Gennady Yuryevich Zharkov, President of the Noncommercial  Partnership “Russian Salmon” about the catch-and-release principle:

The non-for-profit partnership "Russian Salmon: offers, through joint efforts with scientific, state and public organizations, as well as with the citizens, to implement a system for preserving valuable salmonids species. It should be based on the civilized “catch-and-release” fishing. Unfortunately, the practice of releasing the fish has not yet been widely used in Russia, although there is some progress in this direction: 20-30 years ago it did not simply exist at all.

So far, the "catch-and-release" principle until now was not obligatory even for valuable and rare fish species. In practice, the fish are voluntarily released by responsible anglers who care about the future of the fish stocks; by those who do not consider caught fish as food. The principle of "catch-and-release" has become an obligatory rule in many fishing camps and lodges, which hold the leading positions in the organization of the civilised fishing, combined with the protection of valuable species of salmonids.

The principle of "catch-and-release" is not only necessary and useful. In fact, in some cases, it is the only possible way of preserving and enhancing of the valuable and sometimes of the rare species of fish, even of the ones listed in the Red Book. Scientists have repeatedly confirmed that the mortality of fish released after the catch is extremely insignificant. When the fish is handled properly it tends to zero. At the same time, the "catch-and-release" principle allows the fish to continue its life cycle and reproduce. 

The principle of "catch-and-release" is the most effective approach in combining the fishing and the preservation of the valuable biological resources. In the modern world, with a growing population and limited natural resources, an efficient mechanism for managing these resources is needed. This is not about fishing for fee or for free, but about the skillful regulation of the fishing pressure on different waters.

In Russia in the last 20 years, some stocks of salmon and taimen (only where the fishing is organised in this way) from oppressed and low numbers have reached the level of undisturbed natural populations, whose numbers are determined solely by the biological capacity of the water. In other words, in these places there are as many fish now as there were before the arrival of human civilization!