Ukraine’s Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry jointly with the Foreign Ministry of Ukraine are holding consultations with the purpose of sending a draft protocol on the quotas for industrial fishing in the Sea of Azov through diplomatic channels for signature.
“Now we are consulting with the Foreign Ministry and it is obvious that we will send the draft protocol to the Russians through diplomatic channels in order to get their signature. When we get the protocol back, we can say that there are quotas. At the working level, they have been approved, but there is no final document,” acting Agricultural Policy and Food Minister of Ukraine Maksym Martyniuk told the press conference in Kyiv.
According to him, the Ukrainian-Russian commission on fisheries in the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait annually held meetings after the outbreak of an armed conflict with Russia to sign a protocol that, among other things, establishes the total allowable catch of the main industrial fish species and their seizures next year.
“Without a meeting of the commission and signing the protocol on quotas, we cannot carry out industrial fishing in the Sea of Azov. This will be regarded as poaching. If we want our fish industry to work, then we need to sign these protocols. We recommended that the State Fisheries Agency hold a meeting of the commission on the territories of third countries. Unfortunately, it turned out as it turned out. The commission worked, the necessary decisions seemed to have been approved, but the meeting did not end. It was thwarted, and before that the final protocol, which would fix the quota, was not signed,” Martyniuk said.
