Saving Seafood

Fishing Presents a Vexing Snag in Brexit Talks

March 16, 2020 — In the pitch black of early morning, huge waves hurled the 30-ton vessel from side to side, drenching crewmen who struggled to keep their footing as they cast the trawler’s nets into the swirling seas.

But, once back on the bridge, the skipper, Dave Driver was oblivious to the stomach-churning motion of the boat, and dismissive of the perils of his work — even as he recalled once falling overboard and, on another occasion, rescuing two fishermen from drowning.

“I’m my own boss, I do what I want, I think it’s the best job in the world,” said Mr. Driver, who left school at age 15, but now owns the 1.2 million pound trawler Girl Debra, named after his wife.

He has only one major gripe in life: the French.

Mr. Driver thinks French boats are allowed to take too many fish too close to the British coast — touching on a deeply emotional issue on both sides of the channel that could dash hopes of a post-Brexit trade deal between Britain and the European Union.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Sustainability prioritized as UK government rolls out post-Brexit fisheries bill

January 29, 2020 — With the United Kingdom due to withdraw from the European Union on Friday, 31 January, new legislation has been introduced into U.K. parliament that creates the powers for the country to operate as an independent coastal state and to manage its fish stocks independently.

Beyond delivering a legal guarantee that the United Kingdom will leave the E.U.’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) at the end of the transition period in December 2020, and also ending the automatic rights for E.U. vessels to fish in British waters, the new fisheries bill contains provisions that take into account climate change’s impact on fisheries, as well as the new objective to move towards “climate-smart fishing” in U.K. waters.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

EU warns refusal to give access to UK fishing waters after Brexit could lead to new cod war

January 9, 2020 — Failure to grant the European Union access to British fishing waters after Brexit could lead to an outbreak of cod war style hostilities, the EU has warned.

Brussels is demanding continued access to British waters as a condition of the trade deal but Boris Johnson has warned the European Commission that Britain will take back control of its waters once Britain leaves the EU.

“We want to avoid any fisheries skirmishes in the Atlantic. We have seen them before we don’t want to see them again,” Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said at a press conference with Charles Michel, the European Council president in Zagreb

Read the full story at The Telegraph

Forbes pins sales of Russia’s top 10 seafood firms at almost $4bn

December 18, 2019 — The combined turnover of Russia’ top 10 seafood companies is RUB 238 billion ($3.80bn), according to a ranking of the top owners and firms in the sector from Forbes.

Forbes last ranked the top companies in the sector in 2017, but focused on volume then. However, for the 2019 edition, turnover is the metric used, with Norebo Holding coming out on top, with almost $1bn in turnover. Forbes also estimates 2 million metric tons of quota has been allocated to the top 10 companies in 2019.

According to Forbes, Vitaly Orlov and his Norebo are the largest player in the sector, with turnover of RUB 58.2bn ($929.45m). Norebo, which is the subject of a bitter legal dispute in the UK’s High Court of Justice, spent about $600m to buy competitors in the North-West and Far East in 2011-2013, according to Forbes.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

2025 global salmon growth forecasts overestimated, new paper argues

December 17, 2019 — Global salmon growth forecasts to 2025 could be overestimated by 6 to 8 percent, according to a new briefing paper from financial think tank Planet Tracker. The culprit is global warming, the paper argues.

In “Salmon Feels the Heat,” researchers analysed reported fish losses attributed to recurring environmental shocks over the past nine years, as reported by the 10 largest publicly listed salmon producers in Norway, Chile, and the United Kingdom. They found that the aggregated production and earnings losses relative to forecast production reached 5 percent for the period between 2010 to 2019.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Brits buying less fish, with sales declining across all UK retail sectors

November 14, 2019 — The overall volume, value, and number of seafood products sold by U.K. grocery chains has decreased over the past year despite there being no change in retail prices, the latest Nielsen ScanTrack data has found.

In total, but not including sales by in discount stores, U.K. shoppers bought GBP 3.24 billion (USD 4.2 billion, EUR 3.8 billion) worth of seafood in the 12 months through 5 October, 2019. This represented a decrease of 1.4 percent year-on-year. The volume of products sold fell 2.2 percent to 305,554 metric tons (MT), while the number of units sold declined by 1.4 percent to 1.14 billion.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Another GBP 1 billion year for UK fishing fleet but profits fall

August 22, 2019 — The turnover achieved by the United Kingdom’s fishing fleet reached GBP 1 billion (USD 1.2 billion, EUR 1.1 billion) for the second consecutive year in 2018, although external factors such as fuel cost, weather, and the political landscape have led to a fall in profits, new figures released by seafood public body Seafish showed.

Seafish’s report, “Economics of the UK Fishing Fleet 2018,” which analyzes the performance of the catching sector and is based on the most recent annual accounts available for fishing vessels, also confirmed that operating costs for U.K. vessels increased by 2 percent last year to GBP 759 million (USD 922.9 million, EUR 832.6 million).

Read the full story at Seafood Source

CleanTreat by Benchmark wins top aquaculture innovation prize at Aqua Nor

August 21, 2019 — United Kingdom-based Benchmark Animal Health took home the 2019 Innovation Award at this year’s Aqua Nor event for its CleanTreat technology, a water purification system for aquaculture.

Well boats, tankers, platforms, and onshore facilities could all potentially utilize the award-winning CleanTreat, which cleanses treatment water after delousing, according to Benchmark Animal Health. The company is showcasing CleanTreat at Aqua Nor, the world’s largest aquaculture technology exhibition, this week in Norway from 20 to 23 August.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Brexit Could Spark The Next Big Fishing War

August 19, 2019 — Britain’s looming exit from the European Union threatens to spark a new fishing war ― one that risks depleting stocks at a moment when warming seas are already stressing aquatic populations.

Newly sworn-in British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has vowed to take his country out of the bloc by the end of October with or without a deal. That raises the possibility of fresh conflicts as European and British trawlers compete for catches in once-shared fisheries and regulatory enforcement falls to the wayside.

A so-called “no-deal Brexit” would pull the United Kingdom out of the EU’s common fisheries policy and could affect “nearly every fishery and species caught commercially in the Northeast Atlantic,” said Michael Harte, a professor and fisheries policy expert at Oregon State University.

Read the full story at The Huffington Post

‘Smart boats’, AI could revolutionise UK fishing, seafood industries

July 22, 2019 — UK environment secretary Michael Gove has today delivered a boost for innovation in the country’s seafood industry with the opening of a new £10 million research and development fund.

The move paves the way for the potential use of artificial intelligence by fishermen and providing a potential double return on investment for the UK economy, the government claimed.

With the UK fishing industry contributing around £1.4 billion to the economy and employing over 24,000 people, there is huge potential for innovation to improve the technology available across the sector.

Unlike existing funding programs, the Seafood Innovation Fund will focus on delivering longer-term, cutting edge innovation.

UK businesses are already developing satellite technology and virtual watch rooms to track vessel movements, and integrating lighting into fishing nets to reduce unwanted catch and improve efficiency. But with the global fishing industry worth nearly £300bn, the government hopes this fund will encourage further technological development and unlock export opportunities around the world for UK technology pioneers.

“This government is investing record amounts in research and development, with this £10m fund further driving UK innovation,” said Gove. “As the UK establishes itself as an independent coastal state, the Seafood Innovation Fund will bring together our world-leading fishing, seafood, and technology industries to deliver more sustainable and productive fisheries for the future.”

Read the full story at Undercurrent News