Russia Kunashir salmon - trap/net

This FIP includes coastal trap nets, beach seines, and anchored set gillnets operated by PCF Yuzhno-Kurilsky Ryibokombinat Co., Ltd. (YKRK Co., Ltd.). Currently, the fishery is only using coastal trap nets as primary gear that capture pink and chum salmon along the coast of Kunashir Island which is administratively a part of the Sakhalin Oblast of the Far Eastern Federal Region of the Russian Federation. For management purposes, the fishery is located in the South Kuril Fishery subzone. The company was founded in 1946, reorganized in 1999, and is now a dynamically developing enterprise that has gone far beyond the coastal processing in the village of Yuzhno-Kurilsk. It is one of the largest fishing enterprises in the Sakhalin region. The catch of the company’s multiple species reaches 42,000 metric tons annually. The company owns and operates a salmon hatchery located at the Lagoonnoye Lake which began releasing juvenile chum salmon in 2018. 

In 2021, ForSea Solutions completed an MSC pre-assessment for the Kunashir fishery operated by YKRK Co., Ltd., who is interested in pursuing MSC certification. The Units of Assessment include pink and chum salmon stocks with each species considered as separate scoring elements in Principal 1. 

Strengths of the fishery include the use of selective gear and low bycatch, management that meets most requirements including low IUU activity, and strong interest to control hatchery impacts. However, the assessment identified several weaknesses that the client-company wants to focus on in this FIP including reduced escapement monitoring, low escapement levels of pink salmon in recent years, lack of hatchery marking and monitoring, insufficient ETP monitoring, and lack of responsiveness to serious issues in the fishery.  

This FIP is designed to address these issues and others identified in the pre-assessment so that the fishery can achieve MSC certification by 2026. The client-fishery is launching a comprehensive FIP on Kunashir Island with the goal to achieve MSC Certification. Launching this FIP will potentially allow the fishery-client to access new markets in North America and Europe.