Diploma of Aquaculture - inaugural intake

Universiti Teknologi MARA, Mukah Campus enlisted its inaugural intake of students comprising 15 students for the Diploma of Aquaculture in the June 2017 semester. The infrastructure under the Faculty of Plantation and Agrotechnology was completed in 2015 under the private financial initiative concept. The 10 ponds, reservoir, hatchery and aquaculture centre have been designed as the nerve centre for transferring knowledge in both technical and management skills for both upstream and downstream aquaculture industry. By the end of 2016, the acquisition of equipment and instruments was almost completed. The programme has been developed to meet the challenges of human resource capacity in line with the Economic Transformation Programme under Agriculture, one of the 12 National Key Economic Areas (NKEA). Out of the 16 Entry Points Projects (EPP), three specifically focus on the aquaculture industry: EPP 3: Mini-Estate Farming for Seaweed; EPP 4: Integrated Cage Farming and EPP 6: Replicating Integrated Zone for Aquaculture Model (IZAQs) to tap the market for premium shrimps. In addition, the third National Agriculture Policy (NAP3) has been directed towards "private sector participation in commercial fishing, aquaculture through large-scale open marine-cage culture as well as feed and fry production”.