TEHRAN- As announced by a provincial official, 30 tons of fishes were bred in cages in Gilan province, in the north of Iran, during the past Iranian calendar year 1400 (ended on March 20).

Hamidreza Taqi-Nasiri, the acting head of the province’s Fisheries Department, said the nominal capacity of fish farming in cages in the province is 75,500 tons in 27,000 hectares of water body in 12 regions and seven support sites.

He said that Gilan province has a good capacity for fish farming in cages due to having about 300 kilometers of coastline.

As stated by an official with Iran Fisheries Organization (IFO), production of 714,000 tons of fishery has been targeted for the current Iranian calendar year.

Morteza Afrasiabi, the acting head of the IFO’s fishery development department, said that of the mentioned figure, 277,000 tons will be fishes bred in cages and 70,000 tons will be shrimps.

Achieving the targeted 714,000 tons of fishery requires infrastructure as well as credits and banking facilities, the official added.

Fishery production has increased noticeably in Iran in recent years.

Enjoying high quality, Iran’s fishery products were sold easily in the export markets, and also some new export destinations welcomed these products in the past three years; as new markets including China, South Korea, and the Eurasian Union nations opened up for Iranian fishery products.

MA/MA