Saving Seafood

Seafood prices have dropped, but Southcoast fishermen still fish amid pandemic

April 29, 2020 — Though the coronavirus pandemic has limited some seafood markets and lowered prices, SouthCoast fishermen are still going out on trips when the stormy weather isn’t keeping them ashore.

“We’re still going out, everything’s running right along for us,” groundfisherman Antonio Cravo and co-owner of F/V United States said on Monday.

Cravo, who is based in New Bedford, said the prices have dropped and he’s getting less money for the fish he catches, but it’s still worth going out on trips.

“We offloaded last night and just got paid today, the prices dropped, but it’s still worth it to keep going,” Cravo said,“We still get a paycheck, not as much, but we still get a paycheck to keep up with our bills.”

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Blue Harvest Responds to COVID-19 Situation; Plans to Reopen Monday

April 24, 2020 — In an interview with SeafoodSource, Blue Harvest President and CEO Keith Decker said the first employee tested positive on 14 April, having gone on medical leave on 3 April. A second employee tested positive 20 April in what Decker called an unrelated case. A third case is suspected but not confirmed, Decker said.

In response, Blue Harvest “immediately notified the city and Board of Health proactively,” Decker said.

“We have been in close contact throughout the week, and it’s standard protocol to notify the board of health if you have a positive diagnosis,” he said.

Blue Harvest had already arranged for a third-party contractor to sanitize the facility prior to the issuance of a cease and desist letter, and that cleaning took place Thursday, 23 April. The plant is scheduled to reopen on Monday, 27 April, Decker said.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford fishermen navigate waves of uncertainty in age of coronavirus

April 24, 2020 — On the ocean, fishermen know the uncertainty they’re up against on each trip: Mother Nature. They face brutal weather and, at times, a bad catch. However, it’s on land right now that they’re currently navigating an uncharted sea of uncertainty.

Danny Eilertsen owns Nordic Inc., a fleet of six scallop boats docked at Fish Island in New Bedford.

He said they fish for scallops all year, but the scallop season really begins April 1. Ironically, he said, right now is great at sea — a healthy catch and cold waters. Yet when they come back with tens of thousands of pounds of scallops, they’re selling to a completely different market in the age of coronavirus.

“Scallops on the menu at restaurants now are a staple, they’ve been a staple for quite a few years. Pretty much every restaurant you go to has scallops, and that’s just stopped. So the fresh market for us is gone and that’s probably where the value has lost so much this last month, couple of months here,” Eilertsen said.

He says now, they’re selling at auction at 30 to 40 percent lower costs, and most of the product is put in the freezer to be sold at supermarkets or other markets around the world.

Read the full story at WPRI

Commercial fishing industry in free fall as restaurants close, consumers hunker down and vessels tie up

April 8, 2020 — Kenny Melanson has managed not to furlough or lay off employees at his seafood company, but all nonessential workers have been sent home. Now it’s core staff, hair-netted and suited up, spreading fat sea scallops across a mechanized belt and running them through two brine tanks and two washes and then a quick-freeze. There’s a wall of pallets, hundreds of boxes labeled “fresh seafood,” all of it enveloped in sheets of plastic wrap. Waiting for what’s next.

He runs Northern Wind in New Bedford, Mass., contracting with 74 fishing vessels and employing 125 people. In business 33 years, the company sells about 15 million pounds of scallops and about 6 million pounds of ahi tuna a year.

In the absence of sales, Melanson is running 150,000 pounds of sea scallops a day through individual tunnel freezers, banking them for when the pandemic is over. But cash flow is getting tight. And he worries that when regular life resumes, a glut of scallops will mean tanking prices.

“We could obviously tell our suppliers we would prefer if you don’t fish for the next 30 days,” Melanson said. “But I’m very concerned and nervous about the 28- and 29-year employees and the crews we’ve built up to produce these quantities. They all live paycheck to paycheck.”

Read the full story at The Washington Post

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

MASSACHUSETTS: Scallop Industry Kicks Off Season On Uncertain Terms Amid COVID-19 Crisis

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.”

Read the full story at The Public’s Radio

Seafood suppliers forced to adjust to rapidly changing market conditions

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.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MASSACHUSETTS: ‘Too early to tell’ impact of coronavirus on New Bedford fishing industry

March 30, 2020 — The region’s fishermen are looking toward an uncertain future with portions of their markets disappearing as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, but for now, most are still going on with business as usual.

Since the fishing industry was deemed part of the food supply chain, it is allowed to keep operating as an essential service under Gov. Charlie Baker’s stay-at-home advisory.

“Immediate impacts have been minimal,” scalloper Eric Hansen said Thursday. “The market is a little bit depressed but nothing crazy. My bigger concern is the future, what’s going to happen in the next couple of months.”

The market depression was caused by limitations placed on restaurants, which have caused the restaurants to either close or limit their offerings.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Cape Cod fishermen counting on federal stimulus funds

March 30, 2020 — The Donna Marie was at sea when Gov. Charlie Baker closed restaurants to all but takeout food March 14 to help slow the spread of the new coronavirus.

Owner Chris King called his 60-foot steel fishing vessel and the captain reported he had fish and lobsters onboard. They were able to sell those off, including a fire sale of lobster the next day at King’s fish market in Orleans. They then switched the boat over to scallop gear for the opening of that season April 1.

When restaurants shut down almost overnight, the Cape Cod and New England fishing industry scrambled to adapt. Switching to another fishery won’t be enough to weather this crisis, as the price paid to fishermen tumbled like the stock market in recent weeks.

Industry leaders on a March 20 conference call with state Division of Marine Fisheries Acting Director Daniel McKiernan estimated that 70% of all seafood sold in Massachusetts is consumed in restaurants. Especially hard-hit were the “luxury” seafood species such as lobster, scallops, swordfish and tuna favored by diners.

“They are collapsing. It’s real,” Keith Decker, CEO of New Bedford-based Blue Harvest Fisheries, said of prices. “This is having a profound impact on the seafood industry.”

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

New England restaurants to buy 3m lbs of haddock from Blue Harvest

March 27, 2020 — Ninety Nine Restaurant and Pub, a Woburn, Massachusetts-based chain with 105 locations, has upped its commitment to haddock in its summer menu, and that’s good news for Blue Harvest Fisheries, the Gloucester (Massachusetts) Times reports.

The chain will buy 750,000 pounds of fresh haddock landed in Gloucester and another 2.25 million lbs of frozen haddock, according to the article, which reports that the combined 3m lbs is roughly 20% of the haddock caught commercially in New England and the rest of the United States.

Much of the fish is now being caught in the Gulf of Maine by vessels previously owned by harvester Jim Odlin, from Portland, Maine, landed in Gloucester, and then trucked to Blue Harvest’s recently built New Bedford processing facility, according to the article. Previously the fish was provided by Gloucester Seafood Processing, a subsidiary of US seafood importer and wholesaler Mazzetta.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News