A recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) facility to grow trout is slated for launch in the Republic of Karelia, the regional government said in a statement.
The news came after Karelia Governor Arthur Parfyonchikov paid a visit to the village of Kuytezha, where the facility is now under construction.
The investor is Vecherniy Briz, a St. Petersburg, Russia-based company. Vecherniy Briz CEO Evgeniy Kirichenko told Parfyonchikov the farm will minimize impacts on the environment – a sensitive issue for Karelia, where several proposed aquaculture projects have been nixed by locals over ecological concerns.
The farm, with a planned total production of 400,000 fish annually, will focus on growing both juvenile and harvestable fish using two separate farming systems.
At the moment, the farm is under construction, with the equipment needed purchased and soon to be delivered, according to the company. Parfyonchikov said the company will receive incentives provided by the regional government for aquaculture farmers, including subsidies that will partly compensate for the cost of the equipment.
When operational, the farm will employ 10 workers.
The launch date of the new facility depends on when the company will manage to secure gas for its facilities. Parfyonchikov said he has plans to discuss the issue with the top management of Gazprom, Russia’s state-owned gas monopoly.
Karelia is known for its abundant water resources, particularly its lakes. Trout-farming has been done in the region since the 1970s, and Karelia is currently home to 60 trout farms. In 2020, 36,200 metric tons (MT) of the species were produced – up 11 percent from 2019 – and the region now produces nearly 90 percent of all trout farmed in Russia.
Karelian trout is delivered fresh or cooled to markets of St. Petersburg and Moscow. St. Petersburg, which has more than seven million inhabitants, is the fourth-most inhabited city in Europe, and Moscow, the country’s capital, has 17 million residents, making it the largest city in Europe.
In the first half of 2021, Russia’s aquaculture output was 211,000 MT, up 25 percent from the corresponding period of the last year. The Northwest region produced 71,200 MT, with Karelia’s output of 14,000 MT ranking it sixth among all Russian regions.
Photo courtesy of www.kremlin.ru.
