Iran would be in complete charge of the global caviar market in 2006 as the rest of the Caspian littoral states had been prohibited from the lucrative business due to growing environmental concerns.

The lax attitude of local authorities in the Caspian Sea provinces has exacerbated caviar smuggling from northern parts of the country, says a senior fisheries official. Mohammad Kazerouni-Monfared, director general of Gilan Province Fishery, believes that the reason why the local people refused to catch sturgeon in the past was to preserve the precious national asset.
However, today, he said, excessive sturgeon catch has put the Caspian Sea ecosystem and marine reserves at serious risk.
“Fishery has a 200-year-old history in Gilan,“ he said, adding that the Qajar rulers used to ’rent out’ the northern rivers to the Russians.
He said there is recorded historical evidence about fishing activities in Gilan region since 1,300 years ago.
The official told Fars News Agency that the world’s largest sturgeon farming centers are located in Gilan province, where some 75 fishing cooperatives are operating with 5,700 fishermen and producing 6,000 tons of fishes.

Annual Catch
Kazerouni-Monfared says some 400 authorized fishermen catch sturgeon and other fishes used for caviar production off the Caspian coasts in Gilan.
“The catch stands at 25 tons a year, which leads to production of three tons of caviar,“ he said. The province also has some 2,300 fish farms producing 20,000 tons of fish a year.
Caviar is the province’s main export item, he pointed out. Two of the province’s major fisheries companies have obtained international standard certificates for exporting seafood to Europe.
The official believes that unemployment and worsening financial woes have encouraged many people in northern parts of the country to smuggle caviar.
It was announced in May that Iran would be in complete charge of the global caviar market in 2006 as the rest of the Caspian littoral states had been prohibited from the lucrative business due to growing environmental concerns.
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna (CITES) has awarded Iran a significant caviar export quota and maintained a trade freeze on other Caspian Sea nations. Iran thus has exclusive rights to caviar production and exports in 2006.
Some 89 percent of Iranian caviar is exported and the rest consumed domestically.
Iran’s main caviar markets include France, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Japan and the United States. Caviar exports to the US resumed five years ago after a 20-year ban.
The country’s caviar export quota for 2006 has been fixed at 44.3 tons.

Some 400 authorized fishermen catch sturgeon and other fishes used for caviar production off the Caspian coasts in Gilan.

Declining
Caviar exports fell drastically to 18 tons during March 2005-2006. The exports were insignificant given the vast potentials of trade in this delicacy.
This is while Iran has for several years retained its position as the world’s largest caviar exporter with annual overseas sales averaging 59.9 tons.
Head of Iran’s Fishery Organization Shabanali Nezami said earlier that the decline was due to the weak performance of former fishery authorities to protect the endangered sturgeon.
Under a four-year reproduction assistance program, Iran is to increase the sturgeon population, which has been declining at an alarming rate in recent years.
Export quotas for sturgeon meat and caviar are restricted in compliance with CITES, which controls the number of endangered sturgeon.
The convention has restricted exports for all sturgeon at 50 percent of the total catch for beluga, 40 percent for star sturgeon, and 10 percent for Russian and Persian sturgeon.

Undeniably, economic and political developments have an impact on each other.
The Iranian economy is over-politicized to a large extent, experts say.
The fact of the matter is that whenever there is a change in government, officials and experts of the previous government, despite their contributions and invaluable experiences gained, are dispensed with and replaced with inexperienced newcomers, who are aligned with the new political set-up.
Alaeddin Boroujerdi, who heads parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, is also of the opinion that economic issues have a political connotation.
Referring to the controversial letter sent to the president by 50 senior members of the Association of Iranian Economists, the lawmaker told ISNA that economics is a science that needs to be handled by specialized people and experts.
“Economy should be seen outside the political framework,“ he said, stressing that plain criticism will not help.
“Economists should help executive authorities overcome economic challenges rather than merely criticize them.“

Divergent Views
Boroujerdi believes that divergent views regarding economic issues are not exclusive to Iran.
“Everywhere in the world there are divergent economic views and counter views which need to be addressed by economic experts,“ he said, trying to imply that the criticisms of the government’s economic performance by the economists are only a matter of differences of opinion.
Seyyed Hossein Hashemi, who heads Majlis Industrial Commission, is also of the opinion that economic issues need economic solutions, not political ones.
He told ISNA that the politicization of the economy would increase investment risks.
The lawmaker, however, believes that politics could help facilitate economic development as much as it could slow down its progress.
“Political responses to economic questions will create hurdles in the way,“ he said, adding that the economy should not be used as a tool to achieve political objectives.
“Using the economy for political purposes could have a (desirable) short-term effect, but will damage the country and increase its (social and economic) vulnerability in the long-run,“ he maintained.

Harmful
Another outspoken MP, Hamid Reza Hajibabaei, believes that looking at the economy with political spectacles will not only harm the various economic sectors, but will also have a negative impact on other issues of national interest.
The member of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission noted that even criticisms about the economy and responses to such criticisms are politically motivated.
“Unfortunately, the ruling political environment does not allow expert analyses (of the situation),“ he said, adding that this will have an adverse impact on the expert community.
He said the only way out of the politicized economic environment of today is to return to rationality and expertise and do away with factional prejudices and political inclinations.

Power Factor
Parviz Sorouri, a member of the majority Majlis Fundamentalist Faction, is also of the opinion that when a political faction comes to power, it will try to achieve its goals through economic means irrespective of the national interests.
“If the Fourth Five-year Economic Development Plan (2005-2010) and Vision 2025 are implemented properly, problems arising from the interaction between economic and political levels will be reduced,“ he said.
Economic and political interference in cultural domains is also harmful.
Political and economic intervention is harming cultural activities, he warned.
“When one faction comes to power, it fires people from other factions, which destroys the country’s (human resource) capacities,“ he said.
He said administrative and economic managers should act independently of each other.
“We have not yet achieved the required political maturity and interpret coming to power as elimination of opponents from the political scene,“ he observed.

Objectives
Javad Arianmanesh, another fundamentalist MP, told ISNA that achieving economic objectives is far more difficult than realizing political goals.
“The (Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad administration is spending much of its energy on economic issues, which prepares the grounds for its opponents to take political advantage of the situation,“ he said, adding that the Ninth Government’s political rivals are trying to weaken the Ahmadinejad administration.
“They easily propagate the failure of the government in achieving some economic objectives,“ he said, noting that previous governments also suffered from the same failures.
Under the former (Mohammad) Khatami administration, the focus of the government was on political development. This gave opponents the much-needed opportunity to concentrate on economic issues, he said.