Russia's largest salmon producer mulling aquaculture projects in Far East
The Russian Aquaculture Company (RA), the largest salmon producer operating in the country’s North, is working on possible Atlantic salmon farming in Primorye province (capital Vladivostok) with the final decision to be made later this summer. Another possibility on the agenda has to do with marine culture of scallops and sea cucumbers (the latter known as trepan in the region), reports Megafishnet.com.
According to PrimaMedia, the considered project is of great interest for Primorye government since a company with good financial capabilities and technological expertise would be producing scallops and trepan in the area more efficiently and on a greater scale. The thing is that there is a great demand for these products in China as the waters of the neighbors are already seriously depleted. The question is whether the Russian Aquaculture will be able to find free, and most importantly, convenient sites for launching the project.
We are, of course, considering the option to go into marine culture in the Far East. We see that this is a booming business that may lack technology, may lack capital. It is quite likely that we can be the company that will add technology and capital to marine culture, " said Ilya Sosnov, RA CEO, at a conference for investors and analysts.
RA
Russian Aquaculture has been operating under this name since February 2015, before that it was called the Russian Sea Group of companies. Key areas of activity include commercial farming of Atlantic salmon and sea trout in the Barents Sea in the Murmansk region as well as commercial rearing of rainbow trout in the lakes of the Republic of Karelia in the Russian Northwest.
"Of course, there is a huge demand in the world for scallops and sea cucumbers. But, surely, it is necessary to study technologies, opportunities, approaches, and sources of stocking material. All this is quite difficult now in the Russian Far East, so we do not have any specific plans yet, but it would be very interesting for us to look at the development of marine culture in the area, " RA head explained.
Production surge
In 2020, Primorye’s aquaculture production increased more than 1.5 times year-on-year to 48.7 thousand metric tons. Among other species, the total includes 16.1 thousand tons of scallops, 4.8 thousand tons of sea cucumbers and 3.2 thousand tons of oysters.
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