KOCHI: The M S Swaminathan Research Foundation launched a mobile application to aid fisherfolks in 2007. The Fisher Friend Mobile Application (FFMA) is a guiding tool for the community and helps reduce risk while venturing out to the sea. Though it was launched in Kerala many years back, it only has 7,000 users in the state. It is a sorry state of affairs for an app that many fisherfolks swear by. Now, the foundation is planning to spread awareness on the use of the application among the fisher community.
“The catch from Potential Fishing Zone (PFZ) strengthened our trust in the app. It helped us come out of debts as well as satisfy the needs of our family members,” says Arogyam, a fisherman from Thiruvananthapuram. “The information and alerts from FFMA give us confidence on our fishing trips. The app also provides warning on weather events and we can avoid going to the sea that day,” said Silvayyan, a fisherman from Kollam.
“The app has the highest number of users in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh compared to Kerala, Odisha and Karnataka. In Kerala, the application is widely used in Thiruvananthapuram and Kollam. So, we formed a district-level advisory committee meeting to scale up the activities by providing awareness to fisherfolks and the other stakeholders such as Coast Guard, Coastal Police, Marine Enforcement, CMFRI and other fishers’ organisations.
We are planning to create more awareness among the community in Kerala and increase its usage in other districts. The purpose of the advisory committee is to help develop a road map for upscaling the application in respective districts,” said Dr Velvizhi S, principal scientist, Fish for All Research and Training Centre, M S Swaminathan Foundation.
Developed with the support of INCOIS and Qualcomm, FFMA consists of features such as PFZ and its notification, ocean forecast based on states, disaster alert, tidal forecast, harbour locations etc. “The app is designed to provide a quicker, easier and accurate flow of information to fisherfolks. We are also collecting feedback from fishers. Currently, the FFMA has been implemented in eight states in the country. Close to 1 lakh fishers have been using it with a total of 7,800 screen views per day on an average,” shares Dr Velvizhi.
Fisher Friend Mobile Application
1 lakh users across the country
7,000 users in the state
Goals of the district-level committee