Letter to the Editor - Grow fish, President Michel is right |11 February 2016

I fully support the essence of the letter contributed by Mr Barry Laine in the Seychelles Nation of Tuesday February 9, 2016.

Indeed, our President, Mr James Alix Michel, was correct when he remarked we “grow fish” at a side meeting at the United Nations last year. 

Mr Editor, there seems to be a cult of ignorance, ridicule, anti-knowledge and anti-intellectualism that is winding its way through our society today. It may have started yesterday or many years ago. It is alive right now in the social media, at schools and in political circles. It will be very bad tomorrow.

It is a worrying trend. It impedes informed decision-making. We all can have opinions, but opinions based on correct information, on facts, on informed decisions, are the valuable ones.

Mr Laine said: “Please do not misunderstand the English language and let us give James Michel the credit he deserves.”

Education in Seychelles is universal. There are so many opportunities to learn. Let us find more time to read. Focus on our studies. To enrich ourselves with the truth, facts, knowledge. More Google, less giggle!

Just because we do not know, or decide not to know, or incorrectly tell people who do not know what will make them giggle, does not mean that modern usage of some English words is wrong. English, like all languages, is alive and adapting.

Because “grow fish” was extensively exploited in the negative during the election campaign, some politicians created the false notion that democracy means that your decision-making is just as good as your ignorance.  The ones who are giggling at “grow fish” on the social media, and elsewhere, are actually advertising their ignorance. Their decision-making?

Those who started making fun from “grow fish” know that the term is correct. Strangely they started a campaign to make the less knowledgeable believe otherwise, prevent the ignorant from becoming enlightened, and enslaved their minds in darkness.

“Grow fish” is correct. “You can spit on a rose, but it's still a rose,” said Marty Rubin.

Those who tried to poke fun at “grow fish” actually had no respect for the less fortunate in knowledge. It is the poor souls who giggle who become the ridicule and mockery of those who are poking fun.

In today’s world of information technology, with easy access to the internet, wifi, tablets and smart phones, a click on Google search engine for the words ‘grow fish’ will show many results.

In Seychelles we used to grow prawns on Coetivy. The best black tiger prawns in the world. Grow fish is associated with aquaculture. Mr Laine has given plenty of other examples of the usage of the word grow in aquaculture. We also grow our economy. We grow our business. We grow our tourism industry.

Most of the fish we consume come from the wild. In aquaculture human beings are responsible for feeding the small fish, raise them in controlled environment, until they reach the correct size to be harvested for our table. We are responsible for making the fish grow. We, therefore, grow the fish.

In landlocked and mountainous Lesotho, there are fish farms growing fish for export to Japan.  The Queensland government in Australia has produced an aquaculture paper entitled Growing and harvesting black tiger prawns. The paper is on the internet. No one is poking fun at the Queensland government.

And President Michel was speaking at a specialised forum on the ocean. His government is promoting the Blue Economy concept. He is also an ardent defender of the environment. It made even more sense to use the terms grow fish, talk to the ocean, Blue Economy, associated with our livelihood.

“The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant” – Maximilien Robespierre.

Rene A. Morel