region. The low level of fish productivity of this tremendous ocean 

 region means that the take of fish products at the present time averages 

 about 180 kg/km^, an order of magnitude less than in the northeast 

 portion of the ocean. In the most productive areas--the Caribbean, Gulf 

 of Mexico, near the Antilles, off the northwest coast of Africa and in 

 the Gulf of Guinea--the catch rises to 400-500 kg/km^. Studies have 

 shown that the current catch in the tropical zone of the Atlantic Ocean 

 could be almost doubled. 



The South Atlantic has an area of 47 million km^, of which 10.2% is 

 represented by depths of less than 1,000 m. The shallowest plateau 

 (about 1.4'10^ km^) is the Patagonian-Falkland shelf, adjacent to the 

 Atlantic coast of Uruguay and Argentina. The great extent of this 

 region in latitude allows both warm-water (tuna, marl in, swordfish, 

 sardines, etc.) and cold-water (poutassou, hake, nototheniids) fish to 

 live here. The intensity of fishing is high only along the southwest 

 and south coasts of Africa, where sardines are caught in large 

 quantities (0.7 -lO^ t), as well as anchovies (0.4 •10° t) and hake 

 (0.8 'lO" t), whereas on the Patagonian shelf, the fish resources of 

 which would allow up to 5-6 million tons of fish to be taken each year, 

 fishing is little developed (only about 0.6* 10" t are removed each 

 year). The total catch of the South Atlantic is about 4 million tons, 

 the total possible catch--over 9 million tons. In recent years, the 

 Soviet trawler fleet off the southwest coast of Africa has caught 400- 

 720«10'^ t of fish, primarily hake and horse mackerel. 



The regions near the Antarctic, inhabited by commercial quantities 

 of whales, seals, certain fish and particularly small planktonic 

 crustaceans--krill--are of great significance for fishing. Of the fish 

 which have or could have commercial significance in the Antarctic 

 waters, we need note only the species of the nototheniids, and white- 

 blooded fish. Furthermore, during the warm season, poutassou reaches 

 this area from the southern portion of the Patagonian shelf, attracted 

 by the large concentrations of krill, used as food by almost all the 

 inhabitants of the Antarctic, particularly the whales. The reserves of 

 krill here are tremendous, amounting to many hundreds of millions of 

 tons. Whales alone, during the period of their high population, 

 consumed over 100 million tons of krill each year. 



Summarizing the estimate of the raw-material basis for the fishing 

 industry in the Atlantic Ocean, we should note that the catch of all 

 countries in this basin can be increased to 36-37 million tons, 10 

 million tons greater than the current level (as of 1973). The Soviet 

 Union catches about 5 million tons in the Atlantic, i.e., 63% of the 

 total catch of ocean fish. 



The Pacific Ocean provides up to one half of the world catch of 

 seafood (27-35 million tons. Table 19). The catch here is dominated by 

 pelagic objects (89%, as opposed to 55% in the Atlantic Ocean). The 

 current level of fishing productivity of the Pacific Ocean (170 kg/km^) 

 is lower than that of the Atlantic Ocean (260 kq/knr) and the 

 possibilities for further increasing the catch are considerable. 



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