aquaculture Research”).

The programme implemented comprised sub-projects that generally corresponded to activities of the various national programmes. AQUILA selected these sub-programmes and provided them with technical and financial support on the basis of needs and achievements that were often common to numerous countries, which broadened the scope of assistance. In other words, the training, research and information activities promoted by the Project as a catalyst, channelled the respective national resources and capacities for the benefit of the entire region.

Project interventions took the form of:

1. Fixed staff and consultants. The project strategy was to employ a limited number of experts on a regular basis so as to make more funds available for the recruitment of local staff. The main advantage of this strategy was the flexibility it permitted, for this approach considerably broadened the range of accessible disciplines and special fields. An additional benefit was the fact that the project was able to tap the technical, institutional, social, etc., knowledge of each consultant. Concerning the large number of capable experts found in the region, the system adopted allowed this pool of expertise to be tapped and activated region-wide, including as it did all the countries.

   On the administrative level, consultants who were more closely and regularly involved in project operations were contracted through the “when actually employed” system. This enabled the project to employ consultants for a certain number of pre-established days according to its needs. A small number of these consultants, located in areas and countries of major importance for aquaculture in the region, in practice served as project representatives and, as such, contributed effectively to operations.

2. Support mechanisms. The regional activities were designed in agreement with the national institutions responsible for their execution and management and with the help of the project staff. Agreement was reached on the objectives, procedures, execution time frame, expected results and resources earmarked. Letters of agreement were signed between the institutions (not necessarily governmental, but necessarily non-profit organizations), and the Project defining their respective obligations. FAO Headquarters delegated the necessary authority to the Project for this purpose. The resources committed to achieve the objectives comprised:

   1. Resources provided by the host institutions (always and exclusively in kind) in the form of facilities, equipment, local staff, organization, logistics, administration and management;

   2. Resources provided by the Project in the form of direct support of the Project staff, consultants (almost exclusively from the region), technical information, training material and the publication of information and findings generated during the course of implementation (manuals, research summaries, etc.);

   3. Direct financial support from the Project to cover: the remuneration of auxiliary staff, wage increments for the national institution staff involved (incentives), travel and expenses, a contribution towards the acquisition of consumer goods, research and training materials, fuel, a contribution towards equipment maintenance, fellowships, study trips, the preparation and distribution of training and information resources (leaflets, slides, audio-visual material).

As was noted by the Project Evaluation Mission, in its last two years of operation the Project introduced a network of activities involving numerous national institutions who were therefore able to make better use of (and at times, to reactivate) their resources and capabilities. This exercise was in fact TCDC-oriented in terms of its objectives, though not in terms of its means of operation. In effect, the approach was substantially economic and intended to achieve concrete results, and not based on the ideological precepts of utopian Third World cooperation.

Outputs

The relatively brief period of operation of the AQUILA Project precludes an assessment of its impact on the development objectives. However, in addition to certain quantifiable results (see Figure 3 taken from the Project Terminal Report), a measure of its effectiveness can be gleaned from the declarations of support and acceptance made on various occasions and in numerous fora by a majority of the countries of the region:

• Fifth Session of COPESCAL. June 1988. Panama.

• Twentieth FAO Regional Conference for Latin America and the Caribbean. October 1988, Recife, Brazil.

• Eighteenth Session of the Committee on Fisheries (COFI). April 1989, Rome.

• FAO-Italian Government Appraisal Mission. June 1989. Brazil, Chile, Venezuela, Panama, Costa Rica, Mexico.

• Third Session of the COPESCAL Working Party on Aquaculture. July 1989, San José, Costa Rica.

• Twenty-fifth Session of the FAO Conference. November 1989, Rome.

• Twenty-first FAO Regional Conference for Latin America and the Caribbean. July 1990, Santiago, Chile.

ACTIVITIES

TRAINING

• AQUACULTURE PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT COURSE: Mexico (1.8–31.10) 1988 regional; Costa Rica (1.7–21.9) 1989 regional.

• RESERVOIR MANAGEMENT: 1987: Panama (19–24.10) national; Colombia (26–31.10) national; Peru (3–7.11) national; Brazil (29.11-18.12) national. 1988: Mexico (18.7-5.8) sub-regional; Brazil (18.7-5.8) national; Nicaragua (7.12–21.12) national

• FISH AND SHRIMP NUTRITION: Mexico (2.11–5.12) 1987 sub-regional; Mexico (16.5–27.5) 1988 national; Chile (3.7–28.7) sub-regional

• POST-HARVEST TECHNOLOGY: 1988: Venezuela (11.4-6.5) regional; Brazil (15.7–31.7) national

• MOLLUSC CULTURE: 1988: Peru (15.2–23.2) national; Brazil (25.2 -10.3) national; 1989: Brazil (5.10) national

• FISH AND PRAWN PATHOLOGY: Venezuela (26.10-6.11) 1987 regional

• COLOSSOMA BREEDING: (15.11–28.11) Peru 1987 national

• HATCHERY DESIGN AND MANAGEMENT: Panama (28.5-2.7) 1989 regional

RESEARCH

• NATIONAL AQUACULTURE SECTORAL STUDIES: (1988–89) Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, (Ecuador), El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Uruguay, Venezuela.

  Regional Workshop on Aquaculture Planning: Caracas, May 1989 (all the countries that conducted sectoral studies)

• NATIONAL STUDIES ON RESERVOIR FISHERY PRODUCTION: 1989 Venezuela, Mexico, Brazil, Cuba

• MOLLUSC CULTURE: sub-sector national studies in Brazil (1988–89); Cuba (January–March 1989); Panama (January–June 1989)

  Workshop on Mollusc Culture, Brazil 25–30 September 1989.

  Pilot Project on Mollusc Culture in Coastal Communities, Brazil, May–October 1989

• GRACILARIA:

  Workshop in Brazil (Mexico-Brazil-Chile) March 1988

  Culture technique trials (Mexico-Brazil) 1988–89

  Production Workshop, Mexico 5–10.7.89

• COASTAL LAGOON MANAGEMENT

  Research projects in Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico 1988

  Workshop in Caracas, December 1988

• NUTRITION: 1988 National research on the availability of agricultural products for use as fish and prawn feed (Mexico, Brazil, Peru)

  Prawn larvae (penaeids, Macrobrachium) and Colossoma feeding trials (Panama 1987–88)

• SOCIO-ECONOMIC RESEARCH: on

  • Prawn culture (Mexico 1988)
  • Cage culture (Colombia, Peru, Venezuela 1987–88)

  • Colossoma (Brazil 1987–88)

• RURAL AQUACULTURE (managed by FIRI)

  • Study in Mexico, El Salvador, Panama, Colombia, Chile
  • Workshop in Venezuela 24–26.10.89

INFORMATION

SIRIAC (Sistema de Referencia sobre la Investigación en aquacultura: “Reference System for Aquaculture Research”): Data collection in Brazil, Mexico, Venezuela, Peru, Panama, Cuba 1988–89

Workshop in Caracas March 1989

PUBLISHED DOCUMENTS

DOCUMENTS TO BE PUBLISHED

Figure 1 AQUILA Operational Diagram. Relations with each country.

Figure 2 AQUILA Operational Diagram. Ralations between AQUILA and the countries.

Figure 3 Geographical distribution of the main activities.