Saving Seafood

Seafood biz braces for losses of jobs, fish due to sanctions

March 31, 2022 — The worldwide seafood industry is steeling itself for price hikes, supply disruptions and potential job losses as new rounds of economic sanctions on Russia make key species such as cod and crab harder to come by.

The latest round of U.S. attempts to punish Russia for the invasion of Ukraine includes bans on imports of seafood, alcohol and diamonds. The U.S. is also stripping “most favored nation status” from Russia. Nations around the world are taking similar steps.

Russia is one of the largest producers of seafood in the world, and was the fifth-largest producer of wild-caught fish, according to a 2020 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Russia is not one of the biggest exporters of seafood to the U.S., but it’s a world leader in exports of cod (the preference for fish and chips in the U.S.). It’s also a major supplier of crabs and Alaska pollock, widely used in fast-food sandwiches and processed products like fish sticks.

The impact is likely to be felt globally, as well as in places with working waterfronts. One of those is Maine, where more than $50 million in seafood products from Russia passed through Portland in 2021, according to federal statistics.

Read the full story at AP News

Maine seafood industry expects indirect hit from Russian invasion

February 28, 2022 — Though the Maine lobster and seafood industries for the most part do not trade directly with Russia, they are anticipating indirect impacts from the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Russia had already banned seafood imports from the United States and European Union in 2014 in retaliation for previous sanctions imposed on Russia after its invasion and annexation of Crimea, and that ban remains in effect. Still, the invasion is bound to exacerbate ongoing supply chain issues, inflation and high energy prices, which could hurt the seafood industry indirectly in Maine.

Richard Hall, caviar director at Browne Trading Company in Portland, said he has not imported or exported any products from Russia in over 10 years because of the political situation and on-and-off embargoes.

“I get solicited by caviar farms in the (former) Soviet Union almost weekly,” Hall said. “It’s not like we don’t want to work with Russian farms. We’re always interested in finding what’s great for our customers. And it’s sort of sad – I’ve had to tell them recently, keep me on your list of people, but we’re not going to be doing anything with you right now.”

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Maine eyes concepts for developing Searsport as offshore wind hub

February 16, 2022 — State agencies have developed concepts to use the port of Searsport as a manufacturing hub for the burgeoning offshore wind industry.

“We envision an entire port concept,” said Matthew Burns, director of ports and marine transportation with the Maine Department of Transportation.

Burns spoke during a webinar last week, hosted by Augusta public policy nonprofit Maine Conservation Voters, on proposed plans to develop the port for offshore wind.

In November, Gov. Janet Mills directed her administration to study options for renewable energy development at the state’s commercial ports, calling offshore wind an “unprecedented economic and investment opportunity for Maine.”

Led by the Governor’s Energy Office, the Maine Department of Transportation and other agencies, officials are looking at a variety of wind options at Searsport, Portland, Eastport and others.

Read the full story at Mainebiz

China’s difficulties a potential boon for US seafood processors

December 16, 2021 — Mounting difficulties in bringing seafood processed in China into the United States has created an opportunity for U.S. processors, including Portland, Maine-based Bristol Seafood.

China’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has slowed China’s seafood-processing sector’s production, and related logistical and transportation issues have impeded delivery of their products to the U.S. Those issues, along with the continued imposition of U.S. tariffs as high as 25 percent on seafood imported from China, have made China a less-attractive option for processing for U.S. seafood buyers, according to Bristol Seafood CEO Peter Handy.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

Dock price: The cost of cutting access to healthy fisheries

April 7, 2021 — In the early 1980s, when I was fishing a dayboat dragger out of Ogunquit, Maine, a noise ordinance came before the town meeting under the terms of which, as we understood them, fishermen would not be able to start their engines before 7 a.m.

On the bait wharf, we viewed the proposal as the child of well-heeled folks from away who liked the idea of water views and fishing boats but drew the line at having to listen to diesel engines starting up before breakfast.

Talk of the ordinance created quite a stir in the run-up to town meeting, but not so much among the fishermen. We would fish on our schedule, noise ordinance or no.

But that was then. Tourism was not yet a year-round industry nor was new-home construction a way of life. Coastal communities were still home to “working class” families, and during winter it was common to find laid-off construction workers, restaurant help and others on the back deck of fishing vessels trying to earn a paycheck. As a result, the connection to fishing was not casual, but intrinsic. Fishing was woven into the fabric of coastal communities.

Much has changed, especially, for example, in New England’s groundfish ports. The wharves in Portland, Maine, and Gloucester, Mass., that I scrambled over in my youth are no longer jammed with trawlers rafting two or three deep, to say nothing of the chandleries, gear lofts and fuel boats that have disappeared.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

MAINE: Portland fishing community mourns the crew of the Emmy Rose

November 27, 2020 — Members of Portland’s fishing community gathered on the city’s waterfront Wednesday night to remember and honor the four Maine men who were lost at sea when the Emmy Rose sank off Cape Cod early Monday.

Candlelight vigils were held on the Maine State Pier and on the Portland Fish Pier, with roughly 100 people between both sites talking about the men, their lives and their devotion to fishing.

At the Maine State Pier, family and friends placed candles around a makeshift memorial that said, “Family is the anchor that holds us through life’s storms.” At the Portland Fish Pier, candles were placed in front of the fishermen’s memorial that says, “In memory of those lost at sea.”

The 82-foot Emmy Rose, which was based in Portland, sank early Monday roughly 22 miles northeast of Provincetown, Massachusetts, where 30-knot winds were whipping up 6- to 8-foot waves.

The Coast Guard suspended its search for the boat Tuesday evening.

Read the full story at Central Maine

MAINE: Seafood industry ponders viability of Portland Fish Exchange

October 7, 2020 — The Portland Fish Pier Authority is embarking on a strategic planning process that could determine the future of its underused waterfront space.

Built to accommodate large trawling vessels and massive landings, the Portland Fish Exchange faces challenges from the decline of landings, fewer boats in the state’s groundfishing fleet, the coming retirement of its longtime manager, and the sudden impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Business at the exchange peaked in the early 1980s when more than 300 vessels landed nearly 80 million pounds of groundfish. By 1999 only 15 million pounds were landed by 160 boats. The manager, Bert Jongerden, said as of 2019 only about 40 vessels were selling their catches at the exchange.

Read the full story at the Portland Phoenix

Bristol Seafood adds office in New England Ocean Cluster

July 7, 2020 — Bristol Seafood has opened an office in the New England Ocean Cluster (NEOC) in Portland, Maine, U.S.A.

Additionally, Bristol Seafood has provided a founding sponsorship to create Inclusion in the Blue Economy, a new program to support underrepresented blue economy entrepreneurs by providing dedicated workspace and mentorship opportunities to women, people of color, and individuals from non-marine industries who are passionate about building responsible marine-related businesses.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Why climate emergency declarations matter for Maine

December 18, 2019 — On the evening of Dec. 2, the Brunswick Town Council joined Bar Harbor, South Portland, and Portland in declaring a state of climate emergency. Compared to the climate rally that followed on Dec. 6, this was a quiet affair — but a resounding one nonetheless. With unanimous approval, council members passed a resolution drafted by members of Bowdoin Climate Action, naming the urgency of the climate crisis and committing Brunswick to developing an action plan to potentially eliminate carbon emissions by 2030.

At first, such municipal action might seem nominal or unnecessary. Why bother to come out with a statement or engage with a massive, global issue on the scale of local government?

As it turns out, Maine’s towns are hardly the first to make the move. As early as December of 2016, the city of Darebin, Australia, a Melbourne suburb, declared a state of climate emergency. Since then, more than 1,200 local governments in 25 countries have followed suit, translating to nearly 800 million people globally represented by governments that have declared a climate emergency. Eight hundred million — that’s a lot, and it’s a number that will only continue to grow.

Let’s face it: in a time of crisis, where 2019 marks the end of the warmest decade on record and the number of billion-dollar climate disasters each year continues to rise, our federal government has effectively chosen to ignore this. We have no choice but to build power from the bottom up, tackling the climate crisis from our hometowns and city halls. A municipal climate emergency declaration isn’t an empty statement — it’s a bright red flag on the map. Enough of these, and state governments would be hard put to ignore the demands of their constituents.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

MAINE: Green Plate Special: Selling seafood that helps the fish – and the fishermen

December 16, 2019 — It’s an environmental idea that has taken off in recent decades. You can’t help an ecosystem if you don’t also account for the humans who rely on it. A new Portland-based company called Gulf of Maine Sashimi exemplifies the point. In order to help the ocean’s threatened fish populations, it works to help the fisherman, too.

To that end, a handful of Gulf of Maine fishermen supply the wholesale operation with fish species such as Acadian Redfish, flounder, Atlantic mackerel, haddock and white hake. The company’s niche is to wholesale pristine versions of these normally less valuable and more populous fish, so they can fetch better prices than they otherwise would. Then it passes along the extra revenue to the fishermen.

To ensure their catch makes the grade, the fishermen who sell whole fish to Gulf of Maine Sashimi employ two important measures: First, they use a Japanese technique for killing fish at sea called ike jime. A spike inserted quickly and directly into a fish’s hindbrain kills it instantly. Next, they submerge the fish in a slurry of seawater and ice to quickly bring its temperature to just above freezing and keep it there.

These measures combine to stem the flow of adrenaline, lactic acid and blood into the flesh of the fish, Gulf of Maine Sashimi CEO Jen Levin said, which preserves its pristine quality, improves its taste and increases its shelf life. The careful handling also ensures that the fish are not battered and bruised in sea transit, she said.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald