Countries ramp up efforts to save sturgeon population in the Caspian Sea

摘要

Following the Aktau International Summit on August 12, Russian President Vkdimir Putin, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, and leaders of other Caspian states released sturgeon fingerlings to the Caspian Sea. This symbolic gesture was to show the intention of the top officials in the region to enhance efforts to save the sturgeon population from complete extinction. ?The number of sturgeons in the Caspian Sea declined nearly tenfold over the past decade due to large-scale poaching and environmental problems, pushing the Caspian states to introduce a 10-year moratorium on industrial sturgeon fishing in 2011. Recent research, however, showed that all measures taken since then were in vain, as the sturgeon population in the sea continues to decline.