AgroUdora Starts to Look Ahead
The Silver Taiga Foundation ecologists Nikolay Shilov and Nikolay Shuktomov have taken part in the traditional annual reporting meeting of the AgroUdora cooperative in Koslan.
This time the Chairman’s report (in the current year this position has been held by Leonid Vitalyevich Pavlov) turned out to be more positive than in previous years. For the first time since its creation, AgroUdora covered the quota by almost 100 percent. The sails were better organized as well: 536 kg of fish was sold to the population through the point of sale in Koslan, with which the agreement had been concluded. The rest of the fish was sold by the AgroUdora members themselves.
The figures are not too big and the demand for the fresh local fish is not satisfied so far, but it’s a start. Besides, there is a perspective: the district administration is planning to organize in Usogorsk a pavilion for selling the products of the agricultural producers, including the cooperative. Unfortunately, according to a representative of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, subsidies for the sold fish will be canceled from the new year, which complicates the perspective. And yet it still exists.
Nikolay Shilov, the Model River Mezen project coordinator, told about the results and further prospects of cooperation between the Silver Taiga Foundation and AgroUdora at the meeting. In the current year, the initial occasional interaction with the cooperative has become more close and consistent. This is easy to understand: the project aims at the development of the sustainable fish resources management on the Mezen, and the cooperative in the Udora district is virtually the only organized business entity on the river. Over the last two years, many joint activities of different types have been conducted within the framework of the project implementation. They included information and consultation meetings and workshops with the cooperative members, a summer field camp for schoolchildren in Krivushevo, carried out with an active engagement of the Glotovo branch of AgroUdora, the work on the Irva lakes devoted to calculation of the necessary volumes of reclamation activities, the first stocking experience, the preparation of the cooperative members for the independent monitoring of the resources on their leased areas… By the way, during the meeting Nikolay Shilov emphasized the importance of such monitoring for the business entity planning to work for more than one year and thinking about the future prospects: both the amount of applications for catch of some or other fish and fish stocking plans will depend on the monitoring results.
In the coming year, the joint work with AgroUdora in the framework of the Model River Mezen project will be continued. In particular, the Silver Taiga Foundation will support the initiative of establishing a guest house on the Irva. This will also allow the cooperative to develop other areas of activity, including tourism.
Additionally, it is important to note that, in recent years, only the Glotovo branch of AgroUdora has been actually working, because the cooperative has a long-term agreement for lease of the fishing grounds on the Irva, and fishing quotas for several fish species are annually issued here. However, some AgroUdora members also live in other settlements – near the Mezen and the Vashka. Since they had initially been given the fishing quotas only for lamprey, and in recent years lamprey catch was prohibited, the cooperative refused to lease these fishing grounds, and the cooperative members in Pyssa, Vazhgort, etc. were actually only listed as such. Starting from the coming year, it will be possible to apply for quotas and conclude agreements for a year here.
The meeting showed that the AgroUdora cooperative, having released of ballast (now it consists of 70 members compared to the previous 200 plus people), is gradually getting back on its feet, people start to act knowingly and think about the future perspective. What is essential here is the support of the allies and joint work with them – with the district branch of the Interregional Public Movement “Komi voytyr”, Silver Taiga Foundation, LLC “Udora Necklace”… At the recent conference in Koslan, conducted in the framework of the Model River Mezen project, the cooperative members supported the establishment of the District Public Fishery Council, and at the annual meeting – elected their representative to the Council, Ivan Lukin from Vazhgort.
The photos are made by Sergey Davydov
