Results of salmon season 2009 and exploitation of non-TAC regulated stocks in Russia's Far East Basin
The Russian Far East Research and Fishery Council has recently met to discuss results of one of the basin's most important fisheries, the salmon season 2009 and exploitation of non-TAC regulated stocks in the basin's seas, reports www.fishnet-russia.com (www.fishnet.ru) with reference to fishery sources in Vladivostok.
In the current year 2009 the total harvest of Pacific salmons accounted for ca.16% of the nation's catch. Land-based processors handled ca.78% of the harvest with a large workforce involved for the purpose. The bulk of the output was delivered to the domestic market and only 12-14% were shipped for export. The abnormal situation with extremely generous salmon runs has proved the reports of salmons strong abundance in the Northwest Pacific as provided by the research institutes last year.
According to provisional figures, the total catch of all salmon species approached 540,000 tonnes, 1.5 times up on the maximum harvest of the previous odd year 2007. The fishery's success could be also attributed to well coordinated operations of all the participants including federal executive bodies, provinces' administrations and providers of timely information on the fishery progress.
Take-up of recommended salmon catches in January-October 2009
Fishing area | Pink salmon | Chum salmon | Sockeye | Coho salmon | Masu salmon | Chinook salmon | All species | |||||||
actual | % | actual | % | actual | % | actual | % | actual | % | actual | % | actual | % | |
West Bering Sea zone | 0.2 | 23.8 | 0.8 | 56.8 | 0.2 | 44.7 | - | - | - | - | - | - | 1.2 | 43.7 |
East Kamchatka | 138.9 | 95.8 | 11.5 | 72.7 | 10.7 | 88.2 | 1.7 | 77.1 | - | - | 0.6 | 54.8 | 163.4 | 92.7 |
West Kamchatka | 7.3 | 48.8 | 7.3 | 89.6 | 17.0 | 80.7 | 1.2 | 84.1 | - | - | 0.08 | 63.4 | 32.9 | 69.4 |
North Okhotsk subarea | 19.0 | 70.2 | 16.0 | 89.8 | 0.1 | 78.6 | 0.5 | 66.7 | - | - | - | - | 35.6 | 77.8 |
West Sakhalin subarea | 6.5 | 61.0 | 7.2 | 52.3 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | 13.7 | 77.2 |
East Sakhalin subarea | 220.2 | 97.0 | 18.1 | 100.3 | - | - | 0.06 | 64.2 | - | - | - | - | 238.3 | 97.2 |
North Kurile zone | 0.3 | 25.8 | 0.6 | 81.9 | 0.2 | 46.2 | 0.08 | 31.5 | - | - | - | - | 1.2 | 45.5 |
South Kurile zone | 25.3 | 55.7 | 11.6 | 91.0 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | 36.9 | 63.4 |
Primorye subarea | 0.1 | 26.6 | 0.2 | 48.1 | - | - | - | - | 0.006 | 29.3 | - | - | 0.3 | 37.9 |
Amur, estuary | 3.6 | 97.4 | 12.8 | 91.6 | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | 16.4 | 92.8 |
All areas | 421.4 | 88.5 | 86.1 | 83.6 | 28.2 | 82.3 | 3.5 | 74.9 | 0.006 | 11.5 | 0.7 | 54.8 | 539.9 | 87.9 |
At the same time, the Council has pointed out to flaws in the current legislation as well as some fishery management problems, though the main bottleneck during the salmon season 2009 has been actually due to the failure of ports and onshore infrastructure to handle the record strong harvest despite timely announcement on high catches and landings. As a result, already in the beginning of August 2009 delivery of salmon products to central Russia and overflow of coldstore capacities in the Russian Far East have grown critical.
Non-TAC regulated fisheries
Capture of aquatic bioresources not regulated by TACs is carried out under agreements between the applicant and the Federal Fisheries Agency. As for the fishing areas, the largest contributions have been made by the Kamchatka-Kurile subarea - 44.2% and East Sakhalin subarea - 43.4% of the area's total recommended harvest. The biggest catches are recorded for such popular fish species as flounder, wachna cod and skates followed by grenadier, capelin and Atka mackerel. For some stocks the fishery operations have been banned due to exhaustion of recommended catches. As compared to catches of the same species during the recent four years when they were TAC-regulated their exploitation this year (when they are not TAC-regulated) has grown much stronger. In general, classification of a number of species as non-TAC-regulated has made them more accessible for the fishermen and let them conduct the fishery on equal terms. The take-up has increased for the stocks TACs of which have remained uncovered year after year while the fish discards have decreased. Through the first ten months of the current year 2009 the harvest of non-TAC-regulated stocks amounted to 135,400 tonnes or 25.7% out of the total recommended harvest of such stocks.
At the same time, exploitation of aquatic biologic stocks specified as non-TAC-regulated objects of fishery has revealed a number of problems:
- fairly long (at least two months) procedure of fishery closure due to exhaustion of recommended harvest, during this long period the fishing operations are continued with the recommended harvest being exceeded just like the case with grenadier fishery in the North Okhotsk subarea (take-up of 188.2%) and flounder fishery in the Karaginsk subarea (122.2%);
- objects which recommended catches are not large can be harvested as bycatch by several fishing efforts within one day, therefore such species have been recommended for exclusion from the list of non-TAC-regulated species.
The Council has unanimously disapproved amendments to the Federal Law "On Fisheries ..." and the government's draft orders providing for introduction of new types of fishery and quotas both linked to vessels built at home yards after 1 January 2010. Such amendments are supposed to result into a takedown of the legal basis of the industry which has been showing positive production trends with both catches and seafood shipments from the Russian Far East to central Russia exceeding the respective results of last year.