A halászati termékek fogyasztása, termelése és kereskedelme Európában

Abstract

The introduction of the article is detailing the importance of fish, crustaceans and molluscs consumption in the human nutrition. The second part is focusing on Europe, and the European Union introducing the situation of the production and consumption of fisheries products (marine and inland fisheries, aquaculture, fish processing). This informs the reader about that Europe, and the European Union has the third most significant fish production with the total landings of 5.7 million tons in 2005, and it is the largest fish importer (17.3 billion EUR in 2006). The output of aquaculture products of the EU-27 accounts for 1.27 million tons of fish, crustaceans and molluscs with the value of 2.8 billion EUR (2005). The third part of the article shows and analyses the export/import situation and the internal structure of the EU fisheries products. One can conclude that the EU is currently net importer with a continuously increasing deficit, and, at the same time it is the World’s largest importer of fisheries products. The EU share of the World import is increasing: it was 42%, 44% and 46% in 2005, 2006 and 2007, respectively. The import of fisheries products of the EU (27) was 10.5 million tons in 2006. The fourth chapter of the article is describing the major factors influencing the consumption of fisheries products, where the author is dealing with the need for safe food, market need for healthy-, quality-, convenience- and natural (organic) foodstuffs, and the importance of religion, traditions and geographic location. It is key issue to get the consumers acquainted with the importance of fish consumption and its positive physiological effects by using marketing tools in Central-East Europe, to aim the increasing level of fish consumption. The authors suggest that mitigation of the regional differences in the fish production and consumption should appear in the Common Fisheries Policy as a strategic objective.