Wes­tern count­ries have redu­ced their con­nec­tions to Rus­sia to a mini­mum, but the­re are still a few open chan­nels in use and both sides are still able to make agree­ments that many will think of as sur­pri­sing: Nor­way and Rus­sia have sea­led an agree­ment on fishery quo­tas for the Barents Sea and the Nor­we­gi­an Sea, at the Barents­ob­ser­ver reports.

Rus­si­an fishing ves­sel in the Barents Sea.

The Nor­we­gi­an-Rus­si­an Joint Fishery Com­mis­si­on has been in exis­tence sin­ce 1976. It sets over­all quo­tas for eco­no­mic­al­ly important spe­ci­es such as cod, had­dock, cape­lin and hali­but and it defi­nes the share that the fishing fleets of the two count­ries get. The indi­vi­du­al share is usual­ly near 50 % of the total quo­ta.

The quo­ta for cod was redu­ced now for two times in a row by 20 %.

Nor­way and Rus­sia also agreed to con­ti­nue their coope­ra­ti­on within the sci­en­ti­fic moni­to­ring of fish stocks and rela­ted admi­nis­tra­ti­on.

As a con­se­quence of Russia’s war against the Ukrai­ne, Nor­way has clo­sed most ports for Rus­si­an fishing ves­sels. Only Trom­so, Båts­fjord and Kir­kenes remain acces­si­ble for Rus­si­an ships, which are regu­lar­ly sub­ject to minu­te con­trols in the­se ports. Rus­sia has announ­ced to ter­mi­na­te the coope­ra­ti­on with Nor­way in case the govern­ment in Oslo deci­des on fur­ther rest­ric­tions. On the other side, Nor­we­gi­an fisher­men com­plain about fre­quent clo­sings of lar­ge are­as in the Rus­si­an sec­tor of the­se waters due to mili­ta­ry exer­ci­s­es. This often hap­pens on short noti­ce, which trou­bles the fishi­ung fleet.