BBC Tuesday, 19 June, 2001, 07:24 GMT 08:24 UK

Crunch time for Caspian caviar

With demand outstripping supply, the world's caviar is running out

By BBC News Online's James Arnold

Four of the world's biggest caviar producers are battling to avoid an export ban of the delicacy.

Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, which border the Caspian Sea, source of 90% of the world's caviar, are accused of failing to prevent environmental damage and poaching.

Now the UN's Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) is considering imposing sanctions on the countries at a four-day meeting, which opens on Tuesday in Paris.

These could take the form of an 80% reduction in their export quotas, or even a complete ban.

This will almost certainly force the price of caviar on world markets much higher.

However, caviar lovers should still be able to get caviar from Iran, the fifth Caspian state and the world's biggest producer of the delicacy.

Iran does not face restrictions because of its tight management of the trade.

The four ex-Soviet countries have agreed a package of conservation measures to present to the CITES meeting.

Near extinction

The legal Caspian Sea sturgeon catch has fallen from 22,000 tons to less than 1,000 tons in the last 20 years, and certain sub-species - such as the high-quality Beluga and Osetra - are near extinction.

The four ex-Soviet countries are facing penalties because CITES claims they have not exercised proper control of the sturgeon fishing industry.

Officials said they need to be forced to help themselves.

"We owe it to the people of the Caspian Sea region to help their governments manage sturgeon stocks on a scientific basis and protect them from illegal traders," said Ken Stansell, chairman of CITES's standing committee.

Although all caviar-producing countries are subject to CITES export quotas, the high prices commanded by caviar on world markets have made it a magnet for illegal fishing, and even organised crime.

According to a report prepared by the Russian office of TRAFFIC, the trade-monitoring arm of the World Wildlife Fund, 80% of the sturgeon and caviar on sale in Moscow is illegally produced.

The illicit trade is becoming global: last July, US-based Caviar and Caviar Ltd. was fined $10.4m (£7.4m) - the largest fine ever in a wildlife prosecution - for smuggling black market Russian caviar into the United States using forged Russian caviar labels.

Environmental blight

At the same time, pollution and commercial development in the Caspian Sea have taken their toll on the marine environment.

The northern Caspian and the mouth of the river Volga - the sturgeon's favoured spawning ground - have been blighted by industrial waste floating downriver from Russian factories.

The increasing importance of the Caspian Sea in petroleum exploration will only make matters worse, environmentalists say.

A year ago, what's being claimed as the world's biggest oilfield was discovered in the Kazakh sector of the northern Caspian.

Iran to the rescue

The caviar market may not dry up entirely, however.

Last March, the US government lifted its embargo on imports of many Iranian consumer goods, including caviar.

In 1999, Iran exported over 80 tons of roe, a record, and has started investing heavily to meet anticipated American demand.

But Iran will only partly ease the market crunch: imports to the US are just now starting to trickle in, and its caviar is premium grade - usually priced 10-20% higher than Russian.

In demand

The net effect is certain to be yet more steep rises in the retail price of caviar, which has already doubled over the last five years or so.

One gramme of Beluga caviar - the most sought-after grade - is now retailing for close to $3 in New York.

Demand for caviar in Western countries has boomed in recent years, especially in the US, where it has been fuelled by the prolonged stockmarket boom in the late 1990s.

Now, says Gerhard Corsten of Princesse d'Isenbourg et Cie, a London luxury-foods importer, global caviar demand is more than twice the potential supply.

And even the threatened global economic downturn won't be enough to dampen demand, Corsten said.

"The avid consumer of caviar will always find an excuse, whether it's to celebrate or drown his sorrows."

-- Anonymous, June 19, 2001

Answers

http://www.boston.com/dailynews/171/world/Caspian_states_warily_await_ ru:.shtml

Caspian states warily await ruling on caviar exports

By Aida Sultanova, Associated Press, 6/20/2001 20:23

BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) Along the Caspian Sea, warehouses are piled high with cans of black caviar, blocked from export by a U.N. agency that says urgent steps are needed to save the fish that produces the delicacy from extinction.

Officials from the U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or CITES, are meeting in Paris this week to consider what action to take, including a possible ban on exports of beluga caviar from Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakstan and Turkmenistan. The agency has temporarily frozen international sales pending this week's decision.

Iran, another Caspian nation and caviar exporter, would not be affected because its system for sturgeon management is considered relatively effective.

Fishery officials in the region have reacted angrily to the threat of a ban and to CITES' attempts to cut sturgeon fishing quotas in the Caspian by 80 percent to allow fish stocks to replenish. They claim the former Soviet republics are being singled out for punishment.

''We've been asking for help from the world community already for several years, but all of a sudden the CITES secretariat has begun to divide countries into 'good guys' and 'bad guys,''' said Tariel Mamedli, deputy chief of Azerbaijan's state fishing company.

''We don't want to exacerbate the conflict, but let's not forget that there are not four, but five Caspian nations and they should all have the same possibilities.''

All five Caspian countries are signatories to the CITES treaties, along with more than 140 other nations. Under the treaties, CITES can bar other countries from buying products made from endangered species.

Azerbaijan has 5.5 tons of legally caught caviar in warehouses, and Mamedli said an American firm placed an order for it two months ago. If the CITES ban goes through, Azerbaijan could lose millions of dollars. The region's biggest caviar producer, Russia, could lose much more.

''Our position is that so far, it is premature to introduce such serious measures,'' said Vitaly Korchinsky of Russia's State Fisheries Committee.

He refused to disclose how much black caviar was blocked from leaving Russia, but admitted none of this year's harvest has been exported.

Russia's legal quota this year was to have been about 31 tons, Kazakstan's about 29 tons, Azerbaijan's about seven tons and Turkmenistan's about four tons. According to unofficial estimates, more than 100 tons of legally caught caviar are stuck in storage around the Caspian.

Environmentalists say the Caspian's beluga sturgeon stocks have plummeted by about 90 percent in two decades. The decline is due mostly to pollution and the end of Soviet-era controls over caviar fishing and exports, which has left the way open for widespread poaching.

''We are losing sturgeon as a species,'' said Alexander Kosarikov, a Russian lawmaker who favors a moratorium on sturgeon fishing.

Mamedli said that in Soviet times, border guards could dispatch helicopters to chase poachers, but today Azerbaijani anti-poaching officers ''don't even have bicycles.''

Poachers are believed to be harvesting up to 12 times more Caspian sturgeon than authorized fishermen. In Russia, the official caviar trade brings in $40 million a year, compared with $500 million for the poachers, according to Interior Ministry estimates.

Kazakstan has mobilized some unusual methods to protect the sturgeon. The Kazak state company has hired 130 former poachers this year to help identify the best fishing sites, and factory officials say they have developed a way to harvest roe without killing the fish.

''Almost the entire route of spawning sturgeon along the Ural River has been safeguarded,'' said Sergei Dolgikh, president of the Kazak state fishing company. ''Sturgeon have traveled 375 miles upriver, farther than they've been seen in decades.''

Azerbaijan is using a $9.2 million environmental loan from the World Bank to build a sturgeon hatchery that would release 15 million fingerlings a year, Mamedli said. He said an export ban could set back such efforts.

''The Caspian states are no more responsible for the situation than the European states that buy and resell illegally-caught caviar,'' he said.

-- Anonymous, June 21, 2001