“It is necessary to support other sectors of the local economy, except for the oil and gas and petrochemical complexes. It is necessary to revive the work of fish processing enterprises, to attract investors in this sector. We see that the measures taken are not yielding results. Our citizens are waiting for real action. The Ministry of Agriculture and the akimat should focus on this issue,” Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said at the meeting.

Today Atyrau region is known not only as the oil capital, but also famous for the development of the fishing industry.

Currently, 19 production enterprises of various ownership forms, two sturgeon hatcheries are engaged in fish extraction and processing.

In 2019, fish exports amounted to 8.9 thousand tons.

Due to the reduction in the natural reproduction of sturgeon fish and the intensification of hydrocarbon production on the north-eastern coast of the Caspian Sea, the Atyrau sturgeon hatchery was built and commissioned in 1998 as a compensation facility in the Ural River delta.

The subject of the company’s activity is replenishment of sturgeon fish species in the Caspian Sea through the release of juvenile sturgeon fish species obtained and grown artificially into the Ural River. According to the director of the plant Rashiden Kalidullin, annually 3.5 million pieces of juvenile sturgeon species are produced at the plant. Mostly beluga, sturgeon, spike and stellate sturgeon.

From 1998 to 2019, over 89 billion pieces of viable juvenile sturgeon species were grown and released into the Ural-Caspian basin.

“We are 100% fulfilling the order of the Head of State. We produce 3.5 million juveniles of sturgeon species of fish; for nature users we produce over 120 thousand juveniles of sturgeon species of fish. If we talk about the factory workers, 78 people work for us. 60% of them are fisheries specialists,” said Rashiden Kalidullin, director of the Atyrau Sturgeon Hatchery.

Since 1934, the Imeni Amangeldy LLP has been manufacturing fish products. All these years, the main principle of the enterprise was the release of only the best, environmentally friendly fish products. 395 tons of fish are processed here per day. In 2019, 1.1 thousand tons of frozen fish, 225 tons of fillets and 50 tons of processed fish were produced. The products of Imeni Amangeldy LLP are in great demand in the markets of Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and France, Bulgaria, Germany.

“We ship products manufactured by our company to the countries of the EAEU, the Customs Union and other foreign countries. We fully provide the domestic market. We sell more than 20 types of fish products in Atyrau and the districts of Atyrau region. We sell our products at retail outlets at low prices,” said Sabit Sagidullin, Director of Imeni Amangeldy LLP.

Another company operating in the fishing industry is the Caspian Royal Fish LLP sturgeon hatchery. The company began operations in 2014 under the name Caspian Royal Fish. In 2019, the plant produced 12.5 tons of marketable fish and 620 kg of food caviar. Akhat Nimatov, Caspian Royal Fish chief fish farmer, spoke about the plant’s performance and future plans.

“Every year, our performance improves. Now we annually supply 700 kg of caviar to the domestic market. Our goal is to cook up to 1 ton of food caviar in the future. Send half for export. At the same time, we have plans to deal with replenishment of the Zhaiyk river with fry. We have enough specialists for this. We ourselves will grow fry up to 3-10 grams and release them into the river,” Nimatov said.