Table 1. Lithuania. Fishing fleet, by 



selected vessel capacity; 1993. 



C. Jura State Fishing Company 



Source: U.S. Navy, Office of Naval 

 Intelligence, 29 July 1993. 



The 116 vessels listed as having over 

 500 GRT are probably engaged in high-seas 

 fishing, although some of the under-500- 

 GRT vessels are likely involved as well. 

 (For vessels by name, type of vessel, GRT, 

 country and year of construction, see 

 appendix 1) 



B. Fleet Reduction 



Between 1991 and 1993, Lithuania 

 reduced its fleet by 9 vessels; 6 vessels were 

 reflagged to other countries, and 3 units 

 were decommissioned (appendix 2).^ The 

 largest of the reflagged vessels, a 

 TAVRIYA-class refrigerated transport 

 named Sodel I, was sold to a Nigerian 

 owner. Several smaller fishing vessels were 

 turned over to the registry of the neighboring 

 former Soviet republics. The well-known 

 flagship of the All-Union Scientific Research 

 Instimte for Fisheries and Oceanography 

 (VNIRO), the Akademik Knipovich, was 

 returned to Russian registry; its home port is 

 now Kaliningrad where the Russian Western 

 Scientific Research Institute for Fisheries 

 and Oceanography (ATLANTNIRO) is 

 located. 



All three vessels withdrawn from fishing 

 operations were over 25 years old. Their 

 final disposition is not known. 



The JURA company is under the 

 jurisdiction of the Fisheries Department in 

 the Ministry of Agriculture. Located in the 

 Baltic port of Klaipeda, it is the largest of all 

 state-owned enterprises in the Baltics. Its 

 vessels fish mostly on the high-seas and 

 often sell their catch abroad to obtain hard 

 currency. The two most important export 

 markets are Spain and the Netherlands. 

 About 30-50 percent of YURA's catch is 

 sold in Western Europe and in countries off 

 whose coasts the Lithuanians are catching 

 fish. These sales bring in foreign 

 currencies. Another 15-20 percent is sold to 

 fish-processing plants in Lithuania and the 

 remaining 50 percent is shipped to Russia, 

 Ukraine and other former Soviet republics 

 and sold for rubles which can be used to pay 

 for diesel oil. These proportions were 

 prevailing in 1991; more recent information 

 indicates that the percentages are changing in 

 favor of more exports to the West and less 

 to the East, but the authors have been unable 

 to secure reliable trade statistics documenting 

 this shift. 



YURA's assets are still Government 

 property. The enterprise is continuing to 

 operate with increasing losses, yet as far as 

 it is known, no serious attempts have been 

 made to privatize it. The losses are caused 

 not only by the company's fishery 

 operations, but also by other businesses into 

 which it diversified. Some of these have 

 been transferred to other Lithuanian 

 ministries (for example, the fishing port, the 

 shipyard storage plants, etc.), but two 

 unprofitable investments (a resort village and 

 a hotel) have not been sold or otherwise 

 divested. 



73 



