Saving Seafood

The Top 25: Seafood Sustainability & Conservation

September 25, 2020 — There’s no way around it – 2020 so far has been a year wrought with difficult news and stark changes. A global pandemic has kept most of us apart. It’s made the future harder to imagine. Nevertheless, much of the seafood industry persists in its efforts to stay the course, feeding communities in a time of great need. We hope this year’s Top 25 list similarly nourishes your news feed with something good.

From 1999 to 2018, the editorial team of SeafoodSource and its previous incarnation, SeaFood Business magazine, worked tirelessly to produce a list of the leading North American seafood suppliers based on reported sales figures. Last year, we revamped our process, bringing you a new type of compilation celebrating the Top 25 seafood product innovations that have transformed the North American industry. In 2020, we have once again reshuffled the deck.

Cooke Inc.

It all began in 1985 with one family, one farm, and 5,000 salmon. Thirty-five years later, vertically-integrated corporation Cooke Aquaculture, headquartered in Blacks Harbour, New Brunswick, Canada, and a collective of other Cooke family companies together comprise one of the world’s largest seafood enterprises.

A business of such magnitude approaches sustainable development in a variety of ways. For instance, when it comes to certifying its True North Seafood products, Cooke has earned vetting from an array of third-party providers of some of the industry’s most stringent standards, including: the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC), Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP), BRCGS Global Standards, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), Alaska Responsible Fisheries Management (RFM), the International Featured Standards (IFS), Soil Association Organic, Kosher, GLOBAL G.A.P. Aquaculture Standard, Label Rouge, Friend of the Sea, Crianza de Nuestros Mares (“Breeding from our seas”), ISO 14001 and ISO 45001, Halal, and Ocean Wise.

Read the full list and descriptions at Seafood Source

New Bedford’s Mariner Seafood files Chapter 11, True North aims for stalking horse bid

September 14, 2020 — New Bedford, Massachusetts, U.S.A.-based Mariner Seafood filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday, 14 September, with Cooke Aquaculture’s True North Seafood lined up as the stalking horse bidder for its assets.

Court documents filed by Mariner Seafood acknowledge the company defaulted on its revolving USD 10 million (EUR 8.4 million) loan from Wells Fargo, and that the company had been exploring options such as selling assets or facilitating an equity investment to improve its cashflow and repay its debt.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Regulators say Cooke’s Washington trout farming plans unlikely to impact water quality

September 14, 2020 — The C announced this week it will be holding public hearings on Cooke’s draft permits to switch from farming Atlantic salmon to rainbow trout for four existing netpens in the state.

The permits are for Cooke’s Clam Bay, Fort Ward, Orchard Rocks and Hope Island netpens.

Washington state has already held one public comment period where citizens were able to review Cooke’s permit applications to switch species.

“We considered all comments, then evaluated the water quality impacts around the change in species, and developed updated draft permits,” Washington Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Aquaculture Specialist and Permit Coordinator Laurie Niewolny told IntraFish.

Read the full story at IntraFish

Cooke gets draft revised permits for steelhead trout farms from Washington’s Department of Ecology

September 11, 2020 — Cooke Aquaculture Pacific has received drafted revised water quality permits from Washington’s Department of Ecology, another step forward in its effort to shift from farming Atlantic salmon to steelhead trout in its net-pens in Puget Sound.

Blacks Harbour, New Brunswick, Canada-based Cooke has already received a five-year permit from the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife (WSDFW) to farm steelhead trout in at one site near Hope Island in Skagit Bay and three net-pen in Rich Passage.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Northwest Aquaculture Alliance elects new officers

August 27, 2020 — The Northwest Aquaculture Alliance (NWAA) has announced the election of two new officers who will serve in leadership roles for the organization.

Cooke Aquaculture Pacific General Manager Jim Parsons has been elected to the role of president of the NWAA, and Jamestown Seafood CEO Kurt Grinnell has been elected to serve as the vice president. The NWAA is an advocate for aquaculture in the northwest region of the United States, and parts of Canada.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Seafood industry applauds Trump’s new executive order, while some groups cry foul

May 8, 2020 — An executive order issued on 7 April by U.S. President Donald Trump containing a number of new mandates intended to enhance the competitiveness of the U.S. seafood has drawn widespread praise from the industry, and has been derided by some environmentalists and fishing groups.

The new executive order contains an array of recommendations for wild-caught fisheries, and an extensive set of new tasks for multiple government administrations intended to expand the nation’s aquaculture. The new changes are devoted to removing barriers to permitting, improving regulatory transparency, and establishing new “Aquaculture Opportunity Areas.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Environmental groups sue Washington state to slow Cooke’s shift to farming steelhead

February 12, 2020 — A group of conservation and environmental groups filed a lawsuit on Tuesday, 11 February, against the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife, citing the department’s decision to allow Canada-based Cooke Aquaculture to farm steelhead trout at its former Atlantic salmon farm sites.

Last month, the Washington Department of Fish and wildlife approved a five-year permit for Cooke to farm steelhead in Puget Sound and the Salish Sea. In March 2018, the Washington state legislature voted to phase out the farming of non-native finfish after at least 300,000 Atlantic salmon escaped from a Cooke farm near Cypress Island the previous year.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Cooke Aquaculture approved to farm steelhead trout in Washington

January 23, 2020 — The Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife (WSDFW) has approved a five-year permit for Cooke Aquaculture to farm steelhead trout in Puget Sound and the Salish Sea, according to The Seattle Times.

In March 2018, Washington state’s legislature voted to phase out the farming of non-native finfish after some 500,000 Atlantic salmon escaped from a Cooke farm near Cypress Island the previous year.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MAINE: Aquaculture group launches video campaign

January 6, 2020 — As in many segments of American life, social media is playing a role in rising tensions between Maine’s most traditional fishery and the state’s growing aquaculture industry.

In recent months, a group called “Protect Maine’s Fishing Heritage” has been active on Facebook, Instagram and other social media. The group identifies itself as an “organization of lobstermen, fishermen, and other citizens concerned about the rapid growth of aquaculture” in Maine.

Over the past few weeks, the Maine Aquaculture Association (MAA) has posted a pair of professionally produced videos on Facebook aimed at showing Maine fish farmers in a positive light. The first approximately three-minute video features Canadian salmon farming giant Cooke Aquaculture. The second focuses on the husband and wife team of Josh and Shey Conover, who operate their small Marshall Cove Mussel Farm off Islesboro in Penobscot Bay.

The two videos are the initial offerings in a planned series called “The Faces of Maine’s Working Waterfront.”

According to the MAA, the videos “tell the stories of aquatic farmers in Maine, underscoring how aquaculture complements existing marine industries and works to diversify and strengthen our coastal economy.”

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Cooke settles lawsuit with NGO over 2017 collapse of Washington salmon pens

December 2, 2019 — Canada’s Cooke has reportedly paid $2.75 million to settle a lawsuit with NGO Wild Fish Conservancy, brought after the collapse of 10 Atlantic salmon pens in the US state of Washington in 2017.

The lawsuit — brought in November 2017 by the Northwest arm of the NGO — was set to go to court in Seattle on Dec. 3. On Nov. 27, myclallamcounty.com reported comments from Kurt Beardslee, executive director of the NGO, announcing the settlement. Cooke then confirmed the settlement to Undercurrent News.

“This afternoon, Cooke agreed to a settlement over the Clean Water Act violations with us. It was a $2.75m settlement,” said Beardslee. About half of the settlement will pay for legal expenses, he said.

The rest of it’s going to the Rose Foundation, which is going to be opening up to receive grant opportunities “for helping to save wild salmon and killer whales”, said Beardslee.

“Out of respect for the judicial process, we will not comment on the settlement contents given that this agreement takes effect upon entry by the court,” said a spokesman for Cooke.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News