A total of 105 ships are under construction as part of Phase 1 of investment quotas programme
In 2023, Russian shipyards will deliver 19 fishing ships. The schedule of deliveries under Phase 1 of investment quotas programme has been developed by the ad hoc working group of the Federation Council, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Rosrybolovstvo (Russian Federal Fisheries Agency) and USC JSC, according to the Fishery Shipowners Association (FSA).
By the end of the year, domestic shipyard will deliver 10 fishing ships and 9 crab catchers. Two fishing trawlers were delivered in the beginning of the year. The construction of the third one has been completed.
“The schedule has been verified by the customers and the shipyards. All the data was confirmed by FSA which takes part in the inter-committee working group of the Federation Council. They were approved by the association members which had contracted 36 ships. The document was also approved by other investors,” comments FSA President Aleksey Osintsev.
105 modern fishing ships would be built under the programme on granting fishing quotas in return for investments. Admiralteyskie Verfi shipyard has already delivered two large factory freezer trawlers to Russian Fishery Company LLC (RFC). The ships have been put into operation.
After a period of almost 40 years when Russian shipyards built no fishing ships or crab catchers, the year of 2016 marked the beginning of orders inflow due to transition to the auction based principle of allocating quotas in the fishing industry. The reform foresees that the market players should have their ships built in the Russian Federation to obtain a quota for bioresources.
16 shipyards across the country, from Kaliningrad to Kamchatka, are implementing the so called ‘keel quota’ programme. Due to the sanctions and problems with implementation of projects on construction of lead ships under Phase 1, the period for implementation of investment projects was extended by RF Government from 5 to 7 years.
In late December 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on Phase 2 of investment quotas and crab auctions with investment obligations. According to preliminary estimates, order portfolio under phase 2 of investment quotas programme exceeds 70 fishing ships including up to 35 crab catchers. Phase 2 auctions will be held in August-September 2023, Rosrybolovstvo head Ilya Shestakov, said earlier.
Rosrybolovstvo (Russian Federal Fisheries Agency) earlier said that implementation of the two phases of the programme would decrease the age of Russia’s fishing fleet from 35 to 9 years thus allowing for boosting the catch rates and increasing annual output of the Far East fishery by 1 million tonnes.