Saving Seafood

Prices in Maine’s lucrative baby eel fishery sink to 10-year low

April 7, 2020 — A week after Maine’s annual commercial baby eel fishing season got under way, prices for the lucrative catch are the lowest they have been in the past 10 years.

According to information posted on the Maine Department of Marine Resources website, the average price paid to baby eel fishermen in Maine this past week is $512 per pound, which is roughly $360 lower than the lowest average annual price fishermen have received in the past decade.

From 2011 through 2019, baby eels in Maine fetched an average of $1,670 per pound, varying between an average of $875 in 2014 and an average of $2,366 in 2018.

Maine is the only state that has a significant legal fishery for baby eels, which also are known as glass eels or elvers. The vast majority of elvers caught in Maine are shipped live to China, where they are grown in aquaculture ponds and then harvested as adult eels for the global seafood market.

Fishery officials have said that the prices for elvers this year could be unusually low, given the severe adverse impact the global COVID-19 pandemic has had on the economy and the demand for seafood, and in particular on the restaurant market in Asia.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

Safety protocols in Alaska evolving amidst growing COVID-19 concerns

April 7, 2020 — The seafood industry is adapting and tightening its safety protocols as fears grow over summer fishing activities spreading COVID-19 in rural Alaska.

In Bristol Bay, Alaska, a recently released document signed by local industry heavyweights like the Bristol Bay Regional Development Association and the Bristol Bay Native Corporation suggests that all workers test negative within 48 hours of traveling to the region.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford fisheries hopeful as restaurants adapt to COVID-19 crisis

April 7, 2020 — Commercial fishermen depend on restaurants to survive.

Keith Decker, President of Blue Harvest Fisheries in New Bedford, says demand for seafood is down by 65-percent, and much of that is because many restaurants closed down at the beginning of the crisis.

Decker says blue and yellow fin tuna have been hit hard. When their last tuna vessel came in right after the coronavirus shock, “there were no buyers for the fish. That market dried up to zero.” The company inevitably had to sell off the fish for a fraction of its price or freeze it.

And while it’s unlikely high end sushi restaurants will be opening up anytime soon, some fishermen are hopeful. Wayne Reichle, owner of a scallop fishery in New Bedford, says there could be an uptick in demand for less expensive seafood.

“Restaurants are starting to re-open after they figured out they could do customer pick-up or home delivery,” Reichle says. “It’s taken two or three weeks but people sort of figured out how to continue supplying meals and keeping fresh seafood in the supply chain.”

Read the full story at The Public’s Radio

FLORIDA: Local commercial fishermen and fish markets feel affect of COVID-19

April 7, 2020 — With doors closed to area seafood restaurants due to the coronavirus, there’s not much call for commercial fishermen to haul in those fish.

“We had just got a 14,000-pound load of red snapper in, anticipating a whole bunch of busy restaurants,” said Eddie Morgan of Harbor Docks Seafood Market. “But that didn’t happen at all.

“We’re not hardly selling anything to restaurants … we’re still selling a little bit to the fish markets,” he said such as Shrimpers and Goatfeathers in South Walton. “But the restaurants are not like they should be.”

Morgan said they opened their seafood market on Mountain Drive last week and sold whatever they had at wholesale prices to the general public.

But with restaurants closed for in-door dining, and only a few still doing carry out, the demand for fish is low.

“There are a few (commercial) boats fishing, but most of the boats that we work with … we’ve told them to stay at the dock,” Morgan said. “We don’t need much now.”

Read the full story at The Destin Log

NEW JERSEY: Pop-up seafood market at Jersey Shore helps fishermen hurt by COVID-19 restaurant closures

April 7, 2020 — A pop-up wholesale seafood market is helping to keep the fishing industry afloat in an Ocean County municipality.

Point Pleasant Beach’s Shore Fresh Seafood Market is collaborating with the Fishermen’s Dock Cooperative to sell the catch — brought ashore on the docks directly behind the business — on its outdoor patio on Channel Drive.

According to a posting on Shore Fresh Seafood Market’s Facebook page, the new offering is out of necessity.

Read the full story at WHYY

Feds extend waiver on monitors for some East Coast fisheries

April 7, 2020 — The federal government has extended a waiver on the requirement for at-sea monitors for some East Coast fisheries.

Fishing boats often carry human observers, or at-sea monitors, to gather data that is important to the management of fisheries. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the rule is waived in some northeastern U.S. fisheries until at least April 18.

NOAA said in a statement that it will “continue to evaluate the need for further extensions of this waiver on a weekly basis.” The waiver is a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Bangor Daily News

Cape scientists forge ahead with right whale research

April 7, 2020 — Over the past week, New England Aquarium scientist Philip Hamilton, manager of the right whale identification catalog at the aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life, has received photos of about 30 right whales taken by people walking the shoreline around Race Point and off Nahant.

Unfortunately, researchers hoping to see them from the air and sea during what they consider the epicenter of right whale migration into Cape Cod Bay essentially have been grounded by weather and coronavirus.

“We lost 22 days there,” said Charles “Stormy” Mayo, a senior scientist and director of the Right Whale Ecology Program at the Center for Coastal Studies in Provincetown.

COVID-19 fears forced the New England Aquarium to close March 13. Admission fees account for 80% of their $3.5 million in annual operating expenses, and the aquarium announced layoffs and furloughs last week to cut costs.

The Center for Coastal Studies did not lay off anyone, spokesperson Cathrine Macort said, but its offices and lab are closed. The center is watching expenses and applying for federal payroll aid.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

Weathering the storm: Rhode Island’s commercial fishery hit hard by COVID-19 pandemic

April 7, 2020 — When COVID-19 began to spread across the country, the impacts on Rhode Island’s commercial fishing and shellfish industries were immediate and devastating.

With restaurants closed, Robert Rheault, executive director of the East Coast Shellfish Growers Association, said fish and shellfish that had already been harvested ended up in landfills.

“There’s no market,” he said. “The dealers were taking tractor-trailer loads of shellfish to the dump because they didn’t have money to send it back to the growers they’d bought it from. Nobody’s going to pay for that. And they weren’t allowed to throw them in the water because they come from different growing areas and you’re worried about introducing disease.

“… Mountains and mountains of fresh fish went to the dump, too, because when you lose your food service, most people don’t like to cook fish at home. The vast majority of fish is cooked in a restaurant.”

Until the COVID-19 pandemic, the Rhode Island aquaculture industry had been expanding. In 2019, the the total value of shellfish crops was $5.8 million and the industry employed about 200 people. 

Coastal Resources Management Council Aquaculture and Fisheries Coordinator David Beutel said the consequences of the evaporation of the major markets for shellfish are now being felt at all levels of the industry.

Read the full story at The Westerly Sun

NOAA GARFO Office Helping Fishermen Sell Direct to Consumers

April 6, 2020 — The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) is changing the way that many people do business—including fishermen. The NOAA Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office sent out a bulletin on Friday to remind fishermen that they not only remain fully staffed and operational, but are available to help them get the appropriate permits that they need.

News stories have been circulating about groups of fishermen working together to bring fresh seafood right to consumers. This not only provides a healthy and delicious protein for consumers, but helps local fishermen who are struggling to offload the product. It’s completely legal—with the right paperwork. As the GARFO bulletin explains, a federal permit is required to sell catch directly to consumers. Some states also have additional permit and reporting requirements. But even if a state has waived their requirements for direct sales, “federal regulations still apply to federal permit holders.”

Read the full story at Seafood News

Senator Collins Calls for Swift Release of $300 Million to Support Fishermen During COVID-19 Pandemic

April 6, 2020 — The following was released by The Office of Senator Susan Collins (R-ME):

U.S. Senator Susan Collins wrote to Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, urging him to quickly release the $300 million for assistance to fishermen and related businesses that was included in the Phase 3 coronavirus emergency package.  As a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, Senator Collins worked to ensure that this critical relief provision was inserted in the final legislation.

“The seafood and aquaculture industries are experiencing severe financial harm from disruptions to supply, demand, and labor caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Those who make their livelihoods harvesting, transporting, processing, distributing, and preparing the bounty of our oceans have incredibly complex and inter-reliant business models,” said Senator Collins.  

“I am pleased that, as a result of my and other coastal state members’ advocacy, the Assistance to Fishery Participants provision was included in the CARES Act to provide relief that is targeted specifically for these iconic and essential engines of Maine’s economy,” Senator Collins continued.  “It is critical that the $300 million in fishery-related assistance reach those who need it expeditiously in order to manage this period of uncertainty and emerge as strong as before.”

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will be responsible for releasing this funding.  Senator Collins requested that:

  • NOAA work with regional fisheries management commissions to distribute the funds to coastal states;
  • Each state is given reasonable flexibility to distribute money in the ways that will best benefit fishermen and their communities;
  • NMFS use comparative methods and averages that span multiple years—as is common with other fisheries disaster calculations—to allocate funding; and
  • NMFS continue to move quickly to get relief funds out to the states, and require states to submit a spending plan to achieve accountability.

Click HERE to read Senator Collins’ letter to Secretary Ross.