Capture fisheries in the Lower Mekong Basin are an important living aquatic resource exploited for both
food and income by rural communities. The importance of capture fisheries has been recognised by archaeologists
studying the Angkorian Empire and by French travellers during the 1800s. In recent years,
these resources have increasingly been recognised as an important part of rural livelihoods. Yet, they are
highly undervalued in development policy. This has been based on two assumptions: firstly that capture
fisheries are in decline (despite a lack of accurate data) and secondly that fish are a culturally acceptable
development intervention. This paper argues that the focus on fish culture is derived more from outside
perceptions of Asian culture than any real understanding of the importance of capture fisheries, and that this
has resulted in natural living aquatic resources having a low profile in riparian government planning and
policy. The paper begins with an historical review of culture and capture fisheries development in two
Mekong riparian countries, Thailand and Lao PDR. The paper then explores how the ‘cultural appropriateness’
of fish (per se) in Asian cultures has been used as a justification for aquaculture extension in
international aid and national government policy.

 http://www.mekong.es.usyd.edu.au/publications/working_papers/abstract_wp8.htm