The international conference “World fish market: international cooperation vs. pandemic” was held in online format on September 22, 2020. Event was broadcasted in live format. For 2,5 hours 11 speakers analyzed Covid-19 pandemic influence on the fish market, identified current trends and gave forecasts for the future.

281 people watched the broadcast, among them 40% are from foreign countries: Norway, Denmark, Iceland, United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Latvia, Germany, Italy, Spain, Israel, Turkey, Iran, UAE, Morocco, Mauritania, Mozambique, Senegal, Guinea Bissau, Comoro Islands, Madagascar, South Africa, India, China, South Korea, Chile and the USA.

Conference listeners actively participated in Q&A session. Most of them worried about world demand drop down. Second popular question was “Which sector suffered the most due to pandemic”.

During discussion speakers pointed out the following consequences:

•  Demand drop down

•  Expenditures growth (especially for companies with a big share of manual labor)

•  New behavior of consumers (frozen production demand rise, panic purchase of long expire date products)

•  Desire to investigate local and neighboring markets

•  New role of online trade, its influence on current trade order

•  HoReCa crises, refocusing on delivery and take away

•  Digitalization (wish to avoid personal contacts)

•  Fleet proceeding to sea problems (due to virus testing necessity and strict restrictions from foreign states)

The key trend which was emphasized by all the speakers is an increasing role of aquaculture caused by the wish to be closer to the market and to provide sustainable delivery.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture of the Russian Federation & Head of the Federal Agency for Fisheries Ilya Shestakov concluded that state of fish industry would depend on how long pandemic influence will last. In Russia, sectors which suffered the most are small enterprises which are hard to fulfil the Russian Agency for Health and Consumer Right’s requirements, producers who use a lot of manual labor and HoReCa sector.

The discussion will be continued in offline format at IV Global Fishery Forum & Seafood Expo Russia which will take place on 6-8 July, 2021 in Saint-Petersburg.

You may watch the conference broadcast on our YouTube channel.