Summary

Role of the State in the Russian fishery industry development

By Viktor Zubkov, the First Prime-Minister of the RF Government.

- The fishery industry of the Russian Federation is a multisectoral complex, which includes a wide band of activities. In general in the economy of the country the role of the fishery complex is an insignificant one (a specific share of the products sold amounts to less that 1%). Alongside with that the fishery industry plays an important role in ensuring the food safety of the State.

In the recently adopted Doctrine of the food security of the Russian Federation to the development of the fishery complex is given a great significance. A lot of tasks related to providing home made fish products onto the local market at not less than 80% is relied upon it.

At the condition of the potential target species being introduced into the actual fishery the annual catching output may reach the volume of 4.7 million tons.

Last year the volume of Russian fish, fish products and sea products abroad amounted to 1,371.7 thousand MT, valued at – $2,186.1 million, i.e. higher than the indices of the previous year several times. Also in 2009 the fish import volumes were reduced. They amounted to 950.7 thousand tons at the cost of $1,691.6 million.

Making up the results of the Russian fishery complex work in 2009 there should be noted that the target indices of the industry work, established by the Federal target program «Raising the effectiveness of the use and development of the fishery complex in 2009-2012» used to be accomplished fully. That testifies the correctness and the actuality of the decisions adopted by the Government of the Russian Federation aimed at a stable development of the industry.

Japanese-style fish processing

And especially thanks to the high efficiency all the way higher popularity among Russian fishery businessmen there acquires the fish-processing technologies of the neighbor Japan.

Only this year dozens of large Far East enterprises g-sorted their production lines with the new Japanese fish-processing equipment by the «Nikko» company. «Nikko» is the largest producer of technological equipment for fish processing in Japan.

One of the first company to retool the production with the highly technological equipment of «Nikko» there used to be the South-Kuril fish-factory. A whole complex salmon processing workshop was equipped with the «Nikko» fish and row processing equipment.

The Head of the «South-Kuril fish-factory» company limited, Leonid Korobkov tells:

- «South-Kuril fish-factory» company limited is waging an active production activity since 1999. The results of its work dispelled the latest doubts for the Salmon seaon-2009 – we entered there with two lines NAG-501. Thus the production capability of the Salmons processing shop increased up to 100 tons a day. The nearest steps to modernize the production process are discussed with Japanese specialists.

German Zverev: We are often called the «Alaska Pollock OPEC»

On April 29, 2010 the Pollock Association elected unanimously its president German Zverev again. «Fishnews.ru» asked the leader of the largest Russian fishery association to tell about main results of its work, plans for future and ardent problems of the fishery industry.

- Two thirds of the Russian catch of marine living resources are provided by the Far East fishery basin, great deal of that is Alaska Pollock. We are often called an «Alaska Pollock OPEC» and we are facing quite the same problems as the oil OPEC. But we act in a strict correspondence with the Russian antimonopoly legislation.

- Since 2008 the Pollock Association has been increasing the production of Alaska Pollock fillets and we made a special presentation on the issue at the International fishery congress in 2008. Last year our enterprises started to purchase new fillet-making equipment. According to our assessment the capacity of the Russian market of Alaska Pollock primarily frozen fillets amounts to not less than 10 thousand tons.

- On September 29, 2008 the European Union adopted the Directive №1005/2008 and advised all the countries in the world that to start from January 1, 2010 not a single kilo of fish without a special catching certificate would not be allowed to the European market. All the countries accepted this advice, except for Russia. As a result during the Okhotsk sea fishery we had to reduce the production of the Alaska Pollock fillets by 35%, to 20 thousand tons.

- This year Russian companies have broken the record of 2006, the volume of the Alaska Pollock roe production surpassed 30 thousand tons. This is the highest determinant in the first decennial of the XXI century Results of the Fishery-2010 once more again proved the separation of seasons «А» and «B» drastically improves the price situation first of all at the roe market.

– As for the idea of the Head of the Russian fishery agency – to increase the export fees for certain species of marine living resources, my opinion has already been expressed: we will not allow that. They just want to retain a part of the profit imposing upon us, by the way, the modernization of the fleet.

– As for the establishment of the Marine Leasing Company – its presentation will take place at the International Fishery Congress in September this year. Practically in all the countries where the subsidies were used for the modernization of the fleet, within the last 10-15 years there occurred uncontrolled growth of harvesting vessels and the excess of fishery capacities, thus the fish resources downgraded.

– As for the financial situation of the fishery industry – it has been significantly consolidated, however the financial crisis did not come by us. The final financial result of the last year is the total income of 11.7 billion of Rubles, i.e. 2.4 times exceeding the level of 2008, while the final loss of the industry decreased quite three times.

- Thus our tasks for 2010 are: consolidated revenues of the industry’s companies should be 115-120 billion Rubles, the final financial result, cleaned of «poor liabilities» – 13 billion Rubles, the volume of investments – 4.5 billion Rubles. The State should help us a lot.

Three to one: fleet modernization would remove the vessels’ «excess»

Building of new harvesting vessels remains an ardent problem for fishermen. In order to solve it in Primorye there was established a special working group. The member of the group, Chairman of the Union of fishing kolkhozes and the chairman of the fishing kolkhoz «Primorets», Peter Gordienko tells the the readers of the «Fishnews» magazine.

– I’d like to tell you right now: the project 13728 we developed together with «Vostok» design bureau – is obsolete. Thus we proposed to the CTSS to regard a variant to develop a new project of a medium trawler for the work in the economic zone of the RF. Right now we arrived to the stage when we should make an agreement to perform the design. But the problem aroused: where is the money for? One of the decisions is to apply to the Ship-building Corporation.

- We would like to obtain a really working trawler, from the other side it should be a multifunctional one. These are the main requirements to a modern vessel: it should be universal and capable to process the fish wastes right onboard producing fish-mill and fish-oil. We aim to receive a harvesting vessel like that: one new vessel could substitute three old ones.

- We realize that in modern conditions the pay-off period could last at least 12-15 years. Thus we need the so-called «long» loans at favorable conditions. It should be better for them to be the State ones. Sure, at present the State subsidizes, but there are still no orders thus nothing to subsidize. Then the subsidies themselves change a little – they just reduce a bit a certain share of a loan disbursement. But to build a medium trawler – some $30-35 million are required.

- Out of the Far East enterprises only the Khabarovsk ship-yard is ready to build now fishery vessels: it was engaged in building various civil vessels, medium trawlers-refrigerators, a scientific vessel in cooperation with Japan. They could build a fishery vessel in case all necessary components there should be.

– My opinion is: if we have to level up the fishery industry – there will be a need in a leasing company. If we have it until the end of the year – it would be perfect.

Russian reality is taken into account in the Project

There are a lot of proves to a quite obvious fact of the Russian fishery fleet obsoletes. The decision is a clear one – new vessels should be built, but where and for which money?

The deputy general director of the «Center of ship-building and ship-repair technology (CTSS)», director of the design bureau «Vostok», Leonid Gorbov tells the «Fishnews» about the projects.

- «Center of ship-building and ship-repair technology (CTSS)» is the vertically interrelated integrated structure, which united a number of scientific-research institutes and design bureaus. One of the direction of our activities is determined by the design company «Soyuzoryectverf» which accomplishes complex projection of ship-building and ship-repair enterprises, hydro-technical constructions, mechanical engineering and instrument building plants for the ship-building industry. At the moment we should take part in the reconstruction of the Far East ship-yard «Zvezda», to conduct preliminary studies for the Chazhma ship-yard where we act as the general sub-contractor.

- A special attention is paid at the projection and modernization of the ship devices. Practically all the home developments in this sphere belong to the «Armas» design bureau.

- Our design bureau «Vostok» is responsible for the design and projection of fishery vessels, ships for scientific-research activities and for extraction of minerals from the bottom of the World Ocean. Among the most well-known projects of our bureau developed within the 60 years of its existence are whale-hunting mother-ship, «Vostok» mother-ship, big trawler-freezer of 1288 project, type «Pulkovskiy meridian», scientific vessel type «Morskoy geolog» and other vessels. Totally some 800 vessels were built with our projects.

- Mechanism of financing is the most important issue, without which not a single project, even the best one, could be accomplished. Thus, to my mind, the mostly required scheme there could be the one with the participation of the State. According to our calculations a big trawler could be paid back within ten years and then, for quite 20 years would make profits. Other variants, including the use of quotas as a mortgaging, would not satisfy the interested parts, either they are not real.

Competitors are pushing business to innovations

General director of the Pacific scientific-research fishery center (TINRO-Center), professor Lev Bocharov tells the «Fishnews» magazine about Russian scientists developments and innovation process.

- Science produces pacing technologies, while the innovation means the introduction of such developments into business. In the Soviet era we had such a term “implementation”. We, in TINRO are very proud of the fact that all the products in our country made of fish, invertebrates and sea-weeds were developed in local fishery institutes.

- I cannot complain of the lack for our scientific production. Vice versa, the specificity of the TINRO as a complex scientific center is that researches in the sphere of fishery industry resource base are its main product. Another example of such innovations is the constant modernization of the Fishing rules. Other developments also require a great deal of attention and special efforts. First of all these are the raw materials processing processes. Specifically with this purpose the TINRO-Center brings its developments to the stage of experimental production. Sometimes these are very small enterprises, like in the town of Luchegorsk where we breed sturgeons in the warm water of the power plant. Up to 20 tons of sturgeons we breed a year and also a wide scientific and selection work is underway there.

In the TINRO-Center we are also busy with aquaculture projects. There is the «Aquatechnologies» company limited in Vladivostok and the citizens got used to its products: clams and other bivalves in various sauces and marinades, nice products. This company uses our technologies and developments.

I’d like to dwell the issue of biologically active supplements (Russian abbreviation – BAD). These are not just elements of the rational food, the improve the health of the nation, prevent diseases – thus we are working in this sphere for quite a long time. There is another company in the Primorskiy region, «Biopolimery», one of the founders of which is the TINRO-Center.

- The main consumer of scientific developments in the world are the vertically integrated systems. Powerful vertically integrated corporations can directly collaborate with the science. I cannot but mention such a form of innovation process like bio-techno parks. Here in Primorsky region, in the Kievka bay there was established a bio-techno park by such powerful organizations like the TINRO-Center, the Far East State University, the Preobrazhenye Base of trawling fleet and the Preobrazhenskiy fish processing plant. We established a consortium where every member inputs its means and forces, while we are working according to a coordinated plan.

Associations are not a part of the vertically integrated business, however it is also a large progressive system. By the way, the Pollack Association – what was her first step? One year and a half it ordered from the TINRO-Center a huge scientific work for the international certification of the Alaska Pollock fishery. Is this economy – yes, it is. Because the market requires it. This is scope of innovations: to invest and then to get the return.

Actual decisions for the Salmon season

The best and newest samples of the modern processing equipment and complex systems in action were represented by the «Marel» company at the largest specialized fair, «The European Seafood Exposition» in Brussels, where the main target used to be Salmon.

At more than four hundred square meters of the exposition there was deployed a real fish processing shop equipped with sophisticated samples of the first class equipment. The leading role there was played by processing equipment – only the newest and the most powerful models were represented: slicer for Salmon GEBA SC125V, new variant of the popular slicer model IPS 3000, slicer GEBA SC250D-cut, portioning machine I-cut 36, bone removing machine Carnitech Vacuum Pinbone Remover TC 2616, batcher Target Batcher, newest weighing labelers of the 9000 series, the tunnel deep freezing with the integrated skinning Marel Super machine, the spiral freezing machine Marel IQF, as well as the Innova – the computer soft for the production management developed by the, which controls every stage of the production process.

In which interests the fish is transported by rail-way?

On April 17, 2010 the Chairman of the RF Government, Vladimir Putin chaired the working conference held in Murmansk dedicated to the development of the ashore infrastructure to receive, process, storage and transportation of fish products. The head f the Government informed the participants about additional 600 million Rubles to be allocated to support the fishery industry.

The Vice-Prime minister, Viktor Zubkov heading the governmental commission for the fishery complex development stressed the problem of fish deliveries among the problems facing the Russian fishery industry this year.

The General director of the «Refservice» joint stock company, Pavel Ivankin tells the «Fishnews» readers about the situation with fish deliveries by rail-way and reveals the real situation with prices’ formation for fish products.

- The mass transportation of fresh frozen fish by rail-way starts in the last decade of July until October-November. During this period we have enough refrigerating wagons on the Sakhalin railway as well.

- We follow very attentively the forecast made by fishery research institutes. At the Far East scientific-fishery council we obtained very important figures for this year: some 341 thousand tons of salmons are expected to be taken during the fishery-2010. The biggest part of Salmons would be taken off the West Kamchatka (123 thnd MT), in the East Kamchatka zone (42 thnd MT) and in the East-Sakhalin sub-zone (58 thnd MT).

- There are several reasons why the fish deliveries are rather expensive and do not permit to make fish cheaper. First of all there are a lot of whole-sale and retail mediators. Second reason is the negative influence of monopoly at the market of stevedoring and cold-storage services. The share of «DalRybPort» company limited as for the Vladivostok transportation center amount to 30%, but the company has no technological capabilities to dispatch more than 6 refrigerating sections a day. Another serious reason there could be the insufficient volume of cold storage and fish processing facilities.

- The most correct way in solving the problems in the sphere of transportation of fish by rail-way there could be, to our opinion, to redistribute rewards between the participants of the transportation chain at the account of establishing a system of State control using the regulating tools of the State (tariffs, tax policy, etc.).

- At present the «Refservice» is preparing for experimental deliveries of frozen food products in modernized wagon ARV, equipped with new refrigerating device, with increased capacity of fuel tanks. Also we prepare for experimental exploitation the so-called «unmanned» refrigeration section equipped with new system of control with the use of space satellite technologies.

Fishermen leaves behind the «Paper age»

As of today the Federal state enterprise «Center of monitoring and communication system (CSMS)» is the operator of the monitoring system of the Federal Fishery Agency (FFR).

One of the latest developments of the Federal Fishery Agency in the sphere of the fishery management is the sub-system «Permissions». The works on were completed even in 2008, but last year the FFR obliged the CSMS to test the sub-system developed. The Head of the Federal state enterprise «Center of monitoring and communication system (CSMS)» Maxim Sanjko tells:

- I’d like to remind that the main purpose of this sub-system «Permissions» is to present data on permissions issued at the level of all the territorial departments of the FFR. At further stages there is planned to incorporate the sub-system «Permissions» into the North and the West basins, then – into the Caspian and the Black Sea ones.

- Another innovation, the ship’s electronic log – thanks to the efforts of the FFR’s Head, Andrey Krainiy, there was given an impetus to this idea. Speaking about it’s introduction we mean the accomplishment of the 994-th Decree of the RF Government (of December 24, 2008) on transfer of ship data with the electronic-cipher signature.

- There also should be taken into account such benefits of the CSMS as the all day round work of operators, reservation system’s availability, technologies of data exchange, management of the far-reaching system of information centers all across the country, etc. With that, it’s profitable for a ship-owner, as long as there is no need for him to develop an own dispatching center, at the same time the necessary information about location and the status of the ship will be available at any moment.

The Salmon season should be a success…

Primary processing of Salmons is a complicated technological task, especially for medium and large enterprises receiving up to 50 tons of fish a day.

The company «Technologicheskoye oborudovaniye (Technological equipment)» got its publicity specifically like a designer and the producer of the completely developed technological lines for any production tasks in the sphere of fish processing.

The pocket-line on the basis of the slotting conveyer enjoys a great popularity. The device is distinguished by its unpretentiousness and the universality. It occupies only 18 sq. meters together with the job places and permits to process up to 30 fishes a minute with seven processors and up to 84 pieces a minute – with 22 processors. The «Technological equipment» company produces the pocket-lines for quite the fourth year in the row. Only within the first 5 months if the 2010 the four such machines were installed at Sakhalin and at Kuril islands, also two – in the Khabarovsk region. Totally in the Far East region there are working more than 20 units and neither of the operational pockets required a serious repair.

New trawls of the «Fishering Service»

During the season of 2010 the company «Fishering Service» proposed to Iceland fishermen a whole range of new trawls developed in close contact with Icelandic specialists, the trawls «Atlantika», «Typfoon» and «Superskwal» both for pair and solo trawling.
The top of the season there became «Superskwal 2600» for pair trawling. It’s possible to affirm that the «Superskwal 2600», developed by the «Fishering Service» company is the biggest and the innovated trawl in the history of the Russian fishery, which accumulated the 50 years of experience in designing and developing pelagic trawls and their successful use, as well as the innovation developments in using the materials for.

Aquaculture trying balloon

In April this year in the Primorskiy territory there was held the first contest for the distribution of fishery sites fro the purpose of commercial fish breeding. The President of the Far East Fishery State University (Dalrybvtuz), George Kim, shares his opinions with the «Fishnews» magazine:

- In general there was a lot of problems: there should be passed a great deal of coordination before a fishing site could be placed for the contest, the Law on determining the confines of water sites is dealt incorrectly. Then during the distribution the object’s specificity is not taken into account.

- One more remark: there are not taken into account works made ashore. Before you would do anything in the water – you must do a great deal of work ashore, but it is not accounted, nevertheless how much money you invested.

- As you know the Dalrybvtuz is going to further develop not only the production, but the scientific direction as well. Sure, the Far East sea-cucumber (Trepang) is fully banned for catching. But our task was the recovery of the population, even in a certain sole bay. And we did it: in the Severnaya bay, according to assessments of independent experts, – the population of Sea-cucumber restored to the level of 70-s last century according to a sole bay assessment when 7-8 species of the sea-cucumber fell to a one square meter. It is a victory for me personally.

Aquaculture made a step forward. Still there are a lot of obstacles

By the President of the Far East Association «Aquaculture», Alexander Platonov.

– The contest for the right to make an agreement on allocation of the fishery ground to conduct the aquaculture activity in regard to marine living resources of the internal sea waters and the in the territorial sea of the RF in the Primorskiy territory has been conducted in the full compliance to the RF Government Decree № 136 of February 14, 2009.

- There participated to the contest both old and new enterprises. I’d like to stress especially the fact that the fishing grounds are fixed to the users for 20 years.

- The State support of the aquaculture sector still works not so much efficiently. There must be fixed the property right to retain the products bred. Also, there is a lack of modern effective technologies in the sphere of breeding the marine living resources.

- The fate of the Law on aquaculture is a vague one. To my mind, the aquaculture is still is not the interest of the State. I’m sure the State must turn its face to aquaculture. Allocation of fishing grounds is a step forward, but what’s then? The issue is still unresolved.

About the contest and the Law draft

By Viktor Pokotilov, the General Director of the scientific-production association «Nereida».

- The long term waiting of the first contest for the right to make an Agreement to use the fish-production ground for the aquaculture purposes ended with the relieve: the working aquaculture enterprises remained with «water», however the leasing agreement is a rather weak argument for an investor, as its form is not confirmed by the State registration service, thus it cannot be an object for evaluation, mortgage, etc.

- All the power bodies are well aware of the main ardent problem – aquaculture enterprises are practically inoffensive of thefts and poaching, however the Agreement in effect does not permit us to undertake any active sanctions against the mentioned violations.

- The deduction is a sole one – those who write down those projects are far away from understanding of the issue’s essence.

- I was speaking not a once and I would repeat again a simple truth: if you want to help in development – please, create the conditions, if you want to control and regulate – please, write down understandable rules and create a working structure. However today it is a fatuous conglomeration of declarations, controllers and inconvenient procedures, conditions and requirements, sometimes impeding the production process. Once again we have to start from the beginning.

Insurance issues in the fishery complex

Head of the department of insurance in agriculture sector of the «Ingosstrah» insurance company, Delyara Sangajieva tells:

- Problems objecting to the development of insurance in the sphere of the fishery are quite the same as in other sectors related to the fleet. All the specific features of the fishery fleet insurance are reflected in the insurance rate. The cost of insurance is the value depending upon the cost and the technical characteristics of the vessel, fishing ground and the season of exploitation, the set of covered risks and the accident risk of specific objects. In order to reduce the cost many companies strive to second-rate and third-rate markets. The reliability is suffering however it’s possible to acquire the insurance polis at a low price.

- As for the fish-breeding insurance, one must take into account the fish-breeding is a high-risk business, the losses there amount to million Rubles. For the majority of our clients the main reason to be insured is the getting of a loan in a bank. The trade stock of fish in this case is a pledged item. Acknowledged leaders in this sphere are commercial banks, first of all: «Rosselkhozbank» and «Sberbank». The insurance polis of fish resources is always an individual product. Even in case of a standardized mortgage insurance – it takes into account the specific features of each specific aqua-farm. I’d like to stress once again – only those farms which strictly adhere to rules of insurance may have in view the full recovery of losses.

Valery Monakhov