Portuguese press report on Russia: Caviar crisis

The Portuguese mainstream newspapers report that there is a 60% reduction in caviar this year in the Volga delta. It is reported that Russia will export 10% of its sturgeon caviar production this year, 40 tones of the 400 tones produced. Association France Press reports sources in the Russian National Fishing Commission that this is a 60% reduction on last year. Vladimir Izmailov is quoted as saying that the catch this year was “very discouraging”. The crisis is blamed on over-fishing of the sturgeon stocks in the 1960s and 1970s and although there is a surplus of lamprey caviar, the sturgeon caviar is becoming more and more rare. However, Mr. Izmailov said that this year, the quotas allowed by the limit established for the protection of the species were 560 tones and only 400 of these were caught in the Volga delta. In the Caspian Sea itself, the situation is practically the same one hundred tones less than the amount permitted was caught. Other types of caviar, false caviar, are starting to inundate the supermarkets in EU countries, namely lumpfish caviar, both red and black, from Scandinavian countries. The quality, when compared with the sturgeon caviar, is very much inferior but for those who do not know the difference, they do not miss what they never tried.

Tim Bancroft-Hinchey Correspondent of PRAVDA.Ru Lissabon