April 2, 2020 — New dates have been selected for Seafood Expo North America/Seafood Processing North America, the continent’s largest seafood industry exhibition.
The 2020 event will comprise an exhibit hall open 23 and 24 September at its regular home in the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center in Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A, and a conference program that will begin on 22 September.
April 2, 2020 — Facing a marketplace that has been drastically changed in the span of less than two months by the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. seafood suppliers, distributors, restaurants, and wholesalers are adapting by switching up their sales methods.
A number of larger seafood companies have moved further into retail sales. Others are urging greater industry collaboration and a joint “Buy American” marketing effort. On the more local level, small- to medium-sized seafood suppliers have shifted to a much more significant online presence, offering to ship orders directly to Americans’ homes. Online marketing data group eMarketer projects direct-to-consumer (D2C) ecommerce sales to surge 24.3 percent to USD 17.8 billion (EUR 16.3 billion) in 2020.
April 2, 2020 — The scallop industry has been growing steadily over the last few years, valued at over $500 million. But the coronavirus spread has brought it to a halt, mostly because restaurants are no longer buying.
New Bedford scallop fisherman Eric Hansen says there’s usually an influx of landings when the season starts but the coronavirus spread has changed everything.
“I’m questioning myself whether I’m going to make a trip or wait to see if maybe there are restaurants open and a demand starts again,” Hansen said. “But right now everything is in flux.”
April 2, 2020 — Outstanding permitting for the delayed 800MW Vineyard project off Massachusetts may not be resolved until December, when the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) is expected to issue a final decision.
A much-awaited supplement to the draft environmental impact statement (EIS) is currently expected on 12 June.
The Vineyard phase 1 of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid’s “pathfinder” project will miss its original commissioning date of 2022. The deadline for a conditional order for MHI Vestas V164-9.5MW turbines expired in early March.
The National Marine Fisheries Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, had refused to endorse BOEM’s draft EIS for Vineyard, complaining that fishing concerns were not addressed adequately. This helped trigger the government’s ongoing analysis of offshore wind’s cumulative impacts in the region.
Studying cumulative impacts is extremely complicated, said Bonnie Ram, a senior researcher at the Centre for Research in Wind at the University of Delaware. BOEM is not a large agency and is learning as it proceeds, she noted.
April 1, 2020 — The $300 million direct assistance to the U.S. seafood industry to mitigate the economic impact of the novel coronavirus is expected to be just the first of a string of federal relief measures enacted in the coming months, U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton said Tuesday.
Moulton conceded that many of the details of the direct assistance remain sketchy on eligibility requirements and the distribution of the direct aid to the seafood industry stretching from Hawaii and Alaska to Massachusetts and Maine.
“I know people have a lot of questions,” Moulton said by phone. “There are only dribbles of information every day.”
Moulton, who continues to recover from contracting what he said is a mild case of COVID-19, said he anticipates the funds will be distributed in a manner employed in other fishery disaster assistance packages.
In previous assistance packages, the Commerce Department received the congressional appropriation and distributed the funds to individual regions — such as New England, Alaska, the Gulf of Mexico — to be managed by individual states and local communities.
April 1, 2020 — US senator Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat and one of the handful of lawmakers responsible for getting $300 million worth of assistance for the seafood industry in the recently passed $2.2 trillion coronavirus stimulus bill, talked to dozens of fishing industry leaders, state legislators and mayors on Saturday about the state of the crisis, the Cape Cod (Massachusetts) Times reports.
He warned them that it was going to get worse.
“These numbers are mounting, the number of cases, and it could go on potentially for a sustained period of time,” Markey said. He described the relief package as a life raft and said Congress was “fully prepared to come back as many times as it takes to make sure we keep all industries afloat in this health care crisis.”
The fishing industry responded that the $300m won’t be enough.
March 31, 2020 — Specific eligibility criteria and distribution details for the $300 million in federal assistance to the U.S. seafood industry probably won’t be available for at least another two weeks, Gloucester Mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken estimated on Monday.
Romeo Theken, who spent much of last weekend on conference calls discussing the economic and health implications of the novel coronavirus pandemic, said she urged state and federal officials to move quickly in getting the money into the hands of fishermen, charter operators, aquaculturists, processors and other shoreside businesses financially wounded by health crisis.
“We’re fighting this invisible war and everyone has to work together or no one is going to survive this” Romeo Theken said. “The plan is very complex and very broad because, unlike previous fishery disaster assistance, this touches everybody in the commercial fishing industry from Alaska to Massachusetts.”
The mayor said she anticipates the federal funds will be distributed by the Commerce Department through NOAA Fisheries to individual regions and states, which then would manage the disbursement of funds to seafood industry stakeholders.
March 30, 2020 — Stimulus funds made possible by the signing of the phase three coronavirus bill can’t come fast enough for finfish and shellfish harvesters and dealers in the US state of Massachusetts, the Cape Cod Times reports.
The newspaper on Friday, the day the bill was passed by the House of Representatives by voice vote and signed by president Donald Trump, recounted how multiple seafood sectors were being affected by the virus. COVID-19 has now infected over 143,000 and killed over 2,500 in the US and caused the closing or partial closing of foodservice establishments all over the country.
Industry leaders had informed Daniel McKiernan, acting director of the state’s Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF), in a March 20 conference call that 70% of all seafood sold in Massachusetts is consumed in restaurants. Especially hard-hit are “luxury” seafood species, such as lobster, scallops, swordfish and tuna, the newspaper noted.
March 30, 2020 — U.S. seafood suppliers are working to quickly shift from foodservice to retail and direct-to-consumer channels as they deal with the immediate impact of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on their businesses.
Filer, Idaho-based Riverence Holdings LLC, which acquired farmed trout producer Clear Springs Foods in February, is realizing a significant loss in business due to its heavy focus on the foodservice sector, according to Riverence Director of Communications Gabe Watkins.
March 30, 2020 — Congress has passed a $2 trillion rescue plan but before those funds start to flow, American companies from the owner of a single liquor store in Boston to corporate giants like Macy’s Inc., must decide what to do about April’s bills: Which obligations do they pay and which can they put off? How many employees can they afford to keep on the payroll? Can they get a break on rent?
The decisions they make this week could shape how deeply the economy is damaged by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Rent is due. Utilities are due. Credit card bills are due April 1,” said Hadley Douglas, who has laid off two workers from her liquor business, The Urban Grape. “The deadline is looming large and it is petrifying.” She said her landlord turned down a request to temporarily pay half the rent but said to keep in touch as it was focusing first on smaller, harder hit businesses.
Millions of Americans are suddenly out of work and many businesses have already closed under orders from state and local governments to close to prevent the spread of the virus. A record 3.28 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits in the week ended March 21.
The U.S. restaurant industry has lost $25 billion in sales since March 1, according to a survey of 5,000 owners by the National Restaurant Association. Nearly 50,000 stores of major U.S. retail chains have closed, according to the companies.