Introduction to the special issue on ??Development of native species for aquaculture in Latin America II??

GUSTAVO M. SOMOZA; LINDSAY G. ROSS

AQUACULTURE RESEARCH

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Año: 2011 vol. 42 p. 737 - 737

1355-557X

Following the first special edition of Aquaculture Research on Development of Native Species for Aquaculture in Latin America, in which selected presentations from the First Latin American Conference on Culture of Native Fishes were published in 2008, and in view of the continued growth of research and development of aquaculture of native fish species in Latin America, an international steering group was established with the objective of organizing a meeting on this topic on a regular basis. The concept for this series of meetings and publications is the promotion and development of native species culture in order to minimize the introduction, distribution and transplantation of exotic species throughout and within the region. The conservation of biodiversity is also taken into account as an important objective. As a consequence, the Second Latin American Conference on Culture of Native Fishes was held in Chascomús, Buenos Aires, Argentina in between 3rd and 6th November 2009 and the present issue represents a selection of the presented papers. Chascomús is a small city located 120 km south of Buenos Aires with a tradition in studies of the biology, culture and propagation of an emblematic species for that area, the pejerrey Odontesthes bonariensis (Valenciennes, 1835), Atherinopsidae. This meeting was supported by CONICET (Argentine National Research Council), CIC (Committee for Scientific Research of Buenos Aires Province), CFI (Federal Investment Council), the Ministry of Agricultural Affairs of the Province of Buenos Aires and the Chascomús Municipality. The meeting was extremely successful and approximately 250 students, technicians and researchers attended the different sessions. A series of 5 lectures on key selected topics were presented by invited speakers from Colombia, Spain, USA, France, Chile and, Mexico. There were also 50 selected oral presentations and 159 posters from across the continent covering a wide range of species and subject areas. This meeting had fundamental importance for gathering together scientists, technicians and local farmers interested in the biology and culture of Latin American species. A detailed description of the meeting is given at: http://www.laccnf.com.ar/index.php?idioma=1&laccnf=0 We would like to thank the enthusiastic efforts of Dr. Luis F. Canosa, Dr. Darío Collauti, Mr. Manuel Marina, Dr. Leandro Miranda (IIB-INTECH) and, Lic. Gustavo Berasain and Lic. Marcela Velasco (Ministry of Agricultural Affairs of the Province of Buenos Aires).  It is also important to mention the help of the following persons: Andrés Alonso, Leandro Balboni, Daniela Campanella, Tomás Chalde, María Victoria Crivelli, Mariano Elisio, Juan Ignacio Fernandino, Javier Garcia de Souza, Ángela Gárriz,Pedro Gómez-Requeni, Yamila Grunblat, María Ester Haspert, Mauricio Kraemer, Facundo Llompart, Gabriela Carina López, Tomás Maiztegui, Horacio Oñatibia, María Rita Pérez, María Inés Pietrantuono, Maria Emilia Scharrig and, Patricio Solimano without whom the symposium could not have been possible. We are looking forward to the next symposium to be held at the University of Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil in 2011, hoping that it will show further substantial advances in the culture of native species for Latin America.