Fish farming in developing countries is still largely based on unimproved fish strains which are genetically similar or inferior to wild counterparts. There are only a few examples where aquaculture production has benefited from genetically improved strains. This results in aquaculture with poor growth rate, high mortality, and high production costs. Genetically improved seeds of fish and other aquatic species are essential for increasing productivity and improving socio-economic performance of aquaculture production. Due to the importance of tilapia in aquaculture in developing countries, WorldFish and partners developed an improved tilapia strain with faster growth, known as Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia (GIFT).

These gains need to be supported by research that can catalyze the acceptance of the improved strain, and especially among small-scale farmers that are often the last to benefit from these gains. In order to expand the adoption of improved tilapia strains, it is necessary to conduct an integrated assessment to evaluate its performance, economic viability, social acceptability, environmental compatibility, and overall impact under varied agro-ecological systems and socioeconomic environments.

The project, led by WorldFish, conduct integrated performance assessments of improved tilapia strains at farm level to identify opportunities and constraints affecting adoption of sustainable intensification of aquaculture systems using improved strains of tilapia. Myanmar is chosen as the country for this analysis because Myanmar is one of the world’s major aquaculture producing countries, but the technical and socioeconomic characteristics of aquaculture in Myanmar has not been adequately studied compared with the other major fish farming countries. Myanmar is a country where the major household diet share of animal protein and micronutrients comes from fish consumption. This leads to a fast-growing demand for fish as the country urbanizes and increases in income.