It was two years later, that the Artel was transformed into the Collective Fish Farm “Bolshevik”, which later on turned out to be one of the biggest and powerful collective fish farms in Latvia – the owner of 50 fishing boats and employer of about 2000 people.

Despite the European Union policies, setting quotas for different species of fish and promoting scrapping of fishing vessels for management of the EU fishing capacity, Liepaja still continues to host well developed fishery and fishing industry. In 2004, prior to joining the European Union, 269 fishing vessels were registered in Latvia, whereas today, only 59 have remained, whereof 1/3 of the number have settled in Liepaja.

The Port Authorities have allocated a number of berths alongside the City Canal for different fishing companies. In the fishing industry, the Baltic Sea has been traditionally associated with fishery of cod, sprat, herring and flounder. In spring, the coastal waters are rich in herring, turbot, round goby, whereas, in the autumn, the major catch is codfish. The “Kursa” company provides a rich assortment of fresh and frozen fish, as well as, fillets. The “Kolumbija”, Ltd. is one of the leading fish processing plants in the Baltic States, manufacturing different kinds of canned food from the ocean, sea, lake and river fish.

There are a couple of groups and associations of manufacturing companies an Liepaja, which, by using the European Union financing, have created modern fish discharging and manufacturing facilities. Thus, the Group of Latvian Fishery Product Manufacturers deals with sorting fish, ice production, sprat and herring refrigeration, cod filleting and freezing. The Baltic Fishermen’s Association provides ice production, sorting and freezing of all caught fish.

Ltd. “Gamma” is one of the companies in Liepaja, which provides fish sorting and ice production, whereas such companies, as Ltd. “Hanters” and Ltd. “Vido” run their fish processing, freezing, smoking and salting business beyond the port limits:

The main export markets: Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Poland, Estonia, Lithuania. The codfish production is being shipped mostly to the Polish, Lithuanian and Dutch commodity markets.