TURKEY
Muharrem Aksoy, Director, İstanbul Gürpınar Fisheries Market and auction.
allow the fishing boats to remain at sea to continue fishing. At the auction, commissioners buy the fish from the fishermen and sell it further. The commissioners may be wholesalers or even retailers. The auction offers services such as the sale of ice, freezer and cold storage facilities, and logistics. In addition,
the municipality maintains a processing facility at the site.
Sales of farmed fish increase as catches wild seafood decline Muharrem Aksoy, the director of the fish market, says that the
volume of fish going through the auction in 2019 was lower than in 2018, while in 2020 the volumes recovered to approximately the same levels as in 2018. Catches have fluctuated both ways over the last 2 or 3 years, so trends are difficult to discern. According to data from the Turkish Statistical Institute, total catches have declined since 2000. The fiveyear average between 2000 and 2020 has fallen from 433 to 284 thousand tonnes. On the other hand, sales of farmed fish at the market have been increasing over the years and now amount to some 60 of the volume. Fish
from inland waters is also sold throught the market. The auction house was inspired by a Dutch fish auction in terms of its layour, but the auctions are still carried out the old fashioned way with an auction master calling out the price and potential buyers submitting bids. There are no plans to introduce electronic auction systems, says Mr Aksoy, as the industry is waiting for product standards which are being developed by the General Directorate of Food and Control in the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry.
The Istanbul fish auction Auction area (with cooling): 9,000 sq. m Frozen storage capacity: 1,300 tonnes Cold storage capacity: 620 Shock freezing capacity: 90 tonnes/day
Ice production capacity: 120 tonnes/day freshwater or salt water Annual sales volume: 40-55 thousand tonnes Employees: 211
Olivka Foods uses earthen ponds to grow a premium product
Occupying a special market niche Farmed fish production in Turkey is dominated by three species, seabass and seabream raised in the sea, and rainbow trout grown in freshwater. Together, these three species accounted for over 90% of the total aquaculture output in 2020. Seabass and seabream juveniles are typically bred in hatcheries on land and upon reaching 3-5 g are introduced into cages in the sea. Olivka, a company specialised in the production of juveniles, grows them to 10-15 g instead.
O
livka started investing in its aquaculture operations in 2012 with the acquisition of production licenses in earthen ponds. A year later the first batch of fish were introduced into the ponds and in 2014 the first fish were harvested. The following year marked the start of hatchery operations, initially for the company’s own production, but soon after they were commercialised, and juveniles began to be
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sold to other companies producing market-sized fish. In terms of biomass, Mr Kardes estimates the hatchery to be among top five hatcheries in the country today, supplying around 25m juveniles per year. Since 2016-17 the hatchery has focused on the production of juveniles that are larger than the norm. These fish are grown to about 15 g, as opposed to 3-5 g, and are vaccinated. Of the company’s 25m production, about
15m juveniles are grown to this large size.
Large, vaccinated juveniles offer several advantages The company is heavily focused on the added value that it gives the juveniles—by growing them to a large size and by vaccinating them. Usually, fish of 15 g are already in the sea and so must be
vaccinated there. This involves temporarily removing them from the cage, vaccinating, and returning them to the cage in a process that is logistically demanding and can be hindered by bad weather. By supplying already vaccinated fish, Olivka saves buyers from having to go through the inoculation process. Another advantage of growing the juveniles to 15 g on land concerns the logistics of feeding. As the fish grow from
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