The Governor, Boris Dubrovsky, has entrusted to increase the number of areas under the commercial fish farming

In the Chelyabinsk region, on behalf of the head of the region, the border areas under the commercial fish farming, where it is planed to breed fish on an industrial scale and subsequently catch it, have been defined. However, there are still a large number of lakes, which may be involved in the fisheries sector, said the head of the region.

In the South Ural, in recent years, the fisheries sector shows sustained growth, the number of farmed aquaculture in the ponds of the region is increasing. To provide the residents of the southern Ural with a high quality, affordable fish, that has been grown in local ponds – such a task has been set by the governor for the Fisheries Council, which has been established in 2015. The next meeting of the Fisheries Council was held today at the residence of the head of the region.

“I believe, that industrial and commodity fishing has a great potential in the Chelyabinsk region and can be a growth point, due to a large number of water bodies, - said Boris Dubrovsky. - Investors are seeing the potential in this business. In 2015, in the Chelyabinsk region the total catch of aquatic biological resources, including grown fish totaled 4550 tons, which exceeded the previous year by 3.4%. The plan for 2016 is 4700 tons. The main fishing time in the area began in September and will run until the beginning of November. To increase the commercial catch at the end of 2015, 193 million larvae and fingerlings has been released in the ponds of the region, it is planned to release another 200 million in 2016 – those are whitefishes (peled, whitefish, ripus, pelchir, muksun), sturgeons (acipenser and sterlet), as well as trout, carp, silver carp, grass carp, burbot, pike and bream.

On behalf of the governor, the border areas under the commercial fish farming have been defined. Today 163 ponds are already at the disposal of commercial fish farming, 59 are given up for auction, 11 are involved in sport and recreational fishing, 120 areas are potentially ready for the commercial fish farming. Also, we are working on increasing the efficiency of the industry by introducing the new technologies. “The projects on the development of industrial fish farming by cultivating fish in the pools and installations of close water supply are relevant now” - said Sergey Sushkov.

Today, two of such kind of projects have been presented to the Governor. Particularly, the "BIOnika" LLC plans breeding the sturgeon species up to 250 tons per year and grown up whitefish fingerlings up to 1 million per year in Yetkulsky District. In the second project, "Areal" LLC plans to build a complex of ponds for breeding whitefish species. The selection of land plots is underway. Also, in Uvelsky area, in Krasnokamensk pond, the innovative technology of "spawning nests" - artificial "floating island" made of wood - will be tested to increase the fish population. The project was developed by a member of the Fisheries Council, the Dean of the Faculty of Ecology of the CSU, Sergey Likhachev with help from his colleagues”, - said Sergey Sushkov. The significant changes in legislation will take place in early 2017. It is expected, that the authority to conduct auctions for the commercial fish farming will be given up to the subjects of the Russian Federation, which will significantly simplify the procedure of conducting auctions for long-term lease of water bodies.

It should be reminded, that in 2015 the subprogram "Development of commercial fish farming in the Chelyabinsk region in 2016 - 2020 years" has been developed to implement the objectives of the governor. The document provides the provision of subsidies for reimbursement of the costs of loans, attracted by investors. In 2016 5 million rubles are stipulated for the subsidy payments in the region’s budget. According to the strategy of the fisheries sector’s development in the Chelyabinsk region, it is necessary to increase the production volume of marketable fish up to 7 tons by 2020.