The Fisheries Sector of Kazakhstan - Book Report/Review Example

Fish in Kazakhstan Executive Summary Kazakhstan has diverse regional waterbodies hosting a large variety of fish. Fisheries spurred as a business inKazakhstan around the 1960s. The fisheries sector of Kazakhstan employs tens of thousands of people and meets local as well as global demand of fish. While the country has a lot of potential to make fisheries a significant contributor to its economy, lack of proper administration, and unhealthy and unsustainable business practices impede the sector’s tendency to reach its optimal potential. Many fish species are diminishes as a result of excessive salinity and contamination of water from industrial waste and agricultural activities. The actual number of fisheries in Kazakhstan far exceeds the reported number. Accordingly, illegal fishing in Kazakhstan is rampant despite while the implementation of law and accountability is ineffective. These conditions have resulted in significant lowering of many valuable fish species in the country. This paper summarizes the history and important statistics related to fisheries in Kazakhstan and concludes with recommendations for the businesses, industries, and local governments, all of which need to play their roles individually and collectively. The economic, social, and environmental challenges associated with fisheries in Kazakhstan need to be dealt with effectively to optimize the profitability of fisheries and make the business sustainable. Key Words Fish; Kazakhstan; contamination; species; stock Overview of the topic Kazakhstan, the 9th largest country in the world has its international borders traversing some very vast regional waterbodies including 1070km of Aral Sea and 1894km of Caspian Sea (The Fish Site 2010). Kazakhstan’s sheer size embodies a lot of topographical variation. Glacial runoff from the exquisitely long mountain ranges supplies water to most rivers in the country. Kazakhstan has diverse waterbodies which has spurred fisheries’ development in the country. Fisheries in Kazakhstan are relatively young branch of economy compared to agriculture. Intensive fisheries’ development in Kazakhstan started in the 1960s (Ismukhanov and Mukhamedzhanov n.d.). The main target of the fisheries has been river fish stocks, Aral Sea, and the stocks of reservoir fish. Over the decades, new processing factories, lake farms, fish pond farms, and fish producing enterprises have been established in Kazakhstan, thus causing an overwhelming increase in fish breeding to the extent that fish production reached 100,000 tonnes by 1975 (Ismukhanov and Mukhamedzhanov n.d.). However, the number of rivers in Kazakhstan is low despite the country’s large size because of the land’s arid and semi-arid nature. The continental climate displays seasonal variations with dramatic high and low temperatures during summers and winters respectively. Rivers in Kazakhstan are not very important for commercial fisheries, even though some rivers like the Ural, Syr-Darya, Tekes, Kigach, and Irtysh have recreational fishing significance. The deteriorating ecology of the Capsian Sea has resulted in the drop of commercial sturgeon fish stocks so much that today, annual catch has become a meager 250 tonnes (Ismukhanov and Mukhamedzhanov n.d.). The Khrushchev’s Virgin Lands Programs exacerbated desertification of Kazakhstan between the 1950s and 1960s (The Fish Site 2010). The limited availability of water made it difficult to plough without blowing away the topsoil and triggering wind erosion. Besides, Soviet nuclear weapons’ testing in the Semey region toward the north-east at Kurchatov until 1990 has caused radioactive contamination locally along with many other unfavorable consequences including birth defects, radiation poisoning, leukaemia, and anaemia (The Fish Site 2010). By the 1980s, increasing toxicity and salinity of the Aral Sea resulted from the pesticide runoff from cotton fields deprived its waters of the endemic species. The Caspian Sea has been a main source of fishing globally for a long time in the history. However, overfishing has posed such a huge threat to sturgeon stocks that severe controls have been introduced over landings to recover the stock (The Fish Site 2010). Owing to the diminishing species of Fringebarbel sturgeon, its commercial fishing was banned in the Ural River in 2002 (The Fish Site 2010). The total number of species and subspecies of fish recorded in the waters of Kazakhstan is 155 (The Fish Site 2010). The Fisheries Committee of Kazakhstan reports that the fisheries sector employed 17,300 people in 2006. While it is more than the official figure of 13,200 people in 2002 (World Bank 2005), it is sharply down the official figure of 60,000 people in the 1980s. In addition to that, in Kazakh fishers are deprived of specific social security schemes. Recommendations Employers, industries, and local governments all need to play their part in making the fisheries sustainable. Employers and business entrepreneurs should increase the wage of fishers to boost their motivation and increase their productivity as well as personal well-being. The Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Statistics (2008) estimated the latest figure of the number of employees employed in the aquaculture and fisheries to be 2349 earning nearly US$418 monthly on average (fao.org n.d.). Most of these employees are on seasonal contracts so during summers, when there is a decline in the levels of catch, many employees go redundant for two to three months. Employers and business entrepreneurs should make personal safety and protection of the fishers their top-most priority. It is their social as well as moral obligation to provide the fishers with personal protective equipment. Currently, fishers in Kazakhstan are not provided with any specific social security schemes. However, they have different income support and child benefits schemes that they can avail when their income goes below the established limit. Employers in Kazakhstan are legally obliged to take care of their employees in the workplace, but many fishers are deprived of such support in their contracts. Employers assign the fishers responsibility to keep safe while fishing without providing them with the required safety equipment. Industries should establish recycling mechanisms to minimize the discharge of waste into waterbodies. Main recreational fishing sites in Kazakhstan are located in the vicinity of industrial cities or big settlements. The main source of pollution in the waterbodies in Kazakhstan is irrigation farming. The rivers’ self-purification tendency is reduced to such an extent that aquatic life is endangered. Phototoxicity can be used to increase the rate of germination and facilitate the growth of aquatic plants to maintain best breeding and living conditions for the fish in waterbodies. Local government should remove the species of the Balkhash perch and Caspian salmon from the listing of commercial fisheries because of the rapidly lowering number of these fish. Illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing is omnipresent in Kazakhstan. According to The World Bank, “most landings go unrecorded; the majority of activity in the fisheries sector takes place in the underground economy and does not register in official data” (Thorpe and Anrooy 2009). Local governments should envisage fish protection devices while constructing irrigation or multipurpose dams. Owing to the lack of envisagement of the fish protection devices in the past, a number of valuable fish species including Balkhash marinka, Siberian sturgeon, ide, nelma, and Aral barbel have disappeared. Many of these fish species were spilled into depressions, lost in irrigation canals, or spilled after passing through the turbines. The conventional concept of a sustainable fishery is that such a fishery is harvested at a rate that is sustainable, which implies that the population of fish does not decline as a result of the fishing practices over the passage of time. To make the fisheries sustainable, concerned authorities should periodically assess the population of different species of fish in the different waterbodies and impose sanctions to regulate their fishing. This will reduce the risk of overfishing of the valuable fish species and ensure sustainable supply of the fish throughout the year. Local governments should increase stocking material to make optimal utilization of small reservoirs. When stocked with grass carp, common carp, or silver carp in polyculture, these small reservoirs exhibit very good production potential. Finally, a national plan of action should be developed for each Caspian littoral state. This should be followed by the development of a regional plan of action to prevent illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing in the Caspian region. Reflective analysis and concluding remarks My understanding of the role of businesses on natural resources and their impact on the quality of life of the people in the locality as well as globally at large has tremendously improved as a result of doing this assignment as well as through carrying out research since the start of this semester till its end. In this semester, we have done a lot of assignments and research based on the way business practices determine the socioeconomic stability and environmental health and safety of a country. We have covered a vast range of subjects containing diverse topics ranging from the corporate social responsibility of business entrepreneurs, industries, and governments to the impact of poor business practices and governmental policies on the fisheries in Kazakhstan. If I were a business entrepreneur running a fishery, I shall ensure the provision of optimal conditions for breeding and sustainability of the fish. I would install fish protection devices in the water reservoirs and optimize the production potential of the reservoirs by stocking them with silver or grass carp. Alongside, I shall provide my employees with above average salary as well as personal protective equipment to boost their motivation and make the workplace safer for them. References: Fao.org n.d., Processing, marketing and trading of fish and fish products, [Online] Available at http://www.fao.org/docrep/012/i1596e/i1596e02.pdf [accessed: 26 April 2015]. Ismukhanov, K, and Mukhamedzhanov, V n.d., The use of irrigation systems for sustainable production of agricultural and fish products in the Republic of Kazakhstan, [Online] Available at http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5082e/y5082e0d.htm [accessed: 26 April 2015]. The Fish Site 2010, Fisheries And Aquaculture In Kazakhstan: The Current Status, [Online] Available at http://www.thefishsite.com/articles/984/fisheries-and-aquaculture-in-kazakhstan-the-current-status/ [accessed: 26 April 2015]. Thorpe, A, and Anrooy, R 2009, Inland fisheries livelihoods in Central Asia: Policy interventions and opportunities, [Online] Available at http://www.fao.org/3/a-i0870e.pdf [accessed: 26 April 2015]. World Bank 2005, Kazakhstan Fisheries Sector Study, World Bank/Government of Kazakhstan, [Online] Available at http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2006/01/19/000112742_20060119162038/Rendered/INDEX/313830KZ0ENGLISH0updated0fisheries.txt [accessed: 26 April 2015]. Read More