The sea and its “managers”

“We greeted Ukraine’s accession to the World Trade Organization with great enthusiasm. It is a very good stimulant,” said Volodymyr Volkov, head of the State Fisheries Committee of Ukraine. According to the government’s chief fisheries manager, the Ukrainian fishing industry must now be dragged out of the shadows and actively developed. He added that the first steps in this direction have already been taken, as the 2008 budget envisages 50 million hryvnias to renew the fishing fleet.

“Fish is our second oil or second gold because the world’s fish resources are constantly decreasing. We in Ukraine have unique opportunities for preserving and maintaining the fishery. We have about as much water as land, so we have to actively develop this industry,” said Volkov, who also broached the prospect of investments. “This will be a nice “hook” for investors. They will realize that this is an industry where they can really invest their money.”

Volkov acknowledged that the current situation in the fishing industry leaves much to be desired: almost the entire fishing market is in the shadows: “Two-thirds of the catch is unaccounted for.” Isaac Sherman, a professor of agriculture, told The Day about the disheartening state of the fishing industry: “For a long time our fishing industry has been in a state of decline. The fishing fleet and fishing areas are diminishing, the principles of exploitation and production technologies are being violated, etc. In addition, the authorities who are tasked with protecting our fisheries are inadequately equipped and staffed.”

However, the situation can be literally reversed, Sherman added. “There are scientific findings that allow significant possibilities for increasing the fishing output in Ukraine without big expenditures. The whole thing boils down to effective usage of the bioproductive potential that forms the feed resource.” In other words, Sherman proposes to increase the quantity of fry being introduced into our bodies of water where there is plenty of food for them. “This feed potential is not being used and thus upsets the process of natural reproduction.” He believes that these products will have a number of advantages, compared to imported ones, among other things their low cost price (fish will use the natural feed and won’t require organic and mineral additives).

“All these factors are not large-scale ones from the financial angle, but they can produce ideal conditions for catching cheap fish of high quality. Without these principles our water reservoirs will be filled with species that are not in demand, like carp, sprats, and so on. Unless we reproduce a certain amount of fry stock, we will find ourselves in a situation where we will have nothing with which to stock our bodies of water,” Sherman pointed out.

In view of Ukraine’s accession to the WTO, this expert proposed that Ukraine must not waste any time but begin actively developing the fishing industry. His words were echoed by an optimistic Volkov: “Ukraine’s fishing industry won’t disappear now that we have joined the WTO.”

People in the fishing business do not share the enthusiasm of government officials and researchers, although they are not afraid of the WTO, either. “People in the agrarian sector have suffered so much from the inactivity of their own state that we have nothing to fear from the WTO,” Anatolii Kobalchynsky, director of the fish- importing firm Marine Master (Odesa oblast), explained to The Day. He said that the greatest problem faced by Ukrainian fishermen is the lack of government support. “Ukraine does not have a single intergovernmental agreement in the fishing sphere, unlike Russia, which has the world’s largest fishing resources and is a signatory to agreements with West African states and is an active member of various international organizations.”

Kobalchynsky is also unsatisfied with the current laws in the fishing sphere. “Before sending out a trawler, you have to sign a commitment to return it to Ukraine within one year. Why? Because that’s the law. Access to quotas is also done at your own risk; you often have to buy quotas not from the state but from very dubious individuals, or you have to work on someone else’s quota with incomprehensible clauses. As a rule, such cooperation ends up in the loss of the ship and problems with her crew.”

Kobalchynsky does not believe that bureaucrats can jumpstart the industry. He says that everything has to be started from scratch, and the situation cannot be fundamentally improved by stocking fry in all bodies of water. “We need a guaranteed market demand and high processing technologies. We must start by finding those who are willing to buy our fish. But what kind of fish? Silver carp? Our suppliers don’t know what to do with it even now, although theoretically the output can be increased by an order of magnitude. Since parallels are being drawn with oil, imagine a situation in which there is plenty of oil but no oil refineries. Ukraine does not have a single factory, a single business with a Euro-number allowing exports to EU countries. We cannot even supply pike perch, which is in great demand there. With no Euro-number there is no access to Europe! How can you get it? No one in Ukraine will tell you, not the veterinary or sanitary services, not even the State Standard Committee of Ukraine.”

The situation on the domestic market is no better. Kobalchynsky says that fishing in inland waters is so overregulated that no innovative initiative is possible. “The sea is small but there are many managers. None of the fishermen working on the Black Sea or the Sea of Azov can buy a new seiner, and if someone does, he will never work off its cost.”

In view of this situation, Kobalchynsky suggests that half the budget appropriations slated for the renewal of the fishing fleet be channeled to “those special research centers that are still left in Ukraine, so that they can take part in international organizations and keep a finger on the pulse of global processes in this sphere.” Without cardinal reforms, even now that Ukraine has joined the WTO, no investors will seriously consider our fishing industry, he added. “Investors are not fish, so they won’t bite on an empty hook. For example, what rights will an investor have after investing in a cobia (black salmon) farm on the Black Sea? Our controllers will eat him up along with his farm, nurseries, and fry.”

Kobalchynsky’s conclusion is that “there is nothing the WTO can do about this. The way I understand the WTO’s impact is that a free WTO member will bring fish to Ukraine and sell it cheaply. Or is there another way? If so, let him try. Let him try our customs clearance and certification procedures, then pay for containers in long idle time periods and the VAT calculated not on the cost of the fish, but on what the tariffs department decides. Then I’ll see if this WTO member will be willing to keep doing business in Ukraine.”