Russia’s Federal Fishery Agency announced this week that oyster and mussel production in the first nine months of 2016 was 500 tons, two times the level of 2015.
“The products are in demand,” Fishery Agency Head Ilya Shestakov told reporters at a press conference Tuesday evening.
“Shipments have already been made to the central part of Russia. With the growth of production volume, the shipments will increase,” he added.
Ksenia Timakova, an agency spokesperson told the RBC newspaper that production levels had been boosted by oyster and mussel farms in the Crimean peninsula.
"For three quarters of 2016, the production of mussels and oysters in Crimean Peninsula farms increased by more than 2.5 times and amounted to about 100 tons - 70.5 tons of mussels and 29 tons of oysters,” she said.
Apart from the Crimean peninsula, oyster and mussel production also rose in the Krasnodar region and the Far East. According to Timakova, the Far East’s production volume at the beginning of December equaled 60 tons, compared to 50 tons the previous year.
Despite growth in domestic production, Russia still imports most of its mussels and oysters. In the first nine months of 2016, Russia imported 580,000 tons of oysters, significantly higher than the 302,000 tons in the same period from 2015.
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