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Agricultural and food biotechnology

Genome edited crops, crop and animal genomes, breeding technologies, fish farming systems and food grown from cells. Prelims has asked how genome sequencing can be used in Indian agriculture and about biofilters in recirculating aquaculture.

Foundation note: GM crops in India: what is approved, who approves

Showing 2 of 5 articles, those that changed from 1 to 30 September 2026.Show all

Aquaculture

Recirculatory aquaculture and biofloc

Prelims

Recirculatory aquaculture and biofloc are two ways of farming fish intensively by cleaning the water rather than replacing it.

Fish waste turns to ammonia, and ammonia is what limits how many fish a tank can hold.
Take it out of the water and the same water will carry a far heavier stock.
The biofilter of a Recirculatory Aquaculture System (RAS) converts the ammonia in fish waste first into nitrite and then into nitrate.
That is what lets the system reuse 90 to 95 per cent of its water and stock its tanks intensively all year.

What changed

7 Sep 2026
- Biofloc technology, or heterotrophic pond farming, grows beneficial microbes in the pond water, which clump together and clean it.
- Those clumps are eaten by the fish, so the pond grows part of its own feed.
- Because the water is cleaned where it stands, little or none of it is exchanged.
PIB, 7 Sep 2026: Next-Gen Aquaculture in India: Harnessing RAS and Bio-floc Technology in the Blue Economy for the Atmanirbhar Bharat and Viksit Bharat Vision (opens in a new tab)

UPSC has asked

Prelims 2023: biofilters in Recirculating Aquaculture Systems

Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana

Prelims

The Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana (PMMSY), launched in 2020 on the base of the earlier Blue Revolution scheme, is the scheme that funds fish farming units, recirculating and biofloc alike.

India is second in world fish production, at about 8 per cent of global output, and first in shrimp production and exports.

What changed

10 Sep 2026
- Six years of the scheme were the backdrop to a harvest that has more than doubled since 2013-14.
- Fish production reached a record 197.75 lakh tonnes in 2024-25.
PIB, 10 Sep 2026: Fueling the Blue Economy: Six Years of Empowering India's Fisheries Sector under PMMSY (opens in a new tab)

Also filed elsewhere

Radiation in agriculture: mutation breeding and food irradiation · on Fusion, radiation applications and nuclear governance
Mutation breeding exposes seeds to radiation to create changes within the crop's own genome, and the breeder then selects the plants worth keeping.