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Russian and American Scientist Race Clock to Save Russian Salmon Rivers

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANDRIA HALL, CNN ANCHOR: Researchers from the United States are working with their Russian counterparts in a race against time. They're trying to save a threatened biological treasure. It's a pristine wilderness teeming with salmon, hidden on a remote peninsula in eastern Russia.

As CNN's Gary Strieker reports, one of the biggest obstacles is Russia's poor economy.

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GARY STRIEKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the wild watersheds of western Kamchatka, researchers sample the fish.

GUIDO RAFIZ III, WILD SALMON CENTER: These rivers are the richest salmon rivers on the planet. This watershed has 10 species of salmon, trout, steelhead and char living in the same watershed, and this electroshocker enables us to zap the juvenile fish. We catch them in this net. We can determine what species are here and confirm that indeed this river has one of the richest diversities in it.

STRIEKER: One sweep of the net captures three species.

SERGEI MARXIMOV, MOSCOW STATE UNIVERSITY: One big chinook salmon and some red coho salmon, and another one, that's char.

STRIEKER: Eighty percent of Kamchatka's economy is based on commercial fishing, especially for salmon. An estimated one-third of all wild salmon in the Pacific Ocean are spawned in Kamchatka's rivers.

Elsewhere, along both sides of the Pacific and Atlantic, native salmon runs have declined or disappeared. But here, many rivers are as abundant with salmon as they have been for thousands of years; a biological treasure now facing serious threats.

First, from widespread poaching, a billion-dollar illegal trade in salmon and salmon caviar that has already caused declining salmon runs in several major rivers. Much of the trade is controlled by organized crime, but the poachers are desperately poor Russians with no alternatives.

VLADIMIR BURKANOV, ALASKA SEA LIFE CENTER: The greatest risk now in Kamchatka is our poor economy, poor people. Because if people are hungry, they don't have any choice. And they can destroy everything.

STRIEKER: Salmon spawning grounds are also threatened by mining projects, and by construction of a natural gas pipeline across at least 20 pristine river systems.

That's the reason for this rapid assessment mission: to survey salmon stocks in Kamchatka's western rivers. The Wild Salmon Center, based in Oregon, is working with Russian partners on a program to establish a system of salmon refuges to protect these watersheds before it's too late.

RAFIZ: Basically, Russia is in a window of time where they can make a decision to protect some of those watersheds, and if they succeed, this will be one of the biggest salmon conservation achievements in our lifetimes.

STRIEKER: But illegal fishing here is spiraling out of control, and there are mounting political pressures to move ahead with oil, gas and mining projects.

(on camera): Kamchatka is now at a crossroad, facing hard decisions on economic development that will also decide the future of these wild, undisturbed salmon rivers.

(voice-over): It could be the last chance on Earth to save rivers like these.

Gary Strieker, CNN, on the Oblukovina River, in Kamchatka, Russia.

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