Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute

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Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute

Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute Headquarters, Kochi, Kerala
Established	1947
Affiliation	Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Department of Agricultural Research and Education, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare
Director	Dr. Grinson George
Location	Kochi[1] , Kerala , 682018 , India 9°59′18″N 76°16′20″E / 9.988298°N 76.272126°E / 9.988298; 76.272126
Website	cmfri.org.in

The Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute was established in the government of India on 3 February 1947 under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare and later, in 1967, it joined the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) family and emerged as a leading tropical marine fisheries research institute in the world.^[2] The Headquarters of the ICAR-CMFRI is located in Kochi, Kerala.^[1] Initially the institute focused its research efforts on creating a strong database on marine fisheries sector by developing scientific methodologies for estimating the marine fish landings and effort inputs, taxonomy of marine organisms and the biological aspects of the exploited stocks of finfish and shellfish on which fisheries management were to be based. This focus contributed significantly to development of the marine fisheries sector from a predominantly artisanal, sustenance fishery till the early sixties to that of a complex, multi-gear, multi-species fisheries.^[3]

One of the major achievements of ICAR-CMFRI is the development and refinement of a stratified multistage random sampling method for estimation of marine fish landings in the country with a coast line of over 8,000 km (5,000 mi) coastline and landing centers. Institute personnel maintain the National Marine Fisheries Data Centre (NMFDC) with over 9 million catch and effort data records of more than 1000 fished species, from all maritime states of India.^[2]

The institute has four regional centres located at Mandapam, Visakhapatnam, Mangalore and Vizhinjam and seven regional stations at Mumbai, Chennai, Calicut, Karwar, Tuticorin, Veraval and Digha. There are also fifteen field centres and 2 KVKs (Ernakulam and Kavaratti, Lakshadweep) under the control of the institute. The nearly fivefold increase in marine fish production and the increasing contribution of marine fisheries to the GDP growth are supported by the robust research efforts and its impact on fisher folk, fish farmers, fisheries policy planners and managers.^[3]