Guidelines generally carry limitations due to both their general character and broad scope and the present guidelines are no exception. In view of the variety of coastal aquaculture practices and the diversity of their environmental settings in the country, it is likely that some of the issues addressed in the guidelines would need field-level alterations to meet the site-specific requirements of shrimp farmers. These guidelines are addressed to all those who are involved in shrimp farming and to those associated with the planning, development and management of shrimp aquaculture in the coastal area of the country.

With great pleasure I record my thanks to the members of the sub-committee for their efforts in preparation of the guidelines. My special thanks are due to Dr. Y.S.Yadava, former Fisheries Development Commissioner & Member Secretary, Aquaculture Authority and presently IGO Coordinator, Bay of Bengal Programme of the FAO, for critically going through the draft and offering valuable suggestions for improvement. My thanks are also due to the Bay of Bengal programme, Chennai for their technical support in printing the guidelines.  

The Hon’ble Supreme Court in it’s judgment dated 11 December, 1996 in WPC No. 561/94 (Shri S.Jagannathan vs Union of India and others), directed the Central Government to set up an Aquaculture Authority under section 3 (3) of the Environment Protection Act, 1986 and confer on the Authority all the powers necessary to protect the ecologically fragile coastal areas, sea shore, water front areas, other coastal areas and specially deal with the situation created by the shrimp culture industry in the coastal State/Union Territories. The Hon’ble Court interalia also directed that any aquaculture activity including intensive and semi-intensive which has the effect of causing salinity of soil; or the drinking water of wells and / or by the use of chemical feeds increases shrimp or prawn production with consequent increase in sedimentation which on putrefaction is a potential health hazard, apart from causing siltation/ turbidity of water courses and estuaries with detrimental implication on local fauna and flora shall not be allowed by the aforesaid authority.

The Aquaculture Authority was notified on 6^th February 1997 by the Ministry of Environment and Forests and is functioning under the administrative control of the Ministry of Agriculture with Justice G Ramanujam, a retired judge of Madras High Court as Chairman of the Authority.

The main environmental concerns in the shrimp farming sector are about the increased levels of nutrients including nitrogen and phosphorus, suspended soils and particulate organic matter that are released along with the wastewater. Though the nutrients and organic wastes present in the farm effluents are biodegradable, the soluble nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus, beyond a reasonable limit can result in nutrient enrichment or eutrophication in the open waters where the wastes are released.

To address these issues and encourage and facilitate the development of sustainable shrimp farming in the country, the Aquaculture Authority constituted a sub-committee comprising the following members for formulation of guidelines to enable farmers to set up effluent treatment systems in their shrimp farms:

1. Prof. R C Das* 
   Chairman (Retd.)
   Orissa State Pollution Control Board 
   Bhubaneswar, Orissa

2. Dr M Vijayan
   Member 
   Central Pollution Control Board
   New Delhi

3. Mr V Venkatesan
   Director
   Marine Products Export Development Authority
   MPEDA House,
   Cochin, Kerala

The terms of reference of the sub-committee are:

• To examine the present system of waste water treatment from the shrimp culture ponds in organized sector,

• To examine the various provisions of Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 and Central Water (Prevention and Control of pollution) Act, 1974 regarding treatment of effluent waters,

• To examine the design details of effluent treatment system prepared by the Marine Products Export Development Authority,

• To suggest suitable methodology separately for small clusters of shrimp farms varying between 1.0 to 2.0 hectares and for farms up to 5.0 hectares and above,

• To evolve design of model units for the the above mentioned types of farms and to suggest ways and means of implementation.

The following chapters in the Guidelines detail the model effluent treatment system developed by the Marine Products Export Development Authority, Cochin and accepted by the subcommittee. The parameters recommended by the Ministry of Agriculture for discharge of wastewater from shrimp farms into coastal marine waters, creeks and estuaries were also accepted by the sub-committee as an interim measure till the statutory standards under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 were developed. Keeping in view the inadequacy of data and standards on biological parameters, the sub-committee decided no to include such standards in the present guidelines.