Unique species of Sevan lake herring being sold in Armenia at sturgeon
price
2008-01-15 20:41:00
ArmInfo. In 2008 ichthyologists recommend to ban the catch of fish in
Lake Sevan for a whole year. The recommendation of the ichthyologists
has not been taken into account by the Armenian Environment Ministry
yet. Armenian Environment Minister Aram Harutyunyan also evaded the
answer and told ArmInfo correspondent half in jest that maybe there
will be no ban.
At the same time, Director of the Institute of Hydroecology and
Ichthyology of the Armenian National Academy of Sciences Boris
Gabrielyan told ArmInfo correspondent that research to estimate the
fish reserves were held jointly with the "Sevan" National Park. The
Institute holds research to assess the ecological state of the lake.
Thus, the recent surveys of specialists show that the lake herring
reserves in the lake have decreased by 70 tons to about 180-200 tons.
Monitoring held by ArmInfo in Yerevan showed that almost the whole fish
sold on shopboards is brought from fish-farms. In particular, the
matter concerns the rainbow trout, which differs from the Sevan trout,
as well as the Siberian sturgeon which is popularly styled as sterlet
by mistake, and the river trout. Despite the overfishing of lake
herrings in the Sevan, unique species of this fish are still met in the
markets of Yerevan and large cities of Armenia. At the same time, the
Sevan lake herring is sold for 1500-2500 AMD per kg, this price being
equal to that of the Siberian sturgeon. At the moment, no ban on the
commercial catch of fish in Lake Sevan operates. To recall, the
fish-farms’ attempts to breed the Sevan lake herring in reservoirs
failed.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
