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Russia’s Shivulech Volcano Extremely Active, Threatens Eruption, Warn Scientists 

An ash cloud rises from the erupted Shiveluch volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in January 2013. (TASS)
An ash cloud rises from the erupted Shiveluch volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in January 2013. (TASS)
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Russia’s Shivulech Volcano Extremely Active, Threatens Eruption, Warn Scientists 

An ash cloud rises from the erupted Shiveluch volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in January 2013. (TASS)
An ash cloud rises from the erupted Shiveluch volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in January 2013. (TASS)

The Shiveluch volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East has become extremely active, threatening a powerful eruption, the Kamchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team said on Sunday.  

"A growth of the lava dome continues, a strong fumaroles activity, an incandescence of the lava dome, explosions, and hot avalanches accompanies this process," the observatory said on its website.  

"Ash explosions up to 10-15 kilometers (9.32 miles) ... could occur at any time. Ongoing activity could affect international and low-flying aircraft." 

Russia's state RIA news agency cited Alexei Ozerov, the director of the Institute of Volcanology and Seismology of the Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as saying that the dome of the volcano is very hot.  

"At night, the dome glows almost over its entire surface. Hot avalanches with a temperature of 1000 degrees Celsius (1,832F) roll down the slopes, pyroclastic flows descend. This state of the dome is observed, as a rule, before a powerful paroxysmal eruption."  

Shiveluch, one of Kamchatka's largest volcanoes with a summit reaching 3,283 meters (10,771 feet) is also one of the peninsula's most active ones, with an estimated 60 substantial eruptions in the past 10,000 years.  

The volcano last most powerful eruption took place in 2007, according to NASA. 

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Farmed Production of Some Fish - and Seaweed - is Soaring

Farmed salmon -- like the ones grown in pens here in the Australian island state of Tasmania -- are easier to grow than some other fish species. Gregory PLESSE / AFP/File
Farmed salmon -- like the ones grown in pens here in the Australian island state of Tasmania -- are easier to grow than some other fish species. Gregory PLESSE / AFP/File
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Farmed Production of Some Fish - and Seaweed - is Soaring

Farmed salmon -- like the ones grown in pens here in the Australian island state of Tasmania -- are easier to grow than some other fish species. Gregory PLESSE / AFP/File
Farmed salmon -- like the ones grown in pens here in the Australian island state of Tasmania -- are easier to grow than some other fish species. Gregory PLESSE / AFP/File

The amount of farmed seafood we consume -- as opposed to that taken wild from our waters -- is soaring every year, making aquaculture an ever-more important source for many diets, and a response to overfishing.

According to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization, nearly 99 million tons of aquatic animals (fish, molluscs like oysters and mussels and crustaceans like prawns) were farmed around the world in 2023, five times more than three decades ago.

Since 2022, the farming of aquatic animals has been steadily overtaking fishing around the world -- but with large disparities from species to species.

Fast-growing species

The two biggest sellers on the market in 2023, carp and tilapia, mainly came from freshwater farming, while other widely-consumed fish, like herring, came just from deep sea fishing

Thierry Laugier, a researcher at Ifremer, France's national institute for ocean science and technology, told AFP that fish farmers choose species that grow quickly and with simple requirements, to be able to control the life cycle.

Sales of the most widely farmed fish in Europe, Atlantic salmon, came to 1.9 million tons in 2023, 99 percent of which were farmed.

"We know how to control the ageing or how to launch a reproduction cycle, through injecting hormones," Laugier said.

Asia main producer
Asia is by far the biggest producer of farmed fish, accounting for 92 percent of the 136 million tons -- of both animal and plant species -- produced under manmade conditions in 2023.

"For carp, it comes down to tradition, it has been farmed for thousands of years on the Asian continent," the Ifremer researcher said.

At the other end of the spectrum, sardines and herring are just fished in the oceans, mainly for profitability reasons as some fish grow very slowly.

"It takes around two years to get an adult-sized sardine," Laugier said.

He said farming of some fish has not yet been started as, "for a long time, we thought the ocean was an inexhaustible resource".

Seaweed

Little known in the West, seaweed nevertheless accounts for almost a third of world aquaculture production.

Almost exclusively from Asia, seaweed production increased by nearly 200 percent in two decades, to 38 million tons. It is mainly used in industry, in jellies, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, the expert said.

He said seaweed also has the major advantage of absorbing not just CO2 in the oceans, but also nitrogen and certain pollutants.

"And from an ecological point of view it is better to farm macroalgae than salmon," Laugier said.