Salmon season 2023 succeeding in Russia

By August 22, 2023, the Pacific salmon catch in Russia reached 545 thousand tons - 16.4% up on last odd year 2021 and 2.7 times fold on 2022. Last year by August 22 the Russian fishermen harvested 202.6 thousand tonnes of salmon.

According to Russia’s Federal Agency for Fisheries, the initial forecast for this year total salmon catch of 512 thousand tons has already been significantly exceeded. Now the season has gone into to its second half, therefore the fishery activity is expected to decrease.

Salmon fishing is of great socio-economic importance for the Far Eastern regions of Russia and for the domestic consumer market of the country.

Traditionally, Kamchatka fishermen are the leaders, who have caught more than 475 thousand tons (+12.5% to the level of 2021), which is about 87% of the total Far Eastern salmon catch.

In the Sakhalin region, the catch reached 32 thousand tons – twice as high as in 2021. Fishermen of Khabarovsk produced more than 20.5 thousand tons — 39% more than in 2021.

In the Magadan region, the volume of catch exceeded 14 thousand tons (+48% to the level of 2021).

Fishermen of Primorye increased production by 2021 by 12 times – from 127.4 tons to 1.57 thousand tons.

Fresh catches continue to arrive at the ports of Primorsky Krai (the main logistics hub) for further transportation to other regions of Russia. By August 22, the region’s coldstores were loaded with fish products at 68%. There are more than 77 thousand tons of fresh frozen fish products in fish terminals for further sale. A week earlier, the coldstores were loaded at 48%. There were 26 vessels with almost 70 thousand tons of fish products on the approach to the seaports of Primorsky Krai, including 11 vessels with salmon products (more than 20 thousand tons), as well as pollock – 42 thousand tons, herring – 7.3 thousand tons and cod – 0.25 thousand tons.