"No Potatoes, Eat Shrimp."

03.07.2025, 12:36 charter97.org

"No Potatoes, Eat Shrimp."33.07.2025, 11:39 2,390 illustration photo Deposit / East NewsThere is a paradoxical situation in Belarusian stores.Readers of "Belsat" say that Belarusian stores have recently been offering a large assortment of shrimp, and there are very nice price offers. We tried to understand where so much shrimp comes from in Belarus, as well as found a suspicious increase in purchases from the EU amid the cessation of sales from the EU to Russia."You can find any kind of shrimp"One of the readers says that the choice of shrimp is large, but some of them smell strange, and the cat has stopped eating them.Another interlocutor confirms that the stores are "rich and inexpensive":"There are shrimp even in cheap stores, for example, in "Dobrotsen" [Russian chain] - at 27 [Russian chain] - for 27 rubles. In "Euroopt" you can find whatever you want. And big, and small, and on weight, and in packages. This potatoes are not - at 4.5 rubles from Kazakhstan and still unknown where from, but shrimp is".On the site e-dostavka we found 20 types of shrimp and meat from them, and on the site of the network Green in general 27 offers. Most of them are from Russia, but there are also from India, China, Vietnam and even Ecuador. Very few, but found products of Belarusian production.The cheapest offer - Russian shrimp VICI, boiled-frozen in the shell. At the discount they cost 22.99 rubles per kilogram, while the regular price is 28.05 rubles. There are still products close in price, but there are also a lot of Russian shrimp at 70-75 rubles per kilogram.Shrimp from Vietnam will most likely cost 80-100 rubles per kilogram, but there are also at 57 rubles.Chinese shrimp are few - 57 rubles per kilogram. Indian - 62.5 rubles, and from Ecuador cost almost 66 rubles. From the Belarusian shrimp we found only one - white legged shrimp from "Santa Bremore" for 30.49 rubles per kilogram. There is shrimp meat from the same company for 53-56 rubles per kilogram.Belarusian shrimp are not quite BelarusianIn Belarus there really are shrimp - in Lake Beloe, near Beloozersk. For the sake of experiment they were launched there back in 1982. The shrimp were able to take root because the lake is warm - it is used as a cooling pond for the local power plant. At the same time, shrimp from the lake serve as food for fish, and are not sold in stores.The first shrimp farm in Belarus appeared quite recently - in the village of Olkhovtsy in Lyakhovichi district. However, Belarusian shrimp are still far from the counter."For the last six months, I've been dealing with the process of cultivation. Everything turned out to be not as simple as in the book and on YouTube videos. I think I've got the growing sorted out. Now the question of reproduction is the key story. If it works out, then the farm has succeeded," said the owner of the farm Vladimir Gotovchits in the spring of 2025. So, Belarusian shrimps in stores are not Belarusian yet. "Santa Bremore," whose products are sold as Belarusian, buys raw materials abroad. The owner of the company Alexander Moshensky even after the sanctions against Russia in 2014 explained how Belarusian shrimp gets into the Russian Federation - it is simply processed foreign shrimp. If foreign shrimp are boiled or shrimp meat is made, they are already considered a processed Belarusian product."For those in Russia who ironize about Belarusian shrimp or mussels, I will clarify that, unlike the Russian Federation, Belarusian standards do not allow to consider packing as a processing operation... We make a finished product from them - it's either boiled shrimp IQF (frozen individually) or seafood preserves, that is, we reach the depth of processing," said Moshenski.Indeed, if you look at the shrimp from Vietnam, brought by John Dory, the description of the composition says that it's just frozen shrimp. The composition of Belarusian shrimp from Santa Bremore: shrimp, salt, black pepper, allspice, drinking water (protective ice shell).EU shrimp purchases have increased 10-fold in five yearsIf you look at Belarus' foreign purchases, the supply of shrimp really should have expanded. For example, Chinese shrimp over the past five years has only been sold to Belarus in 2023 and 2024, but the volumes are not very large. According to Chinese customs data, Belarus paid $102,000 for frozen shrimp from China in 2023 and $58,500 in 2024. Indian shrimp has also been brought to Belarus in greater quantities. According to the Indian statistical agency, if in 2020 Belarus bought them for $0.21 million, in 2024 - for $1.54 million.Russia also needs somewhere to put its shrimp, which does not want to buy in the EU after the beginning of Russia's full-scale aggression against Ukraine. This may be the reason for the diversity of Russian shrimp supply in Belarusian stores.A noticeable increase in purchases is also observed from Europe. According to Eurostat, if in 2020 Belarus purchased frozen shrimp for almost half a million euros, in 2024 - more than €6 million. In physical terms, purchases have increased 10 times - from 139.5 tons to 1368 tons. This is a record volume in the last 10 years. The growth coincided with the fact that in 2022, shrimp shipments from the EU to Russia were severely reduced, and in 2023 and 2024 there were none at all.It is possible that Belarus resells part of its European purchases to Russia. According to the Russian Fish Union, fish and seafood supplies from Belarus to Russia increased by 20% in 2024 to about 115,000 tons. Judging by the available data for 2023, the growth was even then. The Russian Federal Agency for Fisheries reported that for January-September 2023 the growth to the corresponding period of 2022 amounted to 25%. At that time, 4.9 thousand tons (or 6% of total sales to Russia) of finished and canned crustacean and mollusk products were sold.But Belarus also began to sell some shrimp to the EU. In 2024, frozen shrimp went from Belarus to the EU for the first time in the last five years - to Lithuania and Poland - only 37 tons. Given that Belarus has no shrimp of its own, these are shrimp purchased in other countries.PATREONSupport the website Write your comment 3 You can support the website Charter97.orgMULTI-CURRENCY ACCOUNT FOR ASSISTANCE:Bank's name: Bank Millennium S.A.Address: ul. Stanislawa Zaryna, 2A, 02-593, WarszawaIBAN: PL97116022020000000216711123SWIFT: BIGBPLPWName of the account holder: Fundacja “KARTA ‘97”Purpose/title of payment: Donation for statuary aimsYou can contact us by the e-mail charter97@gmail.comFollow Charter97.org social media accountsFacebookYouTubeX.comvkontakteok.ruInstagramRSSTelegram