Saving Seafood

Alaska Congress members ask to tap relief funds for seafood

June 20, 2019 — Alaska’s congressional delegation said the state’s fishermen and seafood processors should be included in a federal trade war relief package, a report said.

Lawmakers asked the Trump administration to give its seafood industry access to $15 billion earmarked for farmers, The Anchorage Daily News reported Wednesday.

“Unjustified retaliatory” tariffs are eroding Alaska seafood’s market share in China, U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan and Rep. Don Young said in a June 11 letter.

“New market growth has stopped and Alaska seafood consumption has dropped,” the legislators wrote to Perdue.

China’s 25% tariff on Alaska salmon, pollock, cod and other fish implemented in July boosts the overall tariff to 32% on some fish species, they said.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the San Francisco Chronicle

10 nations to jointly study marine resources of the Arctic

June 19, 2019 — A two-day conference of scientific experts from Russia, the United States, Canada, Denmark, Norway, South Korea, China, Sweden, Japan, and the European Union in the Russian city of Arkhangelsk resulted in an agreement to conduct more research on Arctic fisheries.

The April meeting was the first after an agreement between the 10 countries was signed in October of last year. The legally binding accord prohibits all commercial fishing in the Central Arctic until the nations additional surveys of stocks, their sizes, and how the region’s ecosystems operate. The agreement also included a draft of a joint research plan, with details to be discussed later this year and with implemented stalled until all the participating states ratify the agreement.

There is almost no data on high Arctic stocks, as nearly all the Arctic countries have only surveyed their own 200-mile exclusive economic zones. The only known study of the high seas was conducted by scientists from the Stockholm University. Its results presented at the conference brought some surprise and made it clear that more extensive research is needed, according to Vasily Sokolov, deputy head of the Russia’s Federal Agency for Fisheries.

“The Arctic Ocean was supposed to contain no great marine biological resources to be of interest for commercial fisheries. But it turned out that stocks of Arctic cod seem to be there, which means that fishing there may be commercially attractive,” Sokolov said. “The density of stocks increases toward the polar cap.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

China Is Cutting Tariffs—For Everyone Else

June 19, 2019 — Lobster is Maine’s top export. Like many Americans with something to sell, Maine’s trappers benefited from positive turns in China’s economic development. The movement of tens of millions of people out of poverty and into the middle class increased demand for a source of protein—and a Chinese New Year delicacy—that Maine could happily provide.

Yet in the wake of President Donald Trump’s trade war, American lobster sales to China have decreased by 70 percent. China’s 25 percent retaliatory tariff on American lobster was only the start. Beijing has actively helped Chinese grocers and restaurants by also reducing the costs of their finding new, non-American suppliers. It has cut the Chinese tariff on lobster bought from Canada, Maine’s fierce rival in the lobster business. As a result, Canada has seen its lobster exports to China nearly double. Maine may never recover its previously dominant position in this export market.

This story is not singular. Trump started the trade war by levying new taxes on $250 billion worth of Chinese exports. China retaliated both by increasing the duties Americans face and by decreasing the tariffs that confront everyone else: It has cut tariffs on thousands of products from the rest of the world’s fisheries, farmers, and firms.

Read the full story at The Atlantic

Beijing backs green aquaculture revolution

June 18, 2019 — The announcement has racked up 30,000 views on a Chinese industry website and sources in the country have described it as “huge”. The head of China’s Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries Department, Zhang Xianliang, said it is “unprecedented” and that it would be “very important” for China’s aquaculture sector “over the next two-to-three years”.

Wang Songlin, president of the Qingdao Marine Conservation Society, told Undercurrent News there would be clear winners and losers. Many of China’s legion of shrimp farmers using low-tech, intensive farming systems in coastal areas potentially face increased regulatory pressure, he said.

The document innocuously titled Ideas on Accelerating the Green Development of China’s Aquaculture Sector does not immediately stand out.

But it is the stamp of China’s State Council, the chief administrative body of the Chinese government, comprising a select group of 35 officials and chaired by China’s premier, Li Keqiang, that has generated excitement among industry executives, farmers, and academics within China’s massive aquaculture sector.

Read the full story at the Undercurrent News

G-20 urges ‘voluntary action’ on marine plastic crisis but fails to agree on common approach

June 18, 2019 — Environment ministers from the Group of 20 on Sunday recognized an urgent need to tackle the marine plastic litter that’s choking the world’s oceans, but failed to agree on concrete measures or targets to phase out single-use plastics.

More than 8 million tons of plastic are dumped into the world’s oceans every year, equivalent to a garbage truck’s worth every minute, and by 2050 there will be more plastic in the oceans by weight than fish, scientists predict.

But agreeing on a common approach to the problem has proved problematic, with the United States blocking demands to set a global target to significantly reduce or phase out single-use plastics.

“Marine litter and especially marine plastic litter and microplastics, is a matter requiring urgent attention given its adverse impacts on marine ecosystems, livelihoods and industries including fisheries, tourism and shipping, and potentially on human health,” environment ministers from the G-20 said on Sunday.

The ministers said they were “determined to drive measures to resolve this issue,” while also noting that “plastics play an important role in our economies and daily lives.”

Read the full story at The Washington Post

Season of uncertainty: Alaska braces for seafood tariffs

June 14, 2019 — Fisheries are always fraught with uncertainties, but there is an added element this year: trade tariffs on Alaska’s largest export: seafood. “The industry is accustomed to dealing with uncertainty about harvest levels, prices and currency rates. The trade disputes just add another layer to that,” said Garrett Evridge, an economist with the McDowell Group.

Tariffs of up to 25 percent on U.S. seafood products going to China went into effect last July and more are being threatened now by the Trump administration. China is Alaska’s biggest seafood buyer purchasing 54 percent of Alaska seafood exports in 2017 valued at $1.3 billion.

“It’s important to remember that a tariff is simply a tax and it increases the prices of our products,” Evridge explained. “As Alaskans we are sensitive to any increase in the price of our seafood because we are competing on a global stage. And right now we have tariffs imposed on seafood from the Chinese side and the U.S. side.”

In terms of Alaska salmon, the new taxes could hit buyers of pinks and chums especially hard. Managers expect huge runs of both this summer and much of the pack will be processed into various products in China and then returned to the United States.

“There is uncertainty as to whether or not those products will be tariffed and the Trump administration has indicated they want to tariff all products from China,” Evridge said.

For salmon, in a typical year Alaska contributes 30 to 50 percent of the world’s wild harvest. But when you include farmed salmon, Evridge said, Alaska’s contribution is closer to 15 percent of the global salmon supply.

The Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game is predicting a total catch of 213.2 million salmon this year, more than 80 percent higher than in 2018.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Feature: The Entanglement Tango

June 14, 2019 — Despite an ongoing federal trade war with China imposing tariffs on seafood exports and a looming bait crisis as herring quota were slashed in the Atlantic, Maine’s lobster fleet still managed to haul in crustacean cash. The fleet landed 120 million pounds of lobster worth $484 million in 2018, the fishery’s third-highest annual value ever.

Coming off a profitable year, lobstermen might normally be energized gearing up for the peak summer and fall — but the latest news in the industry’s labored relationship with the Atlantic’s endangered right whale population had them focused on the future of their livelihood instead of the upcoming summer.

In April, NOAA informed the industry that in order to reduce mortality and serious injury to right whales, the U.S. fishing industry would need to reduce risks to whales by 60 to 80 percent throughout New England.

To reach those goals, fishing stakeholders on the federal Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Team agreed to attempt a drastic measure: significantly reducing the number of vertical lines used by the region’s lobstermen. In Maine, where thousands of small-scale lobstermen catch the majority of the U.S. lobster haul, that means reducing vertical lines in the water by at least 50 percent.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

US wind energy industry is booming, but tariffs pose a threat

June 11, 2019 — In 2008, Jason Urichich was at a crossroads. He lost his home and landscaping business in Youngstown, Ohio, and decided it was time for a change. He decided to pursue a six-month program at Kalamazoo Valley Community College in Michigan for wind turbine repair.

“I was really interested in the small turbines, and at home I was trying to build one myself,” Urichich said. “I decided I didn’t know enough about it, and maybe I should go to school for it.”

A decade later that “maybe” turned into a career. He’s now a senior lead technician for Avangrid Renewables’ Locust Ridge Wind Farm in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania. The company employs some 300 technicians at its 60 commercial-scale wind facilities across the country. With five more under construction, Avangrid Renewables — which provides clean energy to major companies like Nike and Amazon’s AWS — is hiring dozens more nationwide, as demand continues to grow.

Read the full story at MSN

FAO launches anti-IUU campaign on Chinese social media

June 10, 2019 — The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) is reaching out directly to the Chinese public in a bid to turn opinion against illegal fishing.

The FAO recently launched a social media campaign on Chinese social media in Mandarin, aimed at popular platforms including microblogging site Weibo. The campaign calls for locals to “fight against illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing” and also calls for the protection of fisheries to guarantee food security around the world.

The campaign is a new effort to inform the Chinese public of the impact of illegal fishing on the high seas – some of it conducted by Chinese vessels. The FAO’s campaign is an interesting contrast with state media, which tends to portray the development of China’s distant-water fleet as a strategic national priority.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

‘Why not lobsters?’: Mainers plead with Trump to help an industry suffering from his trade war

June 7, 2019 — The mild-mannered independent senator from Maine, Angus King, got angry as he watched President Trump announce a $16 billion bailout two Thursdays ago to help farmers who are losing money because of the U.S. trade war with China.

A guy from Idaho wearing a “Make Potatoes Great Again” hat stood appreciatively at the president’s side. So did producers of corn, soybeans, wheat and pork. They’re all getting another round of handouts from the Department of Agriculture.

But many of King’s constituents have also been suffering, and they’re getting the shaft from their government. Lobster exports to China, which had been booming for years, have plummeted 84 percent since Beijing imposed retaliatory tariffs last July, according to new data from the Maine International Trade Center. The growing Chinese middle class is eating more lobsters from Canada, which now cost them a quarter to a third less but taste no different.

“We’ve got an industry that’s suffering exactly the same kind of negative effects,” King said in an interview. “Why not lobsters? There’s no logical distinction that I can see. … I’m sure a lot of people in Maine had the same reaction I did watching that press conference: What are we, chopped lobster?”

To be sure, chopped lobster from Maine sounds delicious – especially if it’s thinly coated in mayonnaise and stuffed into a hot dog bun that’s been lightly toasted in butter. But, in all seriousness, King’s frustration underscores the degree to which Trump and his political appointees in Washington have been picking winners and losers. The lobster industry has been one of the losers.

Read the full story at The Washington Post