Less Russian vessels to Finnmark
The numbers of Russian vessels to make port calls to harbours in Finnmark, northern Norway, made a drop last year.
593 foreign vessels made port calls in Eastern Finnmark in 2008. The majority of them were Russian fishing vessels to the Norwegian border town of Kirkenes. The statistics from Eastern Finnmark police district shows a drop of 191 vessels compared with 2007 when 784 foreign vessels made port calls to Kirkenes and smaller fishing harbours in Eastern Finnmark.
Kirkenes is still the most popular harbour for Russian fishing vessels with 376 port calls last year, with the fishing village Båtsfjord as number two with 153 foreign vessels.
Russian image of Kirkenes harbor
In Kirkenes the Russian trawlers are waiting for new quotas, loading ship supply, do repair work and change crews. Some of the fish is also landed or stored onshore awaiting reloading to other vessels shipping them to fish marked, mainly in Europe. For the last decade, the Russian trawlers have become a famous landmark for the entire harbor area in Kirkenes. So is the trawler-crews walking the streets in the little city centre of Kirkenes.
Embark
A total of 5263 seamen embarked or went onshore from foreign vessels in Kirkenes in 2008. That is near 3000 less than in 2007, according to the statistics from the local police. The trawler crews travel from Kirkenes to Murmansk with busses.
New law
In early January, BarentsObserver.com reported that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev had signed a law that removes taxes for fishing vessels repaired or modernized abroad. Until now, shipowners have had to pay value added tax and import duties on all new equipment when calling a Russian port. Consequently, a significant part of the vessels registered for example in Murmansk, never west to that port, but used ports in Norway as bases instead.
It is expected that the number of Russian fishing vessels to call ports in Norway will go down even more in 2009.
