Saving Seafood

NOAA Lists Waiver of Observer Requirements HMS, South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico Fisheries

April 10, 2020 — NOAA has issued another update on the temporary waiver of observer requirements for federally permitted vessels.

According to the latest document, NOAA is temporarily waiving the requirement to carry a fishery observer for federally permitted vessels participating in the following fisheries:

-South Atlantic Penaeid Shrimp
-South Atlantic Rock Shrimp
-South Atlantic Snapper-Grouper
-Southeast Gillnet
-Gulf of Mexico Commercial Reef Fish
-Gulf of Mexico Shrimp
-Atlantic Highly Migratory Species (HMS) Pelagic Longline
-Shark Bottom Longline (Atlantic HMS)
-Shark Gillnet (Atlantic HMS)

Read the full story at Seafood News

LSU AgCenter, Louisiana Sea Grant aim to help struggling seafood industry

April 6, 2020 — The LSU AgCenter and Louisiana Sea Grant are working to help the seafood industry, which is struggling with a massive financial challenge created by the coronavirus pandemic.

Restaurants that use large amounts of seafood are only offering carryout service, and they have drastically scaled back their seafood purchases.

“I’m sure it’s less than 10% of its previous quantity,” said Rusty Gaude, LSU AgCenter and Louisiana Sea Grant fisheries agent in the New Orleans area.

A seafood marketing program, Louisiana Direct Seafood, is one way of helping fishermen and dealers by connecting them directly with consumers.

The Louisiana Direct Seafood program helps consumers buy seafood from fishermen and vendors.

Fishermen in Cameron, Delcambre, Lafourche-Terrebonne and Southshore New Orleans areas post their fresh catch messages on a website. Customers are able to visit the site and see in real time who has fresh product ready for sale, where they are located and their contact information. Consumers can then contact the sellers directly to establish a price, place orders and arrange pickup at the docks or other locations.

Read the full story at The Houma Times

Coronavirus: Struggling Louisiana fishermen, shrimpers look for new ways to sell catch

April 3, 2020 — Louisiana’s fishermen and shrimpers are struggling to sell their catches as the novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, has severely depressed demand from buyers.

The drop in demand largely comes from the state’s shutdown of restaurants, aside from carryout and delivery options, to prevent further spread of the virus. Gov. John Bel Edwards issued an order closing dine-in operations March 16.

With low demand, processing plants’ freezers and inventories are full, leaving most fishermen with nowhere to sell their catches, said Thomas Hymel, a marine extension agent with the LSU AgCenter and the Louisiana Sea Grant.

Read the full story at the Lafayette Daily Advertiser

Coronavirus complications will likely affect shrimp supply chain into summer months

April 3, 2020 — The ongoing coronavirus pandemic is having a big impact on seafood as restaurants remain closed, employees are affected by stay-at-home orders, and borders become tighter to prevent the spread of the virus.

According to a number of industry experts, the disruptions occurring now are likely to have an affect on supply chains into the forseeable future, as processing facilities struggle to obtain products and importers shy away from purchasing goods in the face of uncertain demand. Southeast Asian shrimp production, in particular, will likely be in flux for months to come, according to Robins McIntosh, executive vice president at Charoen Pokphand Foods.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Louisiana’s Seafood Industry Need Us Now More Than Ever

April 1, 2020 — What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word Louisiana? Well, if you’re well adjusted then you either answered food or music. Both answers would be acceptable to me because quite frankly in Louisiana one without the other just doesn’t feel right.

While the effects of the coronavirus pandemic have been illustrated across social media platforms by our state’s musical performers, the effect the virus has had on Louisiana’s seafood industry may not have been as widely publicized.

Think about this fact. About 80% of shrimp caught in Louisiana is sold to restaurants. We already know how the virus has scaled back dining out so if you peel the layers back even further you don’t have to look too hard to see Louisiana’s seafood producing families are truly feeling the pinch.

Read the full story at KPEL

US shrimp importers forced to unscramble COVID-19 Rubik’s Cube

March 31, 2020 — Like the product they specialize in selling, US importers of warmwater shrimp are “frozen” on how to sort out the market puzzle created recently by the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, according to Travis Larkin, president of the Seafood Exchange, in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Foodservice establishments around the country have been ordered to stay closed altogether or are operating under strict limitations, while retail businesses — by contrast — are scrambling to replace their shrimp inventory after a few weeks of panic buying.

“What are importers to do in response?” Undercurrent News asked.

“I don’t think anybody really knows,” answered Larkin, a longtime industry veteran who joined Seafood Exchange in 1997. “You would think that with something of this magnitude, there would be some drastic outcome that we all would predict will come to pass. But I think this is so stunning and so preposterous compared to what we ever thought could happen, that it almost feels like everything is frozen in time and I really haven’t seen any direction in any sense.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

COVID-19 hits Louisiana’s $2 billion seafood industry hard, leaders urge public to buy local

March 31, 2020 — A whopping 80% of shrimp caught in Louisiana is sold to restaurants, but restaurants across the country are shutting their doors due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Now Louisiana’s $2 billion seafood industry is struggling.

“These are all very small family-owned businesses, and they are very dependent on local sales,” Twin Parish Port Commissioner Wendell Verret said.

Larger seafood businesses will also be hurt.

As demand for seafood goes down, they’ll be stuck with too much inventory. When businesses stop buying seafood from fishermen, the effects could be disastrous.

“Once the fishermen are impacted and they cannot continue to fish, they lose their boats. They lose their equipment. They lose their shop, and it’s very hard to get back into that business,” Verret added.

Read the full story at KLFY

LOUISIANA: Virus outbreak hits local shrimp industry hard

March 27, 2020 — Regulations and foreign trade have battered local shrimpers for years, and the economic quagmire caused by Covid-19 is only adding to the problems.

During Lent, sales of shrimp can double or even triple, but the closure of restaurants has frozen sales – literally. Because sales have plummeted, many shrimp processors are keeping their product on ice to wait out the crisis. This leaves a grim outlook for the future of the shrimping industry.

“Sales have plummeted,” said Kimberly Chauvin, of David Chauvin Seafood Company in Dulac. “I think we are down about 90-something percent.”

In 2018, Gulf of Mexico commercial fishermen caught 374 million pounds of seafood worth $780 million, according to the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance.

Chauvin said processors are keeping their product frozen, and this has meant that many shrimpers are staying on shore to avoid unstable prices. The larger shrimp are frozen with their heads still intact, preserving product to be sold at a later date but, Chauvin said, the overhead cost remains the same. Costs like utilities, payroll, insurance and licenses must still be met, and while she has heard talk of financial assistance to small businesses, she said she hasn’t seen action.

Read the full story at Houma Today

US to enforce ban on shrimp, other fish caught in Mexico’s Gulf of California

March 6, 2020 — US importers of Mexican shrimp and other seafood should soon be prepared to present documentation certifying that any of the products they are bringing over the border do not match a list of roughly five species caught in the upper Gulf of California using multiple gear types.

The US’ National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) announced Wednesday that it will ban the import of virtually all Mexican shrimp and other fish caught in that region of the country over concerns about the endangered vaquita porpoise. An effective date has not yet been set, but it is expected to be within a month and require importers to maintain a “certification of admissibility” that is signed by a Mexican government official establishing that the products being shipped are not from the upper Gulf of California’s:

  • shrimp trawl fishery, for both small and large vessels;
  • shrimp suripera fishery;
  • sierra purse seine fishery;
  • sierra hook and line fishery;
  • chano trawl fishery, for small vessels;
  • curvina purse seine fishery; or
  • sardine/curvina purse seine fishery, for both small and large vessels.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News