Saving Seafood

UK seafood industry secures additional GBP 282 million in fishing opportunities

December 22, 2022 — The U.K. fishing industry has secured an additional 140,000 metric tons (MT) of fishing opportunities worth GBP 282 million (USD 341.8 million, EUR 326.4 million) for 2023 through a fisheries accord reached with the European Union.

The U.K. and E.U. reached an agreement on catch levels for 69 fish stocks, including some of the most commercially-valuable stocks to the U.K. fishing industry, such as North Sea nephrops, worth GBP 54 million (USD 65.5 million, EUR 62.5 million); anglerfish, worth GBP 31 million (USD 37.6 million, EUR 35.9 million); and western hake, worth GBP 25 million (USD 30.3 million, EUR 28.9 million).

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

UK Prime Minister Liz Truss resigns after just six weeks in office

October 20, 2022 — Beleaguered U.K. Prime Minister Liz Truss has resigned after just six weeks as the country’s top official.

Truss, 47, secured the position in early September, beating out former U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak to secure leadership of the Conservative Party, which holds a majority in the U.K. Parliament. Truss replaced former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who resigned in July 2022 after a series of scandals.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Report shows Cooke salmon farming supports island life in Orkney and Northern Isles

August 19, 2022 — As one of the largest employers in Orkney and Northern Isles, Cooke Aquaculture Scotland has released an economic impact report showing that the company’s salmon farming operations are having a significant positive social impact on their employees and community viability of the remote islands. The report is titled Cooke Aquaculture Scotland and Orkney: A summary of our impacts for people and communities.

Including bonus and overtime payments during period 2020-21, a striking fact from the report notes that Cooke’s skilled, permanent jobs, are paying 24.8% more than the Orkney average and 8.6% above the average for Scotland.

  • Average salary in Orkney: £28,132
  • Average salary in Scotland: £32,344
  • Average Cooke farm salary in Orkney: £35,112

All the company’s local investment is having real-life impacts in Orkney and Northern Isles:

  • supported local businesses and jobs
  • maintained local populations
  • sustained the uptake of local schools, ferries, shops and cafes; and
  • created ongoing operational spending with local businesses.

“When we first came to Orkney in 2014, as a family-owned company we understood immediately that the jobs we provided mattered – really mattered. They keep people and their families on the islands, attract new people to live here, and help businesses to thrive and schools to stay open,” said Joel Richardson, Vice President of Public Relations for Cooke Aquaculture Scotland. “We have never forgotten that and now we employ 122 people in Orkney, 51 of them on our farms. That includes 25 new jobs created in 2016-2021, all of them helping to keep remote communities viable.”

Orkney salmon farming sites tend to employ 4-5 people each in full-time equivalent (FTE) jobs. For the remote islands especially, a new farm can be transformational in terms of tackling local depopulation. As the only salmon farmer in Orkney to process farmed fish locally, Cooke employs over 41 people at their processing and packing facility in Kirkwall.

Read the full report here

Scotland’s seafood industry fears a return to border chaos

May 19, 2022 — The U.K. government’s intention to introduce new legislation that makes swift changes to the post-Brexit rules surrounding the checking of goods at the Irish border has drawn fire from Scotland’s seafood industry, particularly the farmed salmon sector.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss told the House of Commons on 17 May that the Northern Ireland Protocol, introduced in 2021, had caused unforeseen problems, including “unnecessary bureaucracy” for goods moving between Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Truss said that a proposed Northern Ireland Protocol Bill would mean that British goods destined for sale in Northern Ireland would only have to meet U.K. standards, and not those of the European Union. She said that while the government’s preference is to reach a negotiated outcome with the E.U. and that months of talks had already taken place, the urgency of the situation meant that the government would be prepared to act without reaching such an agreement.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

 

UK restaurants seek relief as Russian whitefish sanctions loom

May 16, 2022 — The U.K.’s restaurant and hospitality industry is asking for financial help as it faces higher taxes and rapidly rising seafood prices due to inflation and impending Russian sanctions.

The U.K. government issued sanctions against Russian goods – including the installation of a 35 percent tariff on whitefish – in March. In April, a government official said the sanctions had been “delayed while we sort some technicalities,” but noted “we are totally committed to them,” per Politico.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

 

UK seafood sales drop on record inflation

April 28, 2022 — Seafood sales in grocery stores in the United Kingdom dropped 8.3 percent for the quarter ending 20 March, primarily due to the impacts of price increases caused by inflation, according to research firm Kantar.

However, retail seafood sales are holding strong versus meat and poultry, and were up 5.6 percent versus the same quarter in 2021.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

 

Inflation dragging down UK grocery, seafood sales

March 30, 2022 — Rising inflation is having an impact on grocery sales in the United Kingdom, which dropped 6.3 percent in the first quarter of 2022, according to new data. Fresh seafood sales are also falling due to higher prices.

Grocery inflation reached 4.2 percent for the 12-week period ending 20 March, its highest level since April 2012, Kantar said in a press release.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

 

UK issues economic sanctions against Russia, fish included in new import tariffs

March 15, 2022 — The United Kingdom has announced a ban on exports of high-end luxury goods to Russia, while also hitting hundreds of key Russian products with new import tariffs that represent a 35 percentage point hike on current rates.

Russian whitefish is one of the products affected by the tariff increases, as is vodka, while the export ban will likely affect luxury vehicles, high-end fashion, and works of art.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

 

Scottish salmon exports return to pre-Brexit, pre-COVID levels

February 15, 2022 — Exports of farm-raised Scottish salmon, the United Kingdom’s most valuable food export, recovered to near-record figures in 2021.

According to official HMRC figures, overseas sales of salmon in 2021 increased by 36 percent year-over-year to GBP 614 million (USD 832.7 million, EUR 732.4 million), just GBP 4 million (USD 5.4 million, EUR 4.8 million) short of 2019’s all-time high.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

British and French talks to settle fishing row end in stalemate

November 5, 2021 — Talks between the British and French governments to settle a post-Brexit fishing row have ended in stalemate as No 10 said it did not believe Paris would follow through on threats to slow down trade.

The Brexit minister, David Frost, spent about 90 minutes meeting France’s Europe minister, Clément Beaune, in Paris on Thursday, but despite smiles for the cameras the two sides remained far apart.

Boris Johnson’s spokesperson said: “We don’t believe the French are planning to move forward with the previous threats they’ve made.” Beaune, however, said France wanted to give dialogue a chance, but “the option for retaliatory measures remains open”.

France and Britain are at odds over the rights of French fishers in the six to 12-mile zone around the UK shore, and Jersey and Guernsey. The dispute threatened to tip into a full-blown trade war until the French president, Emmanuel Macron, called for more talks on Monday, holding back on a threat to slow down British imports coming into France.

Read the full story at The Guardian