China's distant-water fishery annual output grew nearly 800-fold in 30 years

In 2014, the national total distant-water fishery output reached 2.03 million tons, an increase of nearly 800-fold compared with the annual output of 2,600 tons in the initial period of 1985; the total output value reached 18.5 billion yuan, more than 4,000 times that of the initial period.

This is what the reporter learned from the Symposium on the 30th Anniversary of the Development of China's Distant-Water Fishery held here.

“Over the past 30 years, China's distant-water fishery has achieved brilliant accomplishments. Both the overall scale of the distant-water fleet and the distant-water fishery output rank among the forefront of the world, the level of equipment has risen markedly, the industrial structure has become increasingly optimized, and China has begun to steadily advance from a major distant-water fishery country to a strong one.” said Yu Kangzhen, Vice Minister of Agriculture, at the symposium.

On March 10, 1985, a distant-water fishery fleet composed of 13 fishing vessels from China National Fisheries Corporation set out for fishing operations in the fishing grounds of the West African waters of the Atlantic, opening a glorious page in the history of China's distant-water development. At present, China has more than 2,000 distant-water fishing vessels operating year-round in the exclusive economic zones of 40 countries and on the high seas of the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic Oceans.

The ability to develop high seas fishery resources best reflects a country's comprehensive strength in distant-water fishery. According to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture, in 2014 the output of China's high seas fishery accounted for 65% of China's total distant-water fishery output, a proportion more than 4 times that of 2000. At present, China's high seas squid jigging fleet scale and squid output rank first in the world, its tuna longline vessel number and tuna output rank among the forefront of the world, its specialized saury vessel number and production capacity have entered the world's advanced ranks, and important progress has been made in the development of Antarctic krill resources.

“China's development of distant-water fishery has broken the long-term monopoly of high seas resources by developed countries. It plays an important role in raising the level of China's fishery machinery and equipment and meeting the consumption needs of the Chinese people.” said Liu Shenli, Chairman of China National Agricultural Development Group.

Experts also pointed out that, because of its relatively late start, China still has a certain gap compared with strong distant-water fishery countries such as Japan, Sweden and the United States in terms of equipment level, operating methods and resource exploration capacity.

Distant-water fishery has become an important field for resource utilization by major fishery countries worldwide. According to estimates, marine fish, under rational development, can meet the protein needs of about 30 billion people. The resource reserves of Antarctic krill alone amount to more than 1 billion tons, and the scientifically reasonable annual catchable amount can reach nearly 100 million tons, equivalent to the total annual catch of marine aquatic products in the world at present.