Victim of fashion and greed

BOOKS
Sturgeon and caviar

Feb 24th 2005
From The Economist print edition

PABLO PICASSO allegedly exchanged his prints for sevruga, Ian Fleming would buy only osetra, Madonna prefers beluga. As the epitome of conspicuous consumption, caviar hardly needs celebrity endorsers: its iconic power exists “precisely because of the exorbitant costs and their irrelevance to any concept of necessity”. But the allure of caviar obscures a murkier truth. This is uncovered by Richard Adams Carey, along with some of the mysteries of the sturgeon itself—a creature that moves like a dreadnought and whose roe are traded in the dark undercurrents of the criminal world.

Sturgeon, with its 24 separate species, was once the dominant large fish in every major river system of the northern hemisphere. Unchanged in form for 100m years, sturgeon cruise both fresh and salt water, hoovering up prey with a flexible cartilaginous jaw. As recently as 1997 a female beluga, captured from the Volga river, measured 21 feet 4 inches (6.5 metres), and weighed in at over 4,000lb (1,815 kilos). It was estimated to be 130 years old and “were it not for the gaping mouth and frond like barbells could have passed for an ICBM hijacked from an old Soviet missile bunker.”

How the eggs of this ancient fish came from being a minor trade item among the Mongols to selling for over $100 an ounce is a story of fashion, trade and a greed that has repeatedly “outrun stewardship”. Although at the time a near staple in Russia, caviar's export to the West had a shaky start: a young Louis XV reputedly spat out his first gift of caviar from Peter the Great. The eggs came into their own with the Russian aristocrats who filled the salons of Europe after the defeat of Napoleon.

In the United States, immigrant fishermen began to sell caviar from American sturgeon in the mid-19th century. Soon its price rocketed, and the numbers of sturgeon crashed. The “black gold” was exported back to Europe from America in the 1920s, and the Soviet Union began a decidedly capitalistic trade. Today, caviar from the Caspian is controlled by organised crime in a trade in which poaching was worth between $2 billion and $4 billion a year in the late 1990s—and which has resulted in rather few sturgeon being left alive.

The overfishing of sturgeon is most marked by its repeatability: first in Europe, then North America, now in Russia. Mr Carey introduces a range of characters fighting this exploitation, including customs agents, scientists, fishermen and CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species that attempts to protect over 30,000 species of animals and plants. The author's passion for the sturgeon is evident, but for a book that champions the power and beauty of the fish, it is a shame that not one illustration is available to convey its splendour.The Philosopher Fish: Sturgeon, Caviar, and the Geography of Desire. By Richard Adams Carey. Counterpoint Press; 333 pages; $26

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