The U.S. maintains a $9.36 billion trade deficit in seafood, according to government reports for 2009, the last full year of published figures by the US Commerce Department.
If there is a silver lining behind the figures — they show exports of only $3.74 billion against imports of $13.10 million, the largest portion from China — it is that the constraints of U.S. output derive largely from intense conservation efforts here in U.S. waters.
Those have made the U.S. the global leader in fisheries management policies that foster sustainable stocks, as federal fisheries administrator Eric Schwaab asserted in multiple appearances during this week's International Boston Seafood Show.
But a dedicated fund for marketing domestic seafood products that Congress ordered drawn from the hundreds of millions of dollars collected in import tariffs on fish products has never materialized.
And the geography of fishing, in regions around three sides of the nation in a 10,000 mile necklace from Maine to the Alaska — plus the fragmentation of the industry into gear, boat, target stock, wild and aqua-cultured sectors in fresh and saltwater — have all but ensured until now that the industry spoke more like beer line than a choir, putting marketers at a distinct disadvantage.
While political and legal battles rage in Congress and the federal courts to halt or slow the Obama administration's determination to convert weakened fishing industry sectors into commodities markets, a nationwide coalition of seafood processors, including Massachusetts and New England interests, has established a unified program for a dependable national Seafood Marketing Fund.
Read the complete story from The Gloucester Times.