Ashraf Mohamed Abdelsamee Goda

Rice is not a horticultural crop, thus the idea that indoor cultivation cannot compete with outside production in desert and non-urban areas with shortages of water and challenging cultivation circumstances. The study intends to offer critical crops to poor communities through small-scale aquaponics systems that can adapt to climate change, despite some doubts about its feasibility. This study investigates the potential of integrated agriculture-aquaculture systems (IAAS) to enhance water, nitrogen, and phosphorus use efficiency (WUE, NUE, and PUE) while extending the nutrient cycle for rice and aquatic animal culture under climate adaptation conditions using greenhouses. This trial contained four treatments administered over 90 days. Two types of tilapia (T)-rice (R) co-culture systems and integrated multi-trophic-aquaculture (IMTA)-rice (R) co-culture systems were evaluated using two rice hydroponic culture techniques: floating raft system (FRS, T-R-FRS, and IMTA-R-FRS) and nutrient film technique (NFT, IMTA-R-NFT, and T-R-NFT). All treatments were carried out in two independent greenhouses equipped with indoor recycling closed systems and 10 kW solar panels. The FRS-R-IMTA system has superior rice properties compared to the NFT system. IMTA-R aquaponic and tilapia-R monoculture systems can reduce nutrients and water waste while increasing crop yields. These represent a potential solution to the challenges of climate change, which necessitates a more sustainable and resilient food production system. The IMTA system’s apparent FCR values (0.73) surpass those of the tilapia monoculture system (1.58). IMTA-developed technology enables farmers to profitably culture a diverse species of aquatic animals without the need for costly extra feed. The results showed that coupled IMTA-R and T-R using the FRS technique are more promising for optimizing NUE and PUE efficiency than the NFT technique, as well as for producing a wider range of aquatic animals (such as mullets, crayfish, freshwater clams, and silver carp) than the T-R-FRS.

Plankton, comprising phytoplankton and zooplankton, are the primary food sources for marine fish and shellfish in their early larval stages, supplying essential nutrients and energy for growth and development. This chapter provides an overview of the vital role of plankton in the nutrition of marine larvae in hatcheries. This chapter explores the nutritional and biochemical composition of plankton, stressing their high quantities of proteins, lipids, vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids, all of which are very critical for marine larval stages. This chapter addresses the specific dietary requirements of fish and shellfish larvae, highlighting the importance of plankton diets in larval development and survival. This chapter also looks at the challenges and considerations associated with producing and utilizing phytoplankton and zooplankton in marine hatcheries. This chapter emphasizes the importance of plankton as a crucial component of marine larval feeding, hence helping to the success of aquaculture production and wild conservation.

Algae and derivatives are currently being recognized for their potential characteristics as attributes in aquafeeds. These include their high protein content, optimum balance of essential amino acids and fatty acids, trace minerals, vitamins, and relatively low cost, which make them promising alternatives in the diets of farmed fish and shrimp. The inclusion of algae and their bioactive compounds in fish diets provides natural sources of growth promoters and immunostimulants, which improve growth and immune system response and mitigate disease outbreaks and pathogen infections. However, too much substitution would result in poor development and feed utilization. Therefore, this chapter discusses the forms and types of algae, their use in fish feed, the pros and cons of algae, which aid in achieving aquaculture sustainability and their scope for practical implementation.

Seaweeds are increasingly intriguing as a sustainable source of bioactive compounds. They have applications in agriculture, fuels, feed, and food products. To become a cost-competitive product with zero waste, a biorefinery approach is applied, where several products are valorized at the same time. True-Algae-Max (TAM^®) has been investigated for its ability to improve the yield and nutritional facts of a strawberry plant. Three concentrations of TAM (0, 50, and 100%) were examined by foliar spray in 2017 with 50% NPK chemical fertilizer. Results indicated that growth, yield, chlorophyll, and potassium content were significantly improved by TAM treatments. TAM50 % resulted in maximum root length, leaf area, plant fresh weight, fruit weight, and yield with an increase ranging from 10 to 110% compared to control. Compared to the NPK control, strawberries grown with TAM50% improved total soluble solids (TSS) from 7.58 to 10.12% and anthocyanin from 23.08 to 29.42 mg CGE 100 g⁻¹. Noteworthily, this reduced total sugar, and total phenolics were boosted by TAM applications, while non-reducing sugar was reduced compared to control. On the other hand, whole seaweed biomass and TAM residuals were used for bioethanol production by acid scarification. The maximum bioethanol yield was observed in residual biomass (0.34 g g⁻¹ dw), while the whole seaweed biomass showed only 0.20 g g⁻¹ dw. These results proved the biorefinery concept of using seaweed extract as a biostimulator and bioethanol production.

The integration of aquatic animals and horticultural production through aquaponics has been recently studied and endorsed by scientists as a real, sustainable solution to optimize the reuse of nutrient and water resources in food production. The present study (HortiMED H2020 PRIMA Project-Grant Number 1915), conducted in three plastic greenhouses at El-Kanater Research Station in Egypt, has gone one step beyond aquaponics by evaluating the feasibility of combining integrated multitrophic aquaculture (IMTA) with hydroponic horticultural production using the nutrient film technique (NFT) and floating raft systems (FRS) to maximize nutrient cycling resulting from cultured aquatic animals.

Increasing groundwater scarcity and salinity pose challenges for high water demand aquaculture. Adapting animals to grow optimally under saline conditions is key to future growth in many important aquaculture regions. In the current study, 10-week controlled feeding experiment was carried out to investigate dietary sodium chloride supplementation (10% NaCl) as a method of mitigating the effects of increasing water salinity (0,10 and 15 ppt) on growth and metabolism of juvenile Nile tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus in controlled feeding experiments. Fish fed diets supplemented with 10% NaCl recorded significantly better weight gain when compared to fish fed control when held in 10 and 15 ppt salinity water over a period of ten weeks. Blood glucose and blood lactate concentrations were both significantly higher in fish fed diets supplemented with 10% NaCl and increased with increasing water salinity. Fish fed diet containing 10% NaCl recorded the highest values of Na+ concentration in blood compared to other experimental groups. Feed utilization, as indicated by feed conversion ratio decreased significantly with water salinity (P < 0.05). Feed intake also decreased with increasing water salinity. The obtained results indicated that salinity is a key factor in controlling the growth of Nile tilapia. Results clearly indicate that negative effects of increased salinity in rearing water can be partially mitigated by salt inclusion in diets.