Saving Seafood

Economic Impact

Seaspiracy’s lasting impact on sustainable seafood businesses

April 21, 2021 — With each passing day, Seaspiracy becomes increasingly irrelevant, buried in the never-ending content cue of the world’s largest streaming platform. The last month has been full of fact checks, flame wars, and funding accusations. Though it brought out the worst of everyone on social media, it brought the marine science and stakeholder community together. There is a clear consensus that the film was awful. Even Ray Hilborn and Daniel Pauly agree!

I sneer at the filmmaker’s silly “fact page,” a regurgitation of each false claim in the film listed in chronological order.  But I acknowledge—the joke’s on us. The filmmakers had no intention of presenting facts or having an honest discussion about ocean health; they sought to create a piece of horror entertainment by slandering the seafood industry. And they succeeded. For those of us in the sustainable seafood world, the cut is deep and unlikely to heal soon.

Sustainable seafood businesses didn’t deserve this. Those referring to the best available science, making public sourcing policies, exercising due diligence in their supply chains, and seeking certifications are disproportionately impacted. The film concluded that there is no such thing as sustainable seafood, making liars and cheats of those seeking it. A seafood company that makes no sustainability claims is now less likely to receive negative feedback than one that does.

Herein lies the most disgusting part of this film: it disincentivizes sustainability. Sustainable seafood products are often more expensive than unsustainable alternatives, and studies suggest consumers are not willing to pay a premium for environmentally sustainable seafood. Attempting to source seafood sustainably costs time, money, and perseverance. Like brushing your teeth, you can’t just do it once and be considered clean. A diligent seafood sustainability program requires regular re-assessments and constant attention, or else plaque will accumulate. Commitment to sustainability prohibits a fisherman from fishing in a marine protected area even though it might be full of valuable fish; it stops a chef from putting a popular item back on the menu; it requires a mid-size grocery store chain to invest valuable resources into a seafood certification program each year.

Read the full story at Sustainable Fisheries UW

Snow crab and other premium crab saw huge retail growth in 2020

April 20, 2021 — “Insatiable” is the word being used to describe the demand for snow crab as the world’s largest fishery got underway on April 5 in eastern Canada. And while more snow crab will be available this year, buyers expect a tight supply.

Global seafood supplier Tradex said snow crab and other “premium crab” saw huge growth at retail in 2020 and demand is even higher this year.

Seafoods like crab and lobster are now perceived as being affordable to buy and cook at home compared to the cost in restaurants. Tradex spokesperson Tasha Cadence said that shift has spawned a new pandemic-inspired word by market experts.

“It’s ‘premiumization,’ or customers recognizing a higher value for a product and paying a higher price,” she said, referring to comments by industry veteran Les Hodges in his April Crab Update.

The combined Canadian catch for snow crab through September, most of which is sold to the U.S., tops 157 million pounds, 11 million pounds higher than 2020. The Canadian crab makes up 62% of the U.S. market share, according to Urner-Barry which has provided information for the food industry since 1858.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News

Labor shortage leaves restaurants, distributors in the lurch

April 20, 2021 — There appears to be significant pent-up demand for Americans wanting to dine out, but restaurants and foodservice distributors face a weighty new dilemma: how to find enough employees to service returning customers. Food and seafood distributors are also facing a myriad of transportation and supply chain issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Warmer weather, stepped-up vaccinations, economic stimulus payments, and people just wanting to get out of the house after quarantine are pushing up traffic to restaurants, Technomic Managing Principal Joe Pawlak said during the Food Institute webinar, “State of the Industry – 2021 Supply Disruption” this week.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Lawmakers say West Coast seafood industry excluded from USDA CARES Act program

April 19, 2021 — A group of 10 West Coast lawmakers have reached out to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack to see why fishermen and processors in their region have largely been left out of a program created through COVID-19 relief measures.

Led by U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon), the Senators and House members sent a letter to Vilsack noting that the fishing industry in California, Oregon, and Washington state account for more than USD 500 million (EUR 417.5 million) in seafood products produced in the country, roughly about 13 percent of all domestic seafood goods.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

How COVID-19 Affects the Fishing Industry

April 19, 2021 — The global seafood market is a huge industry that employs millions of people. Valued at $159 billion in 2019, it will grow to almost $200 billion by 2027. The system is a network of formal and informal producers and distributors, retailers and consumers. In low-income countries, the fishing industry is especially important as a way to reduce poverty. Developing countries employ 97% of the people, directly and indirectly, working in the fishing industry. About 90% of the fishing workforce are small-scale fishermen. By exporting seafood, low-income countries can boost their economies through the oceanic sector. The fishing industry also helps to increase nutrition and food security for the impoverished. Unfortunately, COVID-19 has devastated the fishing industry, just as it has most other industries.

The Impact of COVID-19 on Fisheries

The pandemic has disrupted supply chains and lowered demand, reducing profits in the industry. Lockdowns and curfews have also reduced catch sizes, which in turn means that fisherfolk make less per day of work. What they do not sell often goes to waste as cold storage is expensive and not widely available to small-scale fishermen. The most affected groups are small and medium-scale fisheries, especially in rural areas, as they lack the resources that large-scale fisheries have to be able to transition and adapt during COVID-19. Furthermore, they do not have the safety net of social protection programs that large-scale fisheries may have.

Many developing countries with large fishing sectors have been struggling to offset the effects of COVID-19. In Thailand and India, migrant fish workers were met with lockdowns and nowhere to sell their products. Traders in India and Myanmar reported a 15% drop in fish prices post-lockdowns. In China, a shift to frozen and processed seafood left fresh-catch fishers floundering.

Read the full story at Borgen Magazine

Food Safety: Seafood links with traceability and transparency

April 16, 2021 — Demand for seafood at the retail grocery level has soared during the pandemic, as stay-at-home chefs desperate for variety realize that they really can cook fish at home —it’s not a restaurant-only proposition.

That increase in demand has shown a spotlight on three aspects of the seafood industry that are closely related: food safety, traceability and transparency.

All three are at the top of the agenda for the seafood industry in Norway, said Anne-Kristine Øen, US director of the Norwegian Seafood Council.

It’s hard to talk about one, she said, without bringing in the others.

“The topics are strongly interconnected in the sense that the consumer is increasingly aware of the origin of the food on their plate, and they want to be able to find out its journey and origin story. Consumers depend on trustworthy and easily accessible sources of information.”

The Norwegian seafood industry, many of whose products wind up in US grocery stores, enjoy the support of strong systems that secure tight control quality and safety, Øen said. The Norwegian system for catch information, the internal control systems and HACCP plans for the various production plants all provide details on the fish, its journey and the sustainability efforts that were in place to raise and catch the fish.

Read the full story at Supermarket Perimeter

Shucked by the pandemic, oyster market begins to open up

April 14, 2021 — Of all the categories of seafood impacted by COVID-19 – both positively and negatively – mollusks appear to have borne the brunt of foodservice closures. The sector experienced a 60 percent decline in sales during the height of the pandemic last spring.

The mollusk market has also had one of the slowest recoveries, according to NPD Supplytrack data shared during a National Fisheries Institute’s Global Seafood Market Conference webinar. SeafoodSource is providing exclusive coverage of the GSMC webinar series, which will be providing market-focused content throughout 2021.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

NOAA to reimburse monitoring costs

April 13, 2021 — NOAA Fisheries has set its electronic monitoring reimbursement policy for Northeast groundfish sector vessels in the 2021 fishing season and is urging fishermen to purchase and install the systems now while federal funds are available.

“For fishing year 2021, groundfish sector vessels may use either electronic monitoring or human at-sea monitors to meet the monitoring requirements, provided the sector has a corresponding monitoring program as part of its approved operations plan,” the agency stated. “Vessels that choose to use electronic monitoring will be eligible for reimbursement, while government funding is available.”

The agency said sector vessels employing electronic monitoring should submit receipts for reimbursable costs to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, using the same process they use for human at-sea monitoring reimbursements.

It said costs eligible for reimbursement largely fall within six areas: equipment, technical support, video review, operational costs, training and COVID-19 protocols.

The equipment category covers the purchase and installation of equipment necessary “to outfit a vessel with one fully functioning electronic monitoring system.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Whole Foods Market launches new responsible sourcing program

April 8, 2021 — Austin, Texas-based Whole Foods Market has launched its Sourced for Good program, an exclusive third-party certification program to support responsible sourcing of foods, including seafood.

The certification program includes making tangible improvements in farmworkers’ lives, strengthening worker communities where products are sourced, and promoting environmental stewardship where crops are grown, the retailer said in a press release.

Read the full story at Seafood Source