A total of 2,500 tons of sturgeon meat and 10 tons of farmed caviar were produced in the last Iranian year (ended March 19, 2020), according to the deputy head of Iran's Fisheries Organization for aquaculture affairs.
Noting that demand for sturgeon fry stands at 1-2 million annually, Hossein Abdolhay added, “Demand has always outweighed sturgeon fry output. However, the recent entry of private sector players in the field of sturgeon production has solved this problem in the current year.”
The official noted that total pond area devoted to shrimp farming was 12,336 hectares last year, from which the country produced 46,000 tons of shrimp last year, IRNA reported.
Caspian littoral states have decided to extend the ban on fishing sturgeons for commercial purposes until the end of 2020, which has been in place since 2011.
As per the agreement, wild sturgeons can only be harvested for research purposes.
Caspian Sea, in the north of Iran, is the world’s primary and largest habitat of the beluga, the most famous sturgeon species, as well as four other sturgeon species.
However, the deteriorating condition of Caspian Sea has long been threatening this fish with extinction. The declining sturgeon population and the ban on their fishing have caused a downtrend in Iran’s caviar exports.
Studies show that most of the world’s sturgeon spawn in the rivers flowing into the Caspian Sea. Iran has some of the harshest laws on poaching the fish while authorities have sought to persuade other countries in the region to implement similar regulations to protect the fish.
The long, prehistoric fish, whose glittery, bead-like eggs make the choicest caviar, had been driven nearly to extinction by overfishing.
Now, dozens of Iranian producers are raising sturgeons legally on fish farms.
According to Nabiollah Khounmirzaei, the head of Iran’s Fisheries Organization, the country produced 2,800 tons of sturgeon meat as well as 590 kilograms of farmed caviar in the last Iranian year (March 2018-19), Mehr News Agency reported.
