Sayram Lake is located at the north of Tianshan Mountains, the largest mountain cold-water lake in Xinjiang. The annual average temperature of the water in the lake is only 7℃ while the highest level is 19.3℃ and lowest level 0.3℃.
In early years, there aren’t any fished in Sayram Lake. To change that status and fully exploit and take advantage of the cold-water resources. Xinjiang Sayram Fishery Technological Development Co. Ltd was built according to market economic system in May 2003 on the basis of former Sayram Lake Aquatic Experiment Station.
Lufeng, the General Manager of Sayram Fishery, said that the enterprise consecutively invested about 10 million yuan and built 200 mu of hot spring cold-water fish species breeding and producing center, which can breed 0.35 billion whitefish roe, juvenile fish 30 million; 10 million trout fertilized roe, juvenile fish 2 million. It can farm more than 60 tonnes of fry of trout and salmon.
Besides, Sayram Fishery invested more than 10 million yuan to build the first hot spring cold-water fish processing factory in Xinjiang whose product acquired export certificate from EU.
Sayram Fishery also actively encouraged local farmers to develop cold-water fish aquaculture, mainly including rainbow trout and golden trout. Now the farming family has expanded from 1 to 55 which can produce up to 350 tonnes of fish.
A total of three big categories, including more than 30 fishes, are available on market now of the products supplied by Sayram Fishery.
Meantime, Sayram Fishery also focuses on brand building and development. It registered the trademark “Sayram” in its early days and its white fish acquired state-level organic food and AA grade green-product certificates, becoming the first aquatic product category that obtained national organic food certification.
Apart form Xinjiang, Beijing, Shanghai and other domestic provinces, Sayram Fishery also marketed its whitefish to overseas countries, such as Finland.
While Sayram is developing its industry chain to promote sustainable fishery development, the large amount of cold-water fish available on market, especially produced by farmers, brings great impact on marketing, which is still the obstacle that confines the industrial development of cold-water fish .
“To solve the marketing problem, deep processing is the key. We plan to finance 5 million yuan in recent two years to build high-end cooked food and snack food production line to tackle the problem of low-level deep processing and lack of product variety. It can not only meet our own demand of fish processing but also provide a way for the farmers’ fish,” Lufeng said, “in the future, it’ll set up modern management system integrating regional distribution, enterprise-oriented operation and socialized service system, forming the comprehensive industry chain covering breeding, producing, processing, marketing, catering and tourism and leisure activities.”
He also added that to make sure the sustainable fishery development of Sayram Lake, Sayram Fishery had build long-term technological cooperation with Dalian Ocean University, Heilongjiang River Fisheries Research Institute (HRFRI) of Chinese Academy of Fishery Sciences, Russian and other overseas and domestic fishery institutes and research academies. And it would stick to scientific development concept to guide Sayram Lake cold-water fishery development.
