Saving Seafood

The U.S. government is donating gulf shrimp to food banks

August 18, 2020 — COVID-19 has impacted agriculture around the country, and that extends to U.S. shrimp fisheries, which are largely located along the coastline of the Gulf of Mexico. With restaurants and hotels closed around the country the demand for shrimp is way, way down, leading to fears that the price of shrimp will collapse. To help offset this, the U.S. government has stepped in and announced it will be buying $30 million worth of U.S.-harvested shrimp.

As reported by the Associated Press (with a hat-tip to Modern Farmer for alerting us to the story), the massive shrimp buy is the result of lobbying from both Louisiana and Mississippi, two states that produce shrimp and stand to be impacted by COVID-related factors. In a press release Mississippi’s two U.S. senators and one of its house members stated that they had sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue in May, asking that the USDA purchase shrimp (thus propping up the industry) and distribute that same shrimp to people being impacted by the pandemic.

Read the full story at The Takeout

Louisiana inshore shrimp season opens as coronavirus hits industry; ‘it’s just not moving’

August 11, 2020 — Louisiana shrimpers started heading out to sea Monday as the fall inshore shrimp season kicked off. But with restaurants closed due to coronavirus, opening day arrived at a time when fewer people are buying shrimp, and prices remain low.

“It’s all about supply and demand,” said Acy Cooper Jr., president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association. Most shrimpers sell their catch to processors, who sell the shrimp to restaurants. But processors haven’t been able to move shrimp out of inventory because of restaurant closures. “It’s just not moving,” Cooper said.

The more shrimp that sits in inventory, the less processors are willing to pay fishers for shrimp at the dock, he said. The federal economic relief package passed in March included $300 million for fisheries, of which nearly $15 million was allocated for Louisiana. But fishers still haven’t seen any of that money.

Read the full story at NOLA.com

LOUISIANA: USDA to buy $30 million pounds of domestic shrimp

August 6, 2020 — The federal government will buy $30 million worth of domestic shrimp to distribute as part of its emergency food assistance efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic, officials said.

Lawmakers say the action will also benefit Louisiana’s shrimp industry as fishermen struggle with decreased sales amid restaurant closures states have enacted to slow the coronavirus’s spread.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture approved the purchase this week under a law that allows it to provide food assistance to states and food banks nationwide during emergencies.

“This is great news for the U.S. shrimp industry, including Louisiana shrimpers, who tirelessly work to provide their delicious, world-class product,” said U.S. Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Metairie, whose district includes southern Terrebonne and Lafourche, home to many shrimp fishermen and processors. “This program will support our shrimpers who have been adversely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic while providing U.S. shrimp proudly produced in Louisiana and the entire Gulf Coast to the families who need it most.”

U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., also praised the action.

Read the full story at Houma Today

Federal court ruling complicates US offshore aquaculture efforts

August 5, 2020 –A federal appeals court has struck down plans to open the Gulf of Mexico’s federal waters to fish farming, creating mixed messages to the industry on exactly who will be managing the future of offshore aquaculture in the U.S.

On Monday, 3 August, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans blocked recent federal rules that would have allowed large-scale industrial aquaculture operations in offshore waters for the first time, upholding a 2018 federal ruling that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is not permitted the authority to regulate offshore aquaculture under existing national fisheries laws.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Appeals court: NOAA can’t make rules for offshore fish farms

August 4, 2020 — A federal appeals court in New Orleans has upheld a decision that throws out rules regulating fish farms in the Gulf of Mexico.

The law granting authority over fisheries to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration does not also let the agency set rules for offshore fish farms, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in its 2-1 decision on Monday.

The farms use enormous open-topped nets or submersible pens to raise huge numbers of fish, including tuna, salmon, seabass and cobia, out in open water.

The government says fish farming, including that on the open sea, is vital to seafood production and can both provide jobs and protect species and habitats. Opponents say huge numbers of fish confined in nets out in the ocean could hurt ocean health and native fish stocks, and the farms would drive down prices and devastate commercial fishing communities.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Washington Post

Louisiana seafood industry says adequate federal help is needed as the pandemic persists

August 4, 2020 — People working in Louisiana’s seafood industry and their advocates hope Congress treats fishermen better when it passes the latest COVID-19 aid package.

The pandemic is crushing restaurants and by extension the local seafood industry.

Pete Gerica is a longtime commercial fisherman.

“Your in-town sales, your sales out of state and all that, everything is at a standstill basically,” said Gerica.

Because of rising cases of the deadly virus Louisiana restaurants have mandated capacity limits.

“Everything is at a standstill basically with everybody with 25, 45, 50 percent of their sales and all of the wholesalers and retailers that we deal with directly they’re all having a rough go of it just like we are,” Gerica stated.

Louisiana Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser works with the seafood industry.

Read the full story at WAFB

Gulf Coast fishing industry struggles to stay afloat during pandemic

June 12, 2020 — The oldest continuously operating oyster company in the U.S., P & J Oyster Company, has been in the business of shucking oysters in New Orleans’ French Quarter since 1876, and it has never experienced anything like COVID-19.

“We had Hurricane Katrina and two years later we had Hurricane Gustav and then, you know, three years after that, we had the BP oil spill. And I’m going to tell you, after being in this business, as long as I have there is nothing —, out of even those catastrophic things that we’ve dealt with —, like COVID,” co-owner Alfred “Al” Sunseri told CBS News. “We had these terrible, devastating impacts on our business, but when they closed down restaurants to where you could not go inside. It’s not really the most conducive thing for oysters.”

P & J processes and sells oysters wholesale to restaurants and vendors across Louisiana. Sunseri has been in the family business for 41 years and has seven employees. He likened the March shutdown of New Orleans to “turning off the faucet,” and said he was only able to reach 50% of his typical sales that month. In April, things were even worse — he only made 2% of his normal sales for the month.

Read the full story at CBS News

Gulf ‘dead zone’ costing seafood industry, environment $2.4 billion in damage each year, study says

June 9, 2020 — The massive “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico is causing up to $2.4 billion dollars in damage to fisheries and marine habitat every year, a new report says.

Covering an area about the size of New Hampshire, the 6,700-square-mile zone of low dissolved oxygen has long been the bane of shrimpers and other fishers off the coasts of Louisiana and eastern Texas. A report released this month from the Union of Concerned Scientists offers the first comprehensive assessment of the dead zone’s economic impact, and warns the root problem — agricultural pollution from the Mississippi River — is likely to grow in severity as the world’s climate changes.

“Gulf Coast communities know that the dead zone impacts their livelihoods, but research has never put a dollar value on its damage to the fishing industry,” said Rebecca Boehm, a UCS economist and the report’s author. “This study quantifies both the amount of nitrogen flowing to the Gulf from farms upstream, and the toll it is taking economically on the foundation of the Gulf fishing industry.”

Read the full story at NOLA.com

LOUISIANA: Shrimping season in SWLA begins

May 28, 2020 — Shrimping season, well known to Southwest Louisiana, kicked off Wednesday morning at 6 a.m.

Boats began lining up as early as Tuesday night to get the perfect spot to take off next morning for some good shrimping.

Vice president of Tommy Seafood Inc Chalin Delaune said there’s a lot of factors that play into shrimping.

“It really depends on the cycle of the moon. It depends on the area,” Delaune said.

“Here in Cameron, this is the last zone for shrimping that opened. So, there are other areas that have opened in the state before Cameron. But we’re hoping they saved the best for last. As of right now, we’ve seen a little bit of shrimp. So, we’re hoping that we’re able to open up and our boats will be able to catch some shrimp to cover their expenses and make some money.”

Read the full story at KPLC