In 2007 Russia’s import of fish and other seafood from Norway has gone up by 43.4 percent to 410,000 tonnes in comparison to 286,000 tonnes in the previous year. Timur Mitupov, the head of the Norge-Fish investment group, informed that the imports of fish from Norway has raised by 28.5 percent by cost to USD 639.9 million in 2007 from USD 497.7 million in 2006.
On the other hand the average cost of one kilogramme of Norwegian fish products plunged by 12 percent to USD 1.56 in 2007 from USD 1.74 in 2006. It was last year when Russia has changed the procedure for fish imports from Norway. Now Russia accepts fish only from plants accredited by Russian veterinary inspectors.
Russia’s salmon catch for the current years will not be remarkable as it will go down, confirmed scientists at the Sakhalin Scientific Research Institute for Fisheries and Oceanography (SakhNIRO).
Alexander Kayev, expert in salmon fisheries at SakhNIRO, said that 2008 will be a loss and the real Pacific salmon catch will be under the Total Admissible Catch (TAC). According to SakhNIRO the Pacific salmon TAC in 2008 will be around 124,000 tonnes of pink, 20,000 of chum, 28,000 tonnes of sockeye and 111,000 tonnes of coho, which means a total catch will be 284,000 tonnes wheras in 2007 the total catch was 325,000 tonnes.
Kayev opined that a decrease in salmon has been reported in particular regional fisheries. He also added that an overall drop in catch has been seen in southeast Sakhalin coast and at Kunashir Island.
