The 2026 International Smart Fisheries and Aquaculture Conference, hosted by China Agricultural University, officially opened in Beijing. With the theme "Digital Drive · Smart Empowerment · Building a New Future for Global Fisheries," the conference attracted more than 400 experts and scholars from home and abroad to jointly explore technological collaboration and innovation in global smart fisheries.
At the opening ceremony, Professor Li Daoliang, Director of the National Digital Fishery Innovation Center at China Agricultural University, officially launched the new generation of the fisheries large model - "Fanli Large Model 4.0", marking a new stage in the digitalization and intelligence of aquaculture in China. As an upgraded version of the first fisheries large model, this version has achieved a leap in computing power, with a parameter scale reaching 397 billion. It comprehensively covers eight core dimensions of aquaculture, including water quality, species, feed, health, operations, equipment, energy, and economy, and integrates professional knowledge of 101 major aquaculture species, building the most complete vertical domain knowledge graph in the industry so far.
In addition to the major upgrade of the industry's large model, the conference also welcomed another global first - the official release of the world's first open data set for smart fisheries. This data set includes 116,000 images and 698,000 task annotations, successfully establishing a systematic and complete image and visual cognition data set, laying a solid data foundation for the development of global smart fisheries. According to the information, this data set and the "Fanli Large Model 4.0" have been fully opened to the world, available for use, evaluation, co-construction, and sharing by scholars and enterprises around the globe, working together to promote the development of global smart fisheries.
In his opening speech, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and President of China Agricultural University Chen Wei pointed out that the global fisheries and aquaculture industry is currently facing many challenges, with significant differences in resource endowments and farming models among different countries and regions. The world has never needed deeper exchanges and mutual learning as much as now. He emphasized that China Agricultural University will continue to promote standardized data resource sharing, cross-disciplinary and transnational collaborative innovation, and focus on cultivating more compound talents, so that more producers can truly benefit from the digitalization and intelligence transformation.
Manuel Barri, Assistant Director-General and Director of the Fisheries and Aquaculture Department of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, also attended the conference. He stated that digital transformation provides strong support for the sustainable development of fisheries and aquaculture. In the future, FAO will continue to deepen its cooperation with the National Digital Fisheries Innovation Center of China Agricultural University, focusing on three core areas: blue transition, digital fisheries, and sustainable fisheries. From the five directions of technology empowerment, green production, large-scale promotion, talent co-construction, and global output, they will work together to promote modern fisheries development with efficient resource utilization and biosecurity.
The two-day conference features three special forums: "Data, Artificial Intelligence, and Decision Support Systems," "Sensing Technology, Intelligent Equipment, and Robotics," and "Smart Production Integration Systems and Collaborative Development of the Entire Industry Chain," continuously promoting technological collaboration and sharing of achievements in global smart fisheries.
