MOSCOW, August 2 The ban on fresh fish imports from Russia, which is currently being discussed in the EU, could deprive the union of more than a quarter of pollock imports, according to calculations based on data from the Eurostat platform.
At the end of July, the German newspaper Die Welt reported that the EU is currently discussing a tougher ban on seafood imports from Russia to the union countries, this time including fresh fish. At the same time, the publication notes that pollock produced in Russia and the USA is especially popular with European buyers. In particular, in Germany, it accounts for 19% of fish consumption.
According to Eurostat, the EU imported pollock worth more than 1 billion euros in 2023. Of this, 26.3%, or 266 million euros, came from Russia. Thus, if a ban on fresh fish supplies is introduced, the EU could lose more than a quarter of its pollock imports.
At the same time, the share of pollock supplies from Russia in 2022 was 27.9% (230 million euros), and in 2021 — 20% (166 million euros). In weight terms, the size of Russian pollock imports in 2023 reached 84.2 thousand tons, in 2022 — 80.5 thousand tons, and in 2021 — 57.6 thousand tons.
At the same time, the volume of supplies of all fresh and frozen fish from the Russian Federation to the EU at the end of last year amounted to 312.7 million euros, which is 16% lower than the 2022 figure of 371.8 million euros.