Answer the questions •boot the text.

1. What industries needs do ship building and ship maintenance have to meet?

2. What other companies are there in the Region?

3. What prodrammes would allow the Astrakhan Region to qualify as a ship-building center?

The III International ship-yards and ship-repairing plant is a public joint-stock society. The plant has production capacities for building oil-tanker and bulk-carrying barges, repairs to oil-tanker towed and self-propelled fleet.

Technological equipment and availability of personnel at the plant make it possible to build annuallysix to seven towed oil-tanker and bulk-carrying vessels with pay-load capacity of 6 thousand tons, three to four self-propelled ships with pay-load capacity of 5.000 to 8,000 tons.

Three plant slip is one of the largest in Europe: ships up to 175 meters in length, up to 29 meters in width and up to 3 thousand tons in dock weight can be raised on the slip.

The plant takes orders for refuting river-going bulk-carriers and oil-tankers into sea-going ones (with account for requirements of international conventions), for repairs of the Volgoneft type oil-tanker vessels.

Remember the words:

joint-stock society - акционерное общество:

self-propelled - самоходный;

bulk - груз судна, refitting - переоборудование

Answer the questions:

1. What production capacities has the plant?

2. What orders does the plant lake?

Text 8. Fisheries

Water reservoirs of the Astrakhan Region - Northern part of the Caspian Sea, lower reaches of the Volga River, its many tributaries - are very rich in valuable fish.

At present fishing industry in the Astrakhan Region operates in the following directions:

- river fishing,

- sea fishing.

- pond fish-breeding.

The special position is occupied by fishing for sturgeon together with obtaining black caviar - in the Caspian Sea basin 90 per cent of the world sturgeon reserves are located with half of them being worked in the Astrakhan Region.

In its best years the fishing industry was the leading one in the area and Astrakhan prosperity and fame is largely due to its own riches in fish: sturgeon, black caviar, river-fish (Caspian roach, pike-perch, wild carp, bream, etc.) pond fish, sea fish (mainly famous Astrakhan sprats).

Artificial Sturgeon Bi ceding.

The main factor negatively affecting sturgeon fishing and getting black caviar is human activities. They include, mainly:

- over control of (he Volga River (low due to hydro-energy facilities construction which causes shrinking of spawning-grounds.

- poaching using modem vessels and fishing implements:

- pollution of water in the Northern part of the Caspian Sea caused by. working major oil and gas fields in the off-shore shelf.

All this, taken together, leads to continued decrease in the numbers of sturgeon. The only real perspective for stopping decrease in fishing volumes, re­storing and multiplying the sturgeon reserves is its artificial breeding. The main version of the artificial breeding includes breeding young sturgeon in fish-pond farms with its further development in natural and artificial conditions. The proper technology is worked out which ensures getting commercially-sized fish in 3 to 4 years (natural development at sea takes 15 years). This technology is successfully used in Germany, France, Italy, Hungary. The Astrakhan Region enjoys a principal advantage over those countries since it possesses natural spawning-grounds in the Volga River delta. Even their:shrinking sizes are still enough for artificial fish-breeding because it is possible to minimize the great losses inevitable with grains of roc and young fish bein washed down into the sea and with development of young fish population in sea conditions which are hard to control.

Pond Fish-breeding.

Pond fish-breeding is considered in the Astrakhan Region an important source of providing people with fresh fish. In ponds they breed mostly carps. Pond fish-breeding started developing in early 60-s and by 1990 production volume reached 10 thousand tons.

But in the subsequent years the volume fell by more than half. The main reason is changing environmental conditions: due to rise in the Caspian Sea level many pond facilities were flooded or semi-submerged. Also production volumes were affected by price increases for feeds and fertilizers due to which reduction of fish-planting material also decreased.

The problem of restoring fish production up to 10 thousand tons a year can be solved.

_ instead of Hooded and semi-submerged ponds in the South of the Astrakhan Region new fish farms will he established in the middle and upper zones of the Volga River delta;

_ nurseries for production of fish-planting material will he organized with fish selection geared to its increased viability;

_ industrial-type feeding farms will be organized for commercial breeding of carp using well-draining dirt-bottom ponds and pools;

_ local resources will be utilized such as products of yeast manufacture (lignin, yeast brew) which will mal-c feeding pond fish significantly cheaper;

_ establishing individual pond farms for commercial fish production will be encouraged; such farms can also breed some special products for ex­port (for example, frogs).

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