COVID

The COVID-19 virus, first discovered in China in early 2020, has been devastating to the seafood industry, but strategies discovered could prove useful for years to come

The seafood companies that survived the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021 will never forget the catastrophic losses experienced and the sacrifices made to survive. There were so many challenges, from the tremendous loss of foodservice sales to the dangerous conditions faced by harvesters and processors and frustrating and financially devastating trade-associated problems.

But now, as the world begins to recover, the industry is quickly gearing up and jumping back into position. Some of the difficulties faced have even led to smart new innovations and approaches.

Buyer behavior has at least temporarily changed, too. Consumers seem to now be more comfortable with preparing seafood in the kitchen, helping to drive retail sales dramatically. More value has been placed on frozen seafood. Will these trends continue?

Keep clicking back here for all of the latest developments.

The temporary workers who pick the meat from soft-shell crabs in the US state of Maryland are having an easier time of it this season compared to last as COVID cases wane and vaccination levels increase.

According to radio station WAMU, the H2-B migrant workers who seasonally staff the state's processing plants saw particularly difficult conditions over the past 18 months due to the pandemic and a shortage of crabs to process.

Seafood processing plants were particularly vulnerable to COVID outbreaks due to close working conditions and the tendency for many of the plant's workers to live and socialize together. But the Old Salty's plant on Hooper Island where Guadalupe Garcia has worked for over two decades did not suffer an outbreak.

"We’re better off this year," Garcia said. "We still need to continue with the health safety measures. But yes, I feel a bit more calm this year."

The amount of seafood consumed in Japan per capita is ticking back up after 2020 saw consumers stay home due to pandemic-related shutdowns, The Japan Times reported.

Japanese seafood consumption fell to 23.8 kilograms (52.4 pounds) in fiscal 2019 from its peak of 40.2 kg 18 years earlier but has increased in 2020 to 23.9 kg for houses with two or more members, the newspaper reported, citing statistics from the country's fisheries agency.

In addition to the pandemic, efforts, including a course on seafood culture from the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology that teaches younger people how to fillet fish, are credited for the trend.

The National Restaurant Association, the US restaurant industry's largest trade association, has provided what it says is a "blueprint for rebuilding" to the National Governors Association, the US Conference of Mayors and the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The four-page letter encourages state and local governments to keep the restaurant industry at the forefront of their conversations about how to accelerate the recovery of their economies.

The blueprint includes 12 steps it says lawmakers can take, including:

"State and local lawmakers have the power to make a real difference in their local industry's recovery," said Mike Whatley, NRA's vice president for state affairs and grassroots advocacy. "Decisive action on this proposal would provide critical tools and opportunities for the hardest hit restaurants struggling to find a new normal. They could help address some of our long-term obligations and the recruitment challenge, which we expect will continue into our busiest months later this summer."

The National Restaurant Association, the US restaurant industry's largest trade association, this week announced that it has taken a majority interest in Winsight Holdings, a conference organizer, research firm and publisher.

Winsight CEO Mike Wood mentioned the restaurant industry's return from the pandemic in a statement about the deal.

"In the face of an historic challenge, our industry has shown resilience, innovation, and teamwork," Wood said. "Restaurants are in the early days of a comeback that promises significant growth for the next five years. Convenience and grocery stores have evolved and redefined what it means to be essential. Thanks to this renewed partnership with the association, Winsight's market defining thought leadership will be available to fuel a rebirth."Winsight will continue to operate as an independent entity, and its senior leadership team will remain in place to run the operation, the statement said.

Among Winsight's holdings are the NRA annual conference as well as several other events. It also owns the research firm Technomic and several publications, including Restaurant Business, CSP, Foodservice Director and Winsight Grocery Business, which the statement said will continue to have independent editorial oversight.

"Together the National Restaurant Association and Winsight will be better positioned to support the dynamic demands of the restaurant and foodservice industry as it continues to rebuild," Tom Bené, NRA's president and CEO, said. "The association's investment in Winsight reinforces its commitment to support and best represent the interests of the entire industry. Winsight's robust engagement and event platforms along with their industry-leading informational resources contribute enormously to the success of every restaurant."

NRA's next annual event is currently scheduled for May 21-24, 2022, in Chicago.

Resident and out-of-state visitors to Alaska can now be vaccinated in its airports, part of a strategy that aims to boost travel to the tourism-dependent US state, the Associated Press reports.

The state's health department said that the vaccinations would take place in airports in areas secured by the Transportation Security Administration in Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau. The use of all three COVID-19 vaccines, including the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, have been authorized.

Additionally, COVID testing will be available at the three airports and at airports in Ketchikan, Sitka, Petersburg, Cordova, Gustavus, Wrangell and Yakutat, the AP reported.

Vietnam hopes to tackle a new COVID-19 outbreak by mass testing risk groups in Ho Chi Minh City and introducing new social distancing measures, reports the BBC.

The Asian nation has had relative success in controlling the virus but cases have been rising over the past weeks.

Over the weekend, officials warned of a new "very dangerous" hybrid variant discovered in the country.

The government says the new variant combines features of the mutations first identified in India and the UK, and is easily transmissible by air.

Overall, the country has registered just over 7,000 infections and 47 deaths, but the latest spike accounts for more than half of the total number of cases.

The US state of Washington is seeking input from the seafood sector on how to spend $40 million in federal COVID-19 relief money, The Daily World reported.

The publication wrote that the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) will be administering the relief funds on behalf of the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. WDFW will hold a public meeting online at 5:30 p.m. on June 8 to gather feedback on how the funds should be used.

"We’re thrilled to be able to begin the process to provide another round of relief funding distributed to support commercial seafood, charter and shellfish aquaculture members here in Washington state," Ron Warren, WDFW's fish policy director said.

The recent COVID-19 outbreak in Guangdong Province has forced the China International Aquaculture Products Expo to be postponed.

The expo was originally scheduled to be held in Zhanjiang, Guangdong Province, on June 18-20. The organizer postponed the event until further notice due to the current COVID situation and measures to combat the national epidemic.

China has reported a surge of coronavirus cases in Guangdong Province, with the fast-spreading Indian variant first found in the city of Guangzhou.

Health authorities have imposed travel restrictions in the region and mass testing is underway.

A Peruvian married couple, Efrain Alva and Keyla Polo, has become the first to craft masks with fish leather using ancient and natural techniques.

Although the pandemic has hit them hard and despite last year's restrictions, they went from producing these masks in their house-workshop in Villa Maria del Triunfo, in Peru, to exporting them to Mexico through their new company Qaya.

The masks are made by hand with skins of mahi-mahi, sea bass, paiche, or tilapia, mainly coming from artisanal fishing and aquaculture waste.

The number of new cases of COVID-19 detected in the US state of Alaska are at their lowest levels seen since July and are trending downward, the Peninsula Clarion reported.

The state, which is the US’ largest source of wild-caught seafood, saw 45 new cases on May 27 and an average of 41 new cases daily earlier that week, the newspaper reported. Those levels were last seen around July 4, 2020.

Joe McLaughlin, the state's epidemiologist, attributed the low case counts recently to increasing vaccination rates.

"We think it's low because so many people are getting vaccinated. These trends are looking good," he said.

The Argentina government has recognized harvesters as a priority group in the ongoing COVID vaccination program, reports the Faro de Vigo website.

Unions had organized a strike last week to protest against the lack of vaccinations for such workers, which was called off over the weekend.

Now the government has pledged to vaccinate those working in the fishing industry "due to the risk presented by [commercial fishing] activity" once the elderly and other vulnerable groups have received the jab.

"Having achieved our objective, our members now form part of the first group of essential workers from the private sector to be considered for priority vaccination," the captains, pilots and fishing skippers union said.

According to the latest public data, just 5.6% of the total population has been vaccinated so far.

Vietnam has widened its coronavirus lockdown measures in the industrialized north to combat its biggest COVID-19 outbreak so far, as authorities reported a daily record in new cases that was more than double the previous high, reports the Bangkok Post.

The health ministry announced 457 new infections on May 25, the biggest jump since the 190 cases seen on May 16, driven by clusters in factory zones in two northern provinces.

Bac Ninh and Bac Giang are the epicenters of the new outbreak that has infected more than 2,800 people since late April, including hundreds of factory workers.

The capital Ho Chi Minh City has shut down restaurants and banned gatherings at public areas. At present, the Vietfish exhibition is scheduled to go ahead in the city on Aug. 25-27.

Singapore too has announced its strictest curbs on gatherings and public activities since a coronavirus lockdown last year, amid a rise in locally acquired infections and with new clusters forming in recent weeks.

The measures, which will be in force until mid-June, include limiting social gatherings to two people, a halt on dining in at restaurants, and for employers to make working from home a default arrangement for staff, reports Reuters.

A food importer in the US island and unincorporated territory of Puerto Rico will not be able to draw from its insurance plan to cover more than $550,000 in losses caused by the coronavirus pandemic, a federal judge has ruled.

Northwestern Selecta Inc., had sued the Guardian Insurance Co. Inc., a US Virgin Islands company, in December, after it denied the importer the ability to draw from its civil authority plan to cover 10,936 boxes of seafood worth $552,861.50 in inventory that expired and became worthless, reports Law360.

Northwestern argued that the incident was a result of a coronavirus-related government lockdown, but US District Court judge Francisco Besosa, in Puerto Rico, ruled on Monday that the lockdown wasn't directed at the goods themselves or their sale. There must be a closer connection, he said.

"While the order had the alleged effect of eventually leading to the seafood product expiring its shelf life, a mere change in outcome is not enough to trigger coverage," Besosa wrote in his opinion."The fact that the two events may be part of the same causal chain does not create enough of a nexus between the civil authority's action and Northwestern Selecta's loss when the plain meaning of the policy's text requires that the civil authority directly affect the insured," the judge said.

China's customs agency stopped seafood imports from four Indian companies on Saturday and suspended their products from entering the country after detecting COVID-19 during the testing of packages, reports CGTN and people.cn, two separate Chinese news services.

The products included one batch of frozen sole tongue, one batch of frozen cuttlefish and two batchs of frozen Penaeus vannamei (shrimp) and the companies identified include Gopal Sea Foods, Charly Fisheries, Orient Frozen Foods LlP and Naga Hanuman Fish Packers.

Import declarations are to be suspended for one week.

No other details have yet been made available.

Seasonal seafood processing workers brought into the US through the H2-B visa program face higher risks of catching COVID-19. Those who work at shellfish processing operations in the US states of Virginia, North Carolina and Maryland are particularly vulnerable, according to an analysis by the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at the University of Maryland that was cited by the publication Delmarva Now.

The journalists conducted interviews with plant workers across all three states and found that the workers often travel cross-country by bus, a practice not regulated by the US Department of Labor. Additionally, no quarantines or pre-employment tests are required by state or federal law, leaving prevention measures largely in the hands of employers, the journalists found.

"If a worker doesn't feel safe, they obviously don't have to come," said Lydia Hock, whose agency, Labormex, has recruited H-2B workers for the seafood industry. "There's millions of people in Mexico that want these opportunities."

The annual AquaNor event held in Trondheim, Norway, will be held live, in-person after all, organizers said.

Organizers were awaiting further guidance on restrictions from the government before making a decision on whether to hold the three-day event in the city beginning on Aug. 24 or hold it virtually. After learning from the government that exhibitions are to be treated in the same manner as shopping centers, the board of the Nor-Fishing Foundation has decided to hold the event both live and online this year.

"Thus, it is with great joy we announce that we can finally meet in Trondheim once again. Rest assured, the exhibition will be planned and executed in accordance with all infection control rules and guidelines, to ensure the safety of all participants," organizers said.

A dozen seafood firms in western region of the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island (PEI) will split CAD 3.4 million ($2.8m) in federal pandemic aid, the CBC reported.

The aid is coming from the CAD 62.5m Canadian Seafood Stabilization Fund.

The six firms to benefit are Royal Star Foods (CAD 1.04m); South Shore Seafoods (CAD 1.1m); Summerside Seafood Supreme (CAD 527,000); Acadian Supreme (CAD 476,000); High Tide Fisheries (CAD 286,000); and Annand Clams (CAD 19,000).

Last week, six seafood firms in the eastern part of the province shared in CAD 386,746 in relief.

Alaska's processors spent $70 million on COVID mitigation measures and other costs in 2020, according to Alaska Public Media.

Citing a survey carried out by McKinley Research Group, the report said that much of this has already been spent, and the costs for this year are expected to go even higher.

McKinley said that the flatfish sector had been hardest hit, with plant closures seen at the start of the year adding to the mitigation costs.

"There were challenges and some plant closures that happened despite all these protocols," the research firm's Dan Lesh said. "A lot of these costs are already baked in, and my understanding is that most of the mitigation measures will be continued," he added.

Despite two-thirds of processors surveyed saying they received COVID relief funds, for most this only covered a quarter of their costs. Not a single processor questioned by McKinley said half of their costs were covered – the highest was 35%.

Chilean salmon producer Invermar issued a statement regarding the situation that occurred on May 9, when 27 workers at its secondary processing plant, located in Castro, in Chiloe Island, were experiencing headaches, muscle pain, stomach pain, diarrhea, and vomiting.

The salmon farmer highlighted that, to date, "all workers are in good health," Mundo Acuicola reports.

Additionally, Invermar also clarified that all those affected were subjected to a PCR test on the same day, which finally tested negative.

"Clinical examinations conducted for two people in the hospital premises did not yield findings associated with a specific cause that could have generated the picture of foodborne illness," the company said.

In the meantime, the Chilean health authority took food and water samples and sent them to a laboratory for microbiological analysis but didn't achieve any conclusive results.

While some parts of the world report progress in reducing infections from the pandemic, reports continue to flood in about other parts that are still suffering significant outbreaks.

Soon after 10 fish sellers tested positive for COVID-19 and one succumbed on Tuesday, the Paradip, India-based Kartikeswar Fish Traders Association announced that it was voluntarily calling for a week-long shutdown of the Baliplot fish market at Atharbanki, from May 12 until 19, The Indian Express reports.

Paradip, a port city on the northeastern coast of India, has just 300 active cases, but it's reporting over 30-40 new cases daily. The fish market serves Odisha and neighboring West Bengal.

Meanwhile, nine stalls at the fish section of a wet market in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, were closed from Saturday to Monday (May 15-17) for cleaning and disinfection after a trader was hospitalized after contracting COVID-19, reports the Star Online, a Malaysian news service.The rest of the market remains open, but some of the 100 others who work there are expected to be tested.

A team of reporters from the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism, a program run out of the University of Maryland, said they found examples of COVID-19 outbreaks among migrant workers at seafood processing plants in the US states of Maryland, Virginia and North Carolina, the Associated Press reports.

Between October 2019 and September 2020, more than 12,000 H-2B workers were authorized to work at seafood companies across the U.S, including 2,232 at 41 companies across the three states, the journalists said they found in their investigative report, published Thursday.

Of the three states, only Virginia provided statewide totals for COVID-19 cases at seafood facilities – 106 cases in three outbreaks.

H-2B seafood workers told the Howard Center about traveling thousands of miles in a packed bus in September, and sleeping in a crowded van with more than a dozen other workers for two nights in January, according to the report. After arriving, workers typically enter group housing provided by their employers — often at a weekly rate the workers pay. Some started work the next day without being tested for the virus.

The US Department of Labor, which runs the H-2B program, did not establish COVID-safety rules for the workers’ cross-country bus travel, according to the article. The three states also failed to provide critical protections, the journalists said they found.

Chile's health authority is awaiting the results of an epidemiology investigation of 27 workers at salmon producer Invermar who were experiencing similar symptoms to determine if they have COVID-19, the radio station Radio Sago reports. However, a foodborne illness is suspected.

The workers, who arrived at different hospitals around the city of Castro, were experiencing headaches, muscle pain, stomach pain, diarrhea and vomiting. All have received medical attention and filled out a foodborne disease investigation form, with stool samples being taken. Some have been sent home pending the results.

Invermar saw 32 positive cases of COVID-19 at its processing plant in Castro in October, causing it to temporarily halt production there, as reported by Undercurrent.

Now that states and cities are beginning to lift restrictions and restaurants are regaining their ability to serve more patrons, complaints are growing about surcharges that some areas have allowed to help pay for losses experienced during the pandemic.

In New York City, where mayor Bill de Blasio gave permission for up to a 10% COVID-related surcharge in October, the gripes are growing particularly loud, the New York Post reports.

Restaurants that add the surcharge are required to warn their customers ahead of time. Many do so with a notice attached to the menu, but diners say it often goes unnoticed until the bill arrives."It's annoying, and the bigger the surcharge, the more annoying it gets," said one diner who asked not to be named. "I’d rather they tell you upfront, because even if it is written on the menu, you can miss it."

The NYC law is supposed to expire 90 days after New York's state of emergency is lifted. However, it remains unclear when that will happen even as dining capacity is set to return to 100% on May 19, the newspaper reports.City officials reportedly said there are currently no plans to take the surcharge off the table.

Leave it to the US city of New Orleans, Louisiana, to combine a popular regional seafood item with the effort to get more people immunized against COVID-19.

WVUE-TV reports that the city has partnered with a local not-for-profit, Go Propeller, to provide free crawfish from The Original Cajun Seafood, a four-location restaurant chain in the city, to individuals who show up at 4035 Washington Avenue on May 13 for a shot of the Moderna or Johnson & Johnson vaccines.

There will also be other food, music and gift card giveaways, according to the article.

India's seafood sector finished its most recent fiscal year (April 1, 2020-March 31, 2021) with exports worth $6.7 billion, a 20% decrease from the previous 12-month period, but it's likely to see a further 10% decrease in the coming fiscal year, Jagdish Fofandi, president of the Seafood Exporters Association of India (SEAI) has predicted.

Fofandi, in a Q&A with India's Financial Express, pointed to a number of different issues, including the difficulty getting exports into China and the sluggish European Union market.

"China has started more stringent checking with the second wave of COVID-19 and this, in turn, leads to delayed clearance and payment," he said. "Unreasonable delay in payment, transshipment and vessel waiting for charges by the shipping lines are adding to the uncertainty. Issues are also there with white spot disease syndrome and COVID presence in packing materials. The entire west coast depends on exports to China and is suffering."

Fofandi also noted the container shortage as a problem for India and other countries, as well as an increase in freight charges.

"For [refrigerated storage] containers to the US, charges have increased from $3,500 in March 2020 to $6,500 at present," he said. "Maersk has now announced that from May 2021 it will be $12,500. Other operators will follow. No industry can survive with these kinds of cost increase."

Almost all of 50 of the UK's biggest employers questioned by the BBC have said they do not plan to bring staff back to the office full-time.

Some 43 of the firms said they would embrace a mix of home and office working, with staff encouraged to work from home two to three days a week.

Four firms said they were keeping the idea of hybrid working, working from home some of the time, under review.

Currently, people who can work from home are still advised to do so. However, that is likely to change in June when the government hopes to end all social distancing restrictions.

This is likely to mean a shift in the country's seafood consumption. For instance, sandwich shops and other lunch outlets in built-up areas are important markets for the smoked salmon and coldwater shrimp sectors, while convenient freezer items like fish fingers have seen sales boom with the vast majority of people working at home.

A fishing cooperative in the US state of New Hampshire may have to pay back a $270,000 COVID-19 economic relief grant after its sales increased in 2020 over 2019, Seacoast Online reported.

The Yankee Fishermen's Cooperative in the city of Seabrook Harbor received the monies under the state's Main Street Relief Fund. During the pandemic, the cooperative had to hire additional workers to help with the surge of fishermen that joined the cooperative as other wholesalers closed.

It wants to use the aid funds to upgrade equipment and pay for new infrastructure. But there are stipulations in the funds that state that no recipient can "be more than made whole", the newspaper said.

"That money was earmarked to help us out with the growth we experienced during the whole COVID pandemic," cooperative president JimTitone said. "The way the whole program was set up from the information we have is that if you exceeded your revenue projections that you proposed for the grant money, you would have to return part of the money. We blew our projections out of the water and actually did better in revenue in 2020 than we did in 2019."

Processors in the US state of Alaska are facing pressures to raise wages ahead of the summer salmon season amid anticipated labor shortages, Tradex Foods wrote.

The Canadian supplier wrote in its weekly "Three-minute Market Insight" publication that efforts to lure in workers to fill the season positions could raise processing costs by as much as 30%.

"If this becomes reality, expect this to set the stage on pricing for fresh and frozen Salmon this year," the company wrote.

However, demand for Alaskan salmon remains high as the pandemic has prompted more consumers to cook and eat at home.and wild-caught fish can command a premium.

"With that said, we anticipate pricing to be at the same level or higher than last year – with the added potential for Alaska seafood marketers to push the value of Alaska-caught seafood even higher," the company said. "One thing is for sure is that pricing is unlikely to drop, fall, or decline, and we will continue to see a bullish market for salmon in 2021."

Some 98% of the at-sea crew members of Kirkland, Washington-based flatfish catcher/processor Fishermen's Finest have been at least partially vaccinated against COVID-19, the company said.

The company, working in partnership with Discovery Health MD, said that 63% are fully vaccinated.

Fishermen's Finest said in a release that it began putting measures in place against the disease on March 3, 2020 and later implemented anti-body testing and a hiring freeze.

The company and Discovery Health added the Abbott ID NOW testing machines in August at its vessels and at its pandemic operations office in Mukilteo and began vaccinating workers in Seattle and Dutch Harbor, Alaska.

"Hotel quarantines are still in place for the partially vaccinated crew but today is a milestone," the company said.

The coast of the US southern state of Mississippi, a major destination for consuming seafood, is starting to see signs of a tourism rebound, television station WLOX reported.

The news outlet spoke to tourists in the city of Biloxi amid National Travel and Tourism Week including to Louisiana resident Thomas Carter who was visiting on vacation.

"Always enjoy some good food," he said. "On the coast, we have the best seafood. Enjoy time with friends, really. Just get a chance to get fresh air and just be out on the beach."

Bill Raymond, Biloxi's historical administrator, remains hopeful for a rebound.

"We had a couple of really rough years there – not just the pandemic but before that was the algae bloom, whatever it was," said Bill Raymond, Biloxi historical administrator. "Now, people are just so excited to be able to go out and enjoy themselves. … Just looking this year over the last five years, I can see that we’re building back to where we’re supposed to be this time of year."

The US Small Business Administration (SBA) will formally open its application period to US restaurants and other food establishments hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic on May 3 at noon, Eastern Standard Time.

The "Restaurant Revitalization Fund" is a $28.6 billion put of funds created by the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, which was signed into law in March. The fund will compensate restaurants with COVID-19 losses up to $10m per business and $5m per location with funds to be used by March 11, 2023, the SBA said.

"Recognizing the great urgency to help restaurants keep their doors open – and with a clear mandate from Congress – the SBA worked at a breakneck speed and is excited to launch this program," said Patrick Kelley, the SBA's associate administrator for its Office of Capital Access said. "From day one, we engaged with diverse stakeholders in the food industry community to make sure we built and delivered the program equitably, quickly, and efficiently."

The regional government of Madeira — an autonomous region of Portugal — has announced that events can now take place on the island with 50% seating capacity; good news for Aquaculture Europe 2021.

The European Aquaculture Society (EAS) board has, therefore, confirmed that the event is on track to take place in Madeira on Oct. 4-7.

It has also filed a formal request to the Madeiran Health Authority, adding, "we strongly believe that whatever the final format and capacity, the event can go ahead in Funchal".

European social partners in the fisheries sector, the European Transport Workers’ Federation, and Europeche have called on the European Commission to support member states in developing a specific COVID-19 vaccination protocol for fishers, "adapting and prioritizing their access to the vaccine".

"Considering their recognition as essential workers and the particularities of the fishers’ workplaces and working patterns, the social partners have put forward practical guidelines that can help accelerate the process."

Despite being a cornerstone of seafood supply and food security in Europe, fishers haven't been prioritized in vaccination programs, exposing them to growing infection rates on fishing vessels and preventing the necessary crew changes around the world, said Europeche.

"Unlike many other workers, fishers are limited in what they can do to avoid infection in their workplaces. The work of fishing crews takes place in confined spaces, where it is impossible to maintain physical distance and with the high risk of coronavirus transmissibility."

"Additionally, the often long periods of stay on board ships make it challenging to immunize them on the pre-established schedule for the general population. Europêche and ETF believe that this unique situation requires a special approach to vaccinations and call on member states to develop new protocols at once."

New York governor Andrew Cuomo on Thursday announced that the state has begun distributing some $6.7 million in aid to its "seafood, marine commercial and for-hire fishing industries after excessive business losses due to the COVID-19 pandemic", and would be providing another $5.7m in coming months.

The combined $12.4m in funds are coming from New York's Marine Fisheries Relief Program but paid for by the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act, passed by the US Congress in early 2020, and also the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021.

"From seafood markets to commercial harvesters and charter boat captains, New York's marine fishing industries experienced severe losses during the pandemic and continue to endure longstanding impacts today," Cuomo said in a press release. "These awards will provide necessary relief to an industry that adjusted drastically to maintain safe and viable seafood distribution throughout New York while continuing to support local businesses and sustain jobs in our coastal communities."

The awards are to be based on the reports of economic loss experienced in 2020 compared to the previous five years, the press release explained. The state's allocation was determined by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) based on the total average annual revenues from New York's fishery-related businesses.

New York's Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) received nearly 300 applications from New York individuals and businesses during the Dec. 1 to Dec. 31, 2020, application period. More than half were from commercial harvesters that experienced losses up to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Seafood shipping businesses and the aquaculture industry represented a smaller portion of applications, but in some circumstances their losses exceeded multiple millions of dollars. Additionally, New York's for-hire fishing industry experienced significant economic losses ranging from thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Award recipients will receive a letter accompanied by a check via mail to the address provided on their application.

"New York's marine fishing and seafood industries are not only vital to the state's economic health, they are a major asset and catalysts for tourism, recreation and maritime opportunities," DEC commissioner Basil Seggos is quoted as saying. "DEC remains steadfast in our commitment to supporting these industries and this relief aid is just one of the many steps ahead in our efforts to come back stronger than ever in our recovery from COVID-19."

As an increasing number of Americans receive their COVID-19 vaccinations, more of them are returning to do their shopping at grocery stores in person, Supermarket News reports, based on a new survey from Inmar Intelligence.

Once fully vaccinated, 27% of consumers said they plan to do most of their grocery shopping at stores, while 38% will do so both in-store and online, the Winston-Salem, North Carolina-based survey company said.Already, 33% of Americans said they are buying their groceries in stores, while 48% remain hybrid shoppers, making both brick-and-mortar and online purchases.

But the numbers look to swing back to more in-store purchases, based on other responses.

"As vaccines become more widely available, it is natural that today's shoppers choose to head back into the store as a part of their grocery shopping routine," Spencer Baird, executive vice president at Inmar and president of its MarTech division, said in a statement. "Most consumers are familiar with an in-store shopping experience — browsing and discovering new products — and there are some products that shoppers prefer to buy in-store."

And even more interesting, more than half of consumers — 51% — said they still plan to stockpile groceries throughout the year. Some 38% of those polled said they would stock up on toilet paper, cleaning supplies, hand sanitizer, food and alcohol.

Americans also are eager to return to dining out, the survey found. As many as 85% of respondents said they plan to eat out more often, including indoor or outdoor dining, Inmar reported.Importantly, the article does not say how many were surveyed or when the survey was conducted.

Through the morning of April 27, nearly 43% of the US population had received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose, with 29% fully immunized, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

On April 23, Ecuador implemented a nighttime curfew and other mobility restrictions as a spike in coronavirus cases again overwhelms hospitals in the Andean country, which in 2020 experienced one of the region's worst COVID-19 outbreaks, Reuters reported. The measures will last for 28 days.

The health crisis, however, is not expected to have a major impact on shrimp production and processing in the country, according to Gabriel Luna.

Luna, a shrimp farmer, and owner of GLuna Shrimp, will discuss shrimp market trends in the country during a webinar organized by the Camara Nacional de Acuacultura. The event will take place (in Spanish) online on April 28 at 18:00 Guayaquil time.

Suffolk County, which includes the eastern side of New York's Long Island, has launched a survey aimed at gauging the pandemic's impact on the local commercial fishing industry.

According to the Long Island Business News, the study aims to develop a "real-time snapshot of the Long Island commercial fishing industry", thought to have been hit hard by the pandemic.

"When we had to shut down last spring to beat back COVID-19 and save lives, the commercial fishing industry, like so many others, suffered," Suffolk County executive Steve Bellone said in a statement. "This needs assessment survey will identify key points and allow us to provide the resources needed to ensure this industry thrives."

New research analyzing the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and policy responses on the availability and price of aquatic foods across Asian and African value chains throughout 2020 has stated that support for value chain actors is crucial.

Published in Marine Policy, the study showed that across Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Egypt and Nigeria, COVID-19 and responsive policy measures severely disrupted aquatic food value chains, particularly via impacts on transport and logistics.

Short-term impacts affected the supply of aquatic food and production inputs, but impacts on demand were longer lasting. A drop in retail price and rising production costs resulted in substantially lower incomes and employment for businesses and workers throughout the value chain in 2020, as compared to 2019. These impacts have exacerbated pre-existing inequalities, and formal assistance has been limited.

Capture fisheries and aquaculture are a vital source of employment, income, and nutritious food for millions of people in Africa and Asia. The research suggests that adaptation efforts and coping strategies of households and businesses are necessary for their short-term survival, but may also undermine well-being and longer-term resilience. To protect livelihoods and ensure the continued supply of aquatic foods during shocks, the authors recommend governments designate workers throughout aquatic food value chains as essential workers; accord value chain actors the same priority as producers when allocating resources; and focus on small and medium enterprises, farms, and fishers, as these are more labor-intensive, and account for the majority of aquatic food produced and traded.

The study's lead author, Ben Belton — WorldFish global lead for social and economic inclusion and associate professor at Michigan State University — said:

"The key challenge is to take COVID-19 as an opportunity to ‘build forward better’. The crisis has helped to expose weaknesses and bottlenecks in global and national food systems and illustrated vividly which policy responses worked and which had unintended negative consequences. As such, there are many valuable lessons to learn for the future. We need to take the opportunity to analyze what happened and why."

"Researchers, policymakers and business can use the current responses to build resilience to future shocks. The research suggests renewed commitments to small- and medium-scale actors in aquatic food systems along the value chain can aid economic recovery and tackle hunger in low-income nations. Keeping value chains functioning smoothly is essential to prevent shocks to food systems."

The Bangladesh aquaculture sector saw tremendous disruption in its production during the pandemic, according to a study published Friday, as reported by the Financial Express.

As many as 64% of the aquaculture farmers in the country saw their supply of fish feed, fish-related goods and shrimp sales disrupted due to restrictions on vehicle movement. Cultivators were forced to sell their fish at lower prices, though the cost of feed and shrimp seed increased. Harvests were delayed.

The study, titled "Opportunities in the aquaculture sector in Bangladesh", was conducted jointly by LightCastle Partners and Larive International between January and March of 2021. It included 50 participants.

Bangladeshi fish farmers produced 4.38 million tons of seafood during the 2018-19 fiscal year, according to the study. It projected the per capita fish consumption of Bangladesh to grow to 23.1 kilograms per day by 2025 from 21.8 kgs per day in 2019, facilitated by a projected growth in fish production to 5.67m metric tons by 2024, signifying an annual production growth of 5.2%.

The study suggested providing farmers with bank loans and increasing government incentives, while providing better training, working to maintain the supply chain, ensuring smooth market management and helping to keep feed prices down. It identified a lack of quality seeds, poor animal health, low availability of high-quality feed, post-harvest loss and less-developed cold chain facilities as major bottlenecks of the sector.

The study also suggested there are opportunities for stakeholders in the aquaculture sector, ranging from facilitating training programs to setting quality and regulatory protocols, expanding the use of improved technology, and providing technical assistance in identifying and preventing diseases.

The city of Dilingham, Alaska, a major center for salmon processing for the important Bristol Bay sockeye fishery, has determined that vaccinated seafood workers won't have to quarantine for two weeks this year or need to provide negative test results.

According to the Homer News, the city made the determination in a recent emergency ruling. It applies to both vaccinated workers and those who have recovered from a previous COVID-19 infection.

"Proof of fully vaccinated status, or recovery from previous COVID infections, such as a note from your doctor or medical official, must be available for inspection upon arrival or upon request," according to the new rule.

The US states of Alaska and Florida have sued the federal government in an attempt to overturn restrictions that are blocking sailings from large cruise ships.

According to the Anchorage Daily News, on April 20, Alaska filed a motion to intervene in Florida's suit which claims that mitigation measures the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention imposed on the cruise industry are arbitrary, capricious and violate federal law.

However, even if the US restrictions are overturned, cruises to Alaska face another legal hurdle as the Passenger Vessel Services Act requires ships to make a stop in Canada where cruise travel has been banned until February of 2022.

"The state acknowledges that there is an additional hurdle for Alaska that does not exist in Florida — Canada shutting down its ports for the summer of 2021. But we need to fight this on all fronts," Alaska assistant attorney general Maria Bahr said. "We continue to work with our congressional delegation and others to address the issue with closed borders into Canada and the Passenger Service Vessel Act."

A seafood restaurant in the US state of Florida has gone all Jetsons as it deals with staffing shortages caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, People Magazine reports.

Mr. Q Crab House, a Cajun-style eatery in Hollywood, Florida, added three robots to the staff roughly two weeks ago at a cost of $10,000 each, according to the story, which was first reported by the South Florida Sun Sentinel.

The restaurant sees heavy customer traffic over the weekends when customers flow over from the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino across the street.

One robot, named Peanut, acts as a host, greeting guests as they enter and showing them to their tables, according to the article. A human server takes the order but another robot brings the food to the table. One robot can carry an entire table's worth of food from the kitchen, whereas a human would require making three or four trips, according to the article.The robots also entertain, singing "Merry Christmas" and "Happy Birthday" in four languages.But the robots can be "a little annoying sometimes," general manager Shaheen Maleki reportedly said.

"Once Peanut started freaking out when its battery was low. It was saying to us, ‘I have to go back! I have to return myself!’ and we couldn't find the volume button," he recounted.

US senator Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat, is leading a nine-lawmaker drive intended to convince the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to buy more from West Coast seafood harvesters and processors in order to help them deal better with the expenses and losses associated with the coronavirus pandemic.

"We appreciate USDA's efforts to date to expand its long-standing purchasing programs to include seafood products from various US regions," the lawmakers said in a letter sent April 12 to agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack. "However, thus far, few of the procurements have focused on the purchasing of seafood products from the West Coast."

The letter requested USDA include, in its commodity purchasing programs, seafood from the Pacific Northwest and West Coast that is "currently being produced in large volumes, easily accessible, and easily transportable for immediate distribution to food assistance programs".

The letter presented a number of statistics to make its case. On average, commercial fishermen on the West Coast deliver more than $500 million in ex-vessel value per annum, accounting for 13% of the value of total US seafood production, it noted. A quarter of all American seafood processing and wholesale jobs are located in Washington, Oregon, and California, representing the largest employment opportunity among all seafood-producing regions in the US, it said "During these unprecedented times, USDA's procurement programs are critical to filling an incredibly important void – one that ensures that food production essential workers stay employed, supply chains keep operating, and America's nutritional needs are met," the letter stated.

The letter is also signed by senators Ron Wyden (Oregon), Alex Padilla (California), and Patty Murray (Washington), as well as representatives Peter DeFazio (Oregon), Earl Blumenauer (Oregon), Kurt Schrader (Oregon), Suzanne Bonamici (Oregon), Jared Huffman (California) and Derek Kilmer (Washington).

Young UK smoked salmon brand The Pished Fish saw 2020's coronavirus pandemic coincide with what, on the face of it, was a bitter pill to swallow: its major retail partner securing a new supplier which meant it was surplus to requirements.

Said partner had begun stocking the Brighton-based firm's alcohol-infused salmon products around a year after it was founded, in 2017. Business with this retailer grew until it took up all of Pished Fish's attentions, before the unfortunate double-whammy of COVID-19 and a tough retail move.

"It would be a lie to suggest that there wasn't a period of deep concern as overnight order books were emptier; however even at the business's lowest ebb the overriding emotion was one of relief."

Founder James Eagle and his team returned the business to its roots.

"The team recognized that stuck-at-home customers were seeking out indulgent ‘comfort food’ like never before which fed the need for a spruced up online site, the purchase of a refrigerated van and meaningful monies being directed to online advertising, which enabled The Pished Fish team to rapidly build a sizeable consumer database whilst simultaneously expanding its salmon experience to include pate, canape collections and alluring seasonal bundles."

Today, the firm said, its monthly turnover is higher than it's ever been, leading to new staff hires and new product development, including fish pies and potted salmon items.

Aquaculture America 2021 will occur as a live event, Aug. 11-14, 2021, in San Antonio, Texas, as scheduled, the World Aquaculture Society (WAS) reports.

The event was originally scheduled for February but WAS announced in October 2020 that it was postponing due to concerns about the COVID pandemic. The venue will be at the San Antonio Marriott Rivercenter and has space reserved for nearly 200 exhibit booths.

The announcement shines as a first, rare glimpse of optimism in relation to the scheduling of in-person seafood conferences. As recently as April 6, Diversified Communications canceled its large annual seafood show in Boston, Massachussetts, which had been planned for July 11, 2021.

"We have considered the COVID-19 situation and ramifications and we feel that with the vaccination progress and the improvements of the overall pandemic, we can go forward with Aquaculture America 2021," WAS says on its website, adding that it will announce safety measures later.

The previous event was held in Hawaii in February 2020. It drew several hundred attendees.

WAS, which works with the US Aquaculture Society, National Aquaculture Association and the Aquaculture Suppliers Association to produce the event, is now inviting abstracts for presentations. Several other groups will organize their annual meetings around the event, including the Aquacultural Engineering Society and US Trout Farmers Association, WAS said.

The chief operating officer (COO) of the United States Seafood Company is apologizing to members of the community of Unalaska, Alaska, after crew members aboard the vessel Seafreeze America broke quarantine rules to visit a local bar and ended up spreading COVID-19.

According to Alaska Public Media, Dave Wood, the company's COO apologized on the company's behalf.

"We are extremely sorry about the events that occurred," he said. "We regret that these individuals made terrible decisions, put a lot of people at risk and harmed a lot of people. We are as outraged as you are."

Fishermen from the vessel reportedly visited the Norwegian Rat Saloon on April 10 despite the company's quarantine plan.

"There was a vessel that came into town on Saturday, and on that vessel, there's been 26 confirmed individuals who tested positive for COVID-19 and then two additional presumed positive for COVID-19," Unalaska city manager Erin Reinders said previously. "There was a breach in the company's isolation plan with some of those positive individuals, and due to that breach, that did cause a community exposure."

The crew members who broke the rules could face fines of $500.

The port of Los Angeles, California — the US’ biggest container port — processed 957,599 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in March for a massive 113% jump from the volume handled in March 2020, when global trade was slowed to a crawl at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the commercial vessel gCaptain reports.

A total of 95 cargo vessels arrived last month, including four extra loaders.

It was the strongest performance in the port's 114-year history, the biggest monthly year-over-year increase, and it capped the port's busiest first quarter, the publication reports.

Year-to-date, overall cargo volumes through the port are up 44%.

"As more Americans get vaccinated, businesses reopen and the economy strengthens, consumers continue to purchase goods at a dizzying pace," said Port of Los Angeles executive director Gene Seroka in a video-recorded presentation. "I applaud our longshore labor force, truckers, terminal operators and supply chain partners who are working day and night to process the additional cargo."Seroka said the port has made progress at reducing the number of container vessels waiting offshore.

Empty containers surged 219% compared to March 2020 reaching 344,585 TEUs, reflecting heavy demand for empty for shipping containers Asia.

The reopening of what used to be the Pinneys of Scotland site, which was purchased by Russia-based businessman Keshav Bhaghat in 2019, is still on hold due to the pandemic, reports the Daily Record.

The site, which had been owned by Young's Seafood, was closed in 2018 after Young's relocated its salmon processing business from Annan to Grimsby, resulting in the loss of more than 400 jobs.

Bhaghat — who operates seafood supplier Atlantis Holdings — then bought the site for £9 million.

However, the pandemic has resulted in all plans being put on hold, with no funds as yet paid out. Two years after the takeover, the factory is still closed, although government vehicle Scottish Enterprise claims the interior has been developed extensively for new operations.

The Scottish government, Scottish Enterprise and Dumfries and Galloway Council are all reportedly in close contact with Bhaghat, according to the Daiy Record.

A vaccine clinic in the US fishing port of New Bedford, Massachusetts, vaccinated over 1,100 people, mainly fishermen, on Saturday, April 10, South Coast Today reported.

The Greater New Bedford Community Health Center is focused on increasing vaccinations among the fishing sector, which numbers around 6,200.

"It was a better turnout than I thought it was going to be," health center chief operating officer and chief nursing officer Noelle Kohles said. "I was really impressed to see the engagement between all of the fishery leadership in supporting this".

The fishers received the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

"A lot of them do go out to sea, so we weren't sure how many of the workers would actually be able to be here today, and how many we would have to schedule another day for," she said.

Crew members aboard the United States Seafoods vessel Seafreeze Arizona who reportedly violated quarantine plans and visited a bar in Unalaska, Alaska, have prompted fears of further disease spread among the local population.

According to KTOO, fishermen from the vessel reportedly visited the Norwegian Rat Saloon on April 10 despite the company's quarantine plan.

"There was a vessel that came into town on Saturday, and on that vessel, there's been 26 confirmed individuals who tested positive for COVID-19 and then two additional presumed positive for COVID-19," Unalaska city manager Erin Reinders said. "There was a breach in the company's isolation plan with some of those positive individuals, and due to that breach, that did cause a community exposure."

The crew members who broke the rules could face fines of $500.

The COVID-19 pandemic will force the US seafood industry to wait at least another year until the next "Symphony of Seafood", an annual competition that shows off the sector's innovations.

The event's organizer, the Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation (AFDF), said in a press release that two main factors drove its decision: the recent cancelation of Seafood Expo North America, more commonly known as the Boston seafood show, and the industry's recent inability to roll out new value-added products during the pandemic.

AFDF said that it plans to issue a call for new products in August for the next in-person Boston show, which has been slated for March 2022.

Luke's Lobster, the US seafood processor and restaurant chain based in Portland, Maine, jumped into taking online orders in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic as an emergency step to preserve the business. But Luke Holden, one of the owners, told Fortune Magazine recently that ‘e-commerce is here to stay".

The 12-year-old company was in "Titanic mode" last April, with all of its 26 domestic "shacks" shutting down, employees furloughed and summer purchasing commitments to harvesters fast-approach, the article says.

The online sales effort, which was previously thought of as a long-term plan, was spearheaded by two senior employees who learned e-commerce on the fly and established an online marketplace in a week.

By the end of April 2020, the company had shipped $86,506 worth of lobster, crab and other crustacean-related products across the country. But it continued to grow. Sales in December were $647,755, according to the article.

"We had the entire corporate team and everybody else who had not been furloughed on the floor, sweating, running around, trying to get orders packed on that day, knowing that the UPS truck was going to show up at 3 p.m.," Ben Conniff, another co-owner, recalled.

The article provides many of the logistics behind the Luke's Lobster operation, including its approach to handling online orders. It relies on the platform Shopify. Packers secure the temperature of the frozen lobster with dry ice, and UPS comes at 3 p.m. every afternoon.

"E-commerce was always sort of on the back burner—we’ll do it eventually, maybe 2021, 2022," said marketing director Meaghan Dillon. "And then overnight, Luke said, ‘We’re doing it next week.'"

"We didn't have any experience with direct-to-consumer platforms, so I was literally just creating a Google sheet of all the different options and comparing everything from things I had read about customer service to payment processing fees to how they could accommodate our unique tax situation, shipping from Maine to a lot of different states," said Lauren Gibson, vice president of e-commerce and retail. "Overwhelmingly we heard Shopify was really wonderful and would be especially great for a team that had very little experience with managing and updating a platform like this."

Meanwhile, 17 of the Luke's Lobster shacks have reopened.

A New York appellate court has at least temporarily reinstated an 11 p.m. COVID-related curfew for some 90 restaurants and bars in the western part of the US state, the NBC television affiliate Channel 2 WGRZ reports.

The businesses had won a lower-level court decision in late February against the curfew after making the argument that there was no evidence to show the extra hours increased the chance of infection, according to the report. But the state's five-judge panel has stayed the decision and reinstated Democratic governor Mario Cuomo's curfew until May 8, giving both sides more time to make their case.

Cuomo recently extended the date of his 11 p.m. curfew until May 6, which has led to some political sparring in the statehouse.

New York Senate minority leader Rob Ortt and fellow Republicans on Thursday called on the rule to be lifted, saying it is unscientific and killing restaurants. But Democratic state senator Sean Ryan said he believes COVID restrictions are going to stay in place at least until the Fourth of July.

"As we get more and more people vaccinated, we can start lifting those restrictions. But right now Western New York is getting a bad case of spring fever, and it's showing in our COVID rates and our hospitalization rates," he said.

French tuna fishing firm Sapmer is asking the country's government to put sailors on the priority list for populations to be vaccinated after a spate of recent COVID-19 cases at sea that saw two of its workers killed.

According to Le Telegramme, the two deaths occurred recently on the vessel Belle Isle. Another 50 crew were found to be asymptomatic for COVID-19 and were quarantined.

Even after several months of the French vaccine campaign, "the sailors have no visibility on their position in vaccine priority, and this in spite of their permanent exposure to the risks of contamination", the newspaper quoted the company as saying.

Also in March, 10 Sapmer crew members aboard a longline vessel near the territory of Reunion tested positive for COVID-19. One remains in intensive care, the newspaper reported.

E. Gagnon et Fils, a seafood processor and exporter in the Canadian province of Quebec, is scrambling for staff after four temporary foreign workers were found to be infected with COVID-19 and 40 other employees who traveled with them from Montreal were required to isolate themselves, the CBC reports.

The workers had arrived in Montreal two weeks before the snow crab season in crab fishing area 12, off the coasts of New Brunswick and Quebec, was set to open on April 2, so they could be quarantined for 14 days. They had tested negative when boarding their flights to Canada and again after they arrived, but two of the workers tested positive during their quarantine.

Another test found two more employees to be positive.

Bill Sheehan, a vice president at the company, which is in the coastal town of Sainte-Therese-de-Gaspe, said he was told by the public health authorities that additional tests weren't necessary, but he's glad he had them done. It would have been a "real mess" otherwise, he said.

E. Gagnon et Fils, which translates to E. Gagnon and Sons, counts on the area's short, two-month snow crab season to bring in half its annual income.

The company was able to bring on some workers from a nearby lobster fishery that have yet to begin their season, but more are needed, Sheehan said.

Two Cape Breton, Nova Scotia-based processors are to receive CAD 536,000 ($427,000) in COVID relief funds, reports the Cape Breton Post.

Lobsters ‘R’ Us Seafood is getting a repayable sum of CAD 450,000 which will be used to "expand its facility, increase cold-water storage capacity and add ice-making equipment". It will also receive CAD 50,000 to upgrade its facility to ensure it meets pandemic health and safety requirements, which it doesn't have to pay back.

Meanwhile, Louisbourg-based A&L Seafoods is being handed CAD 36,753 to purchase personal protective equipment and meet COVID-19 requirements, the report added.

The payments are part of the Canadian Seafood Stabilization fund aimed at helping the processing industry survive the COVID-19 pandemic.

The focus of the funding is "ensuring employees are healthy, maintaining strong and healthy safety measures, [and] at the same time investing in capacity to process, store and package and distribute healthy and quality products that come off our coastal areas", said Cape Breton-Canso member of parliament Mike Kelloway.

New research led by scientists at the University of Maine suggests that local seafood supply chains, dubbed by researchers as "alternative seafood networks" were strengthened in the past year by changed consumer habits during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Maine's Bangor Daily News reported that the alternative networks, which often involve sourcing from local vessels, saw "unprecedented" growth as traditional supply chains were disrupted as restaurants shut down last year amid lockdowns.

"This research shows that alternative seafood networks help to make seafood supply chains more diverse," Joshua Stoll, assistant professor of marine policy at the University of Maine School of Marine Sciences, said. "In doing so, it brings attention to the critical role that local seafood systems play in supporting resilient fisheries in times of crisis."

US grocer Safeway and other groups teamed up to vaccinate hundreds of fishermen in Alaska's major port of Dutch Harbor earlier this week in an effort targeted at the industry.

The grocer, along with the City of Unalaska, the Iliuliuk Family & Health Services Clinic, Discovery Health and several fishing companies were slated to vaccinate around 500 fishermen on March 31 and April 1.

"We recognized that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was a good fit for fishermen, due to the logistical complications for them to get vaccinated. We are happy to allocate these doses to ensure that these essential workers get the vaccine and can continue their fishing operations," Safeway said in the release.

The Toyosu fish market, nicknamed the "kitchen of Japan", is struggling after a second government-imposed state of emergency caused many restaurants to close temporarily, giving the seafood arriving at the market nowhere to go. Meanwhile, Toyosu's fish traders battle on, hoping for an end to the pandemic, reports The Nippon.

The relocation of the former Tsukiji market to the brand-new Toyosu facility was a mammoth undertaking for the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, and while brisk business was envisaged, the volume of produce handled by the market has continued to decline.

Thirty years ago, nearly 800,000 metric tons of seafood passed through Tsukiji each year, but by 2019 that figure had more than halved to around 350,000t. In 2020, the volume fell still more, to just 330,000t.

Suzuki Tsutomu, the proprietor of the tuna wholesaler Suzutomi, also operates a chain of sushi restaurants in Tsukiji and Ginza. In an interview in March, he noted that in the state of emergency he buys far fewer tuna at the auction, as his restaurants are forced to operate on reduced hours.

"This is no time to be dispirited. If anything, I take my job even more seriously," said Suzuki.

According to TV news reports, Ginza and Shibuya are seeing more foot traffic now than they did in spring 2020.

"Perhaps because people are working from home more, far fewer customers frequent sushi restaurants in places like Ginza," said Suzuki. "I have to make sure that I am more discerning than ever about quality and freshness for the sake of those customers who do come."

Commercial fishermen and seafood processing workers in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the US’ largest scallop landing spot and most valuable seafood port, will be able to get the COVID jab thanks to a new vaccination facility set up in the city.

The New Bedford Waterfront Vaccination Center at 14 Hervey Tichon Avenue was converted from a former dewatering facility and will open its doors on April 10, the SouthCoastToday, a local newspaper, reported.

The ribbon-cutting, which took place on Wednesday, March 31, was attended by New Bedford mayor Jon Mitchell as well as US senator Elizabeth Warren and US representative Bill Keating among other dignitaries.

"This center is about protecting our essential workers. It is about treating our fishermen with respect," Warren said.

Mitchell added: "We want to make sure that the folks who work here get the protection they need."

As of 2018, 6,200 people worked in the New Bedford commercial fishing and processing industries, according to the newspaper.

The return of large bluefin tuna to waters off the coast of Wales, UK, presents a "massive opportunity" for science and tourism, fishing groups have said, as reported by the BBC.

The fish disappeared from UK waters during the 1960s due to commercial overfishing and a changing climate. But they are returning, and fishing groups want to catch, tag and release a limited number.

The Welsh government said it was part of UK-level discussions on the issue.

Fishing groups have warned Wales risks "missing the boat" if action is not taken quickly, but the Wildlife Trusts have urged caution.

A tuna fishery would attract anglers from around the world, presenting a "massive opportunity" for a coastal region that's had a terrible year with COVID-19's impact on tourism, advocates propose.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), part of the US’ National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, announced Tuesday that it was giving skimmer trawl vessels that are 40 feet and greater in length until Aug. 1, 2021 to begin using turtle excluder devices (TEDs). The original compliance deadline was April 1.

NMFS explained that the extra four months was needed to complete training workshops on how to install and use TEDS in nets. If not done properly, turtles will not be able to escape as intended.

"Safety and travel restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic have limited our Gear Monitoring Team's ability to complete the in-person workshops and training sessions on the final rule that we had anticipated and communicated to the public," NMFS said.

NMFS said its outreach strategy will use social media, targeted virtual meetings and dockside workshops, instructional videos, digital media, and the establishment of a role-based social media and email account.

NMFS said it's also considering taking additional action to protect sea turtles in the skimmer trawl fisheries, including an expansion of the requirement to include vessels less than 40 feet in length.

The US National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has allocated $255 million in COVID-19 relief that it plans to distribute to states and territories, which will then pass it on to the seafood sector.

NOAA said in a press release that the latest batch of money is coming from the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2021. It follows a separate round of relief authorized last year under section 12005 of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act).

"Our priority is to award these funds as quickly as possible using existing processes established under the CARES Act," Paul Doremus, NOAA Fisheries’ acting assistant administrator said. "As a next step, we will use these allocations to provide additional funds to our partners—the interstate marine fisheries commissions, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands—to disburse funds to address direct or indirect fishery-related losses as well as subsistence, cultural, or ceremonial impacts related to COVID-19."

The massive container ship Ever Given that had blocked marine traffic through Egypt's Suez Canal has been freed, CNN reported.

Salvage workers managed to refloat the ship at 9 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, thanks to extensive efforts from tugboats. The blockage further disrupted global shipping, including seafood trade flows, at a time when it's already under strain due to ramifications from the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 400-meter (1,312-foot) vessel was freed by the salvage company Boskalis, CNN reported.

Centro Comuntario de Trabajadores (CCT), a not-for-profit organization that works with the immigrant community in the US scallop capital of New Bedford, Massachusetts, and surrounding areas, is working to help seafood processing company employees get their COVID-19 vaccines, reports the South Coast Today.

Fishing industry workers, many of whom go out to sea for lengthy stretches and have ever-changing schedules, became eligible for the vaccine in Massachusetts on Monday. The group was moved ahead following a meeting in December by CCT representatives with health officials and staff from US senator Elizabeth Warren's office.

CCT executive director Adrian Ventura told the newspaper that the group's goal is to register 25 seafood processing workers per day.

About 250 families with employees in New Bedford's seafood processing industry had at least one member who contracted COVID-19 — be it a parent, child, or every member of the family, he said.According to a report from the New Bedford Port Authority, more than 6,200 people work directly in the harbor's commercial fishing and seafood processing industry.

Processing workers exposed themselves and risked their lives to put food on Americans’ tables, so for them to not be included until recently was bothersome, Ventura is quoted as saying.

But signing up for the vaccine online has not been simple. The state's vaccine website crashed last month and with high demand and limited supply, slots fill up very quickly.

Getting members of fishing crews in for vaccines can also be particularly challenging, the article suggested.

"I think, like many portions of the population, there is some hesitancy," Heidi Sulman, vice president of health policy and research at Fishing Partnership, said. "Fishermen… they’re an industry that has dealt with many hardships and they’re used to kind of dealing with it on their own. There are a lot of regulations that are not helpful at all to fishermen, and so I would not be surprised if some of them are a little reluctant to trust the government."

"But honestly, the primary reasons fisherman may be reluctant or slower to get vaccinated are logistical," she said.Two of the three vaccines currently available require two doses, which means two trips away from the boats to go to the pharmacy or the closest mass vaccination site."Guys here in New Bedford may be out for 10 days," she said. "They don't always know their schedule. If they say no to a captain, they may not go out again."

The US state of Oregon has detected eight new cases of COVID-19 at a processing facility run by Pacific Seafood Group in the city of Warrenton, the Daily Astorian reported.

The cases at the plant, which has seen previous large-scale outbreaks, had their most recent onset on March 14, according to the Oregon Health Authority.

"It's been concerning to see the rising cases of COVID-19 in our community and unfortunately eight of our workers were impacted," Brandie Hogg, Pacific's vice president of human resources said in a statement. "Thankfully, five have already recovered and returned to work while others recuperate at home."

The company plans to launch an on-site vaccination clinic for its workers soon, Pacific said.

Following the relative optimism of the 2020 summer months, both business and consumer confidence dropped from October to December in the UK, reports Seafish in its latest coronavirus impacts summary.

From September onward, restrictions continued to increase across the UK and in important trading nations on the continent in response to the rising numbers of COVID-19 cases.

Some infections amongst the seafood processing workforce tested health and safety protocols implemented at the start of the pandemic but did not notably impact production, it said.

Most larger vessels kept fishing, aside from Northern Irish mobile-gear vessels which were offered a further tie-up scheme in October and November. Much of the small-scale fleet continued to face poor prices. Some persisted with direct sales. Others opted to utilize government support and tie up early, avoiding poor winter fishing conditions in November and December.

Heightened restrictions disrupted both domestic and international demand for British seafood. While retail sales remained strong to the end of the year, the re-closure of much of the foodservice market at home and abroad challenged businesses once more. Christmas is an important period for seafood sales across both retail and foodservice. Restrictions during the festive period saw record highs in retail and record lows across foodservice, it said.

Global transport remained slower and more expensive through the end of the year. Strict limits and COVID-19 checks on exports to China further hampered global seafood trade during this period.

Market volatility and operating uncertainty throughout this period were further compounded by the fast-approaching "end of the [Brexit] transition period". By October, businesses across the supply chain engaged in trade with the EU had shifted much of their focus away from COVID-19 and onto Brexit planning. Businesses worried about the possible impacts of the UK and EU not reaching a favorable trade agreement. There was a focus on planning for a worst-case, "no deal" scenario. By the end of the year, however, COVID-19 issues regained prominence.

The approval of several COVID-19 vaccines in November and December showed a path back to ‘normality’. Rising case numbers however drove all four UK nations to return to full lockdown measures by the end of December. This decision was largely driven by a new faster-spreading COVID-19 variant that was identified in southeast England in mid-December.

The new variant also caused further trade disruption ahead of Christmas. A number of European countries closed their borders with the UK until a testing scheme could be implemented to prevent the new variant surging on the continent. This closure came at a particularly bad time. Many businesses were in the midst of moving product for the Christmas market. Also anticipating bottlenecks at the border from Jan. 1, many were moving extra volume at the end of December.

A massive cargo ship wedged into place at Egypt's Suez Canal is threatening to further disrupt global shipping at a time when it's already under strain due to ramifications from the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the Associated Press, the Panamanian-flagged vessel Ever Given ran aground in the canal on March 23 in a way that has caused a floating traffic jam. The disruption will likely have the effect of driving up the price of shipping from China to Europe.

According to the news service, it is unclear when the blockage will be solved.

"The Suez Canal will not spare any efforts to ensure the restoration of navigation and to serve the movement of global trade," Lt. Gen. Ossama Rabei, head of the Suez Canal Authority, said.

The Cape Fear Seafood Company, a restaurant chain based in the US state of North Carolina with four locations and franchises available, is paying its employees a bonus for getting vaccinated against COVID-19, reports WECT News 6, an NBC television affiliate in Wilmington, North Carolina.

So far 40 of the company's 115 workers have been vaccinated, according to the article.

"We’re a tourist town," owner Evan Trawick is quoted as saying about the area where most of his restaurants operate. "We have lots of folks from out of town, here, as well. We just feel that it's important for us to keep our doors open and have as many of our employees vaccinated as possible."

Legally, employers can require vaccines, barring exceptions for religious beliefs and health reasons, the TV station said it heard from lawyers it consulted. But it's a controversial idea that few businesses are willing to enforce, the article added.

"Practically speaking, it's mostly the frontline essential workers, healthcare workers and occupations like that that are, in fact, requiring their employees to be vaccinated," said employment law attorney Benton Toups. "The same rules are applied across the board."

A new science publication has found no evidence of the coronavirus pandemic impacting salmon welfare in Scotland.

The study, which has been published in the journal Veterinary and Animal Science, examined whether sea lice numbers and mortality rates in salmon farms had changed over the three-year period from 2018-2020.

The paper found that monthly sea lice counts and mortality in 2020 were comparable with monthly values in 2018-19, indicating that welfare standards were maintained in 2020, in spite of COVID-19. The report did not look at the economic or social impacts of COVID-19 on aquaculture.

"It has been widely predicted that the impact of COVID-19 on human health and activity would result in indirect impacts on animal health and welfare, however this study shows no gross evidence of this being the case with salmon welfare in Scotland," said Marine Scotland Science's Alexander Murray.

"This is an area we want to explore in more detail and we will be doing further analysis as we receive more data."

Due to concerns about the spread of infection, observers will not be welcome on board when snow crab harvesters kick off their season in Canada's Zone 17, in the Saint Lawrence River, off the coasts of the provinces Quebec and New Brunswick, on Wednesday at dawn.

That's what the heads of several fishing associations told Le Soleil, a Canadian news service.

The harvesters will apply the same guidelines as those of the previous season, said Pierre Leonard, the fisheries coordinator of the Innu First Nation of Essipit. They will form bubbles within the crews.

"For the month of April, we will be 100% opposed [to observers]," said Rene Landry, president of the Association of Crabbers. "It is not negotiable. In April, we are mainly observed for the white crab. In 50 years, I have never seen a white crab in the month of April."

April is too important of a month for the harvesters to take any unnecessary risks, Landry said. The season ends on June 24.

"It's the start of the season which is good for the fishermen. If we miss the month of April, we cannot recover afterwards. It's finished!"

Area 17 is the first in Atlantic Canada to open for snow crab fishing, the article observes. It gives the harvesters an advantage in the market, where enthusiasm is typically high, especially as it falls roughly a week before Easter weekend.

"The market is good, for sure," Landry said. "If they don't sell it all here, the US market is just as good and there is no inventory. The craze is on our side. Everyone tears it off at the start."

On the downside, scientists from the Maurice-Lamontagne Institute in Mont-Joli suggest that the biomass available for commercial snow crab fishing is still low, the article noted.

A team of scientific researchers from the World Health Organisation believe they have pinpointed the origins of COVID-19 after a lengthy investigation, Live Science reported.

The news site said that the WHO team plans to issue a formal report in the coming weeks.

While initial suspicions fell on the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the city of Wuhan as ground zero for the virus, the disease is now thought to have originated at one of the wildlife farms that supplied the market. The animals were likely infected with the disease SARS-CoV-2 from nearby bats, the news site said.

A collaborative effort between commercial fishermen in the US state of Florida and a not-for-profit group there are helping to supply people with fresh fish during the pandemic, the television station WTXL (ABC 27) reports.The group Catch Together has thus far donated more than $5 million to purchase from harvesters who belong to the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance and Fish for America USA, according to the article.

The fishermen reportedly have been hurt by the closing and/or limited business being maintained by restaurants in the state.

Since the COVID-19 crisis began, Catch Together has provided more than 2 million meals. The not-for-profit is supporting several efforts along the Gulf of Mexico, including in Tallahassee, Florida, Tampa/St. Petersburg, Florida, Galveston, Texas, and in several communities across the states of Louisiana and Mississippi.

This week, they’ll be delivering the first of what will be 13,000 pounds of fresh, red snapper to Second Harvest of the Big Bend, which continues to report a major increase in need due to the economic hardship created by the pandemic, the news service reported."With demand for seafood still way down, we’re all facing another really difficult year ahead," Jim Zurbrick, the president of Fish for America USA, told the TV station. "But this program will not only support fishermen in Steinhatchee, it also allows them to help feed our neighbors with healthy, local, sustainably caught seafood in a time of crisis."

Some major changes that restaurants and retailers implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to stop the spread of disease are likely to endure, a recent study found.

According to the US firm Inmar Intelligence, some 53% of consumers they surveyed have used contactless payment options for the first time since the start of the pandemic. Fifty-five percent of those surveyed said they were eschewing the use of cash in order to reduce contact. Methods to reduce contact have included curbside pickup, in-store pickup and in-store checkout. These trends are likely to stick around, the study found.

Additionally, the firm Zenreach, citing the same study, said that 28% of consumers will avoid places that don't offer contactless payment options, which includes restaurants.

"It's truly amazing that technology has evolved to the point where customers are able to have a contactless dining experience at a brick-and-mortar establishment. Contactless solutions for ordering and payments should go a long way towards alleviating consumer concerns,"John Kelly, Zenreach's CEO, said in a press release.

As COVID-19 vaccinations rates rise across older residents of New Orleans, Louisiana, the tourism-dependent US city is seeing a much-needed boost in traffic, NOLA.com reported.

Along with the expansion of outdoor dining areas, many restaurants in the culinarily famous city are reopening their indoor seating.

"I love nothing better than going out to eat with friends. It's really all I do," Debbie Coyle, a 62-year-old recently vaccinated resident, said. "You go out to have more than a meal, it's the company, the atmosphere, all of it. I missed it so much, I can't wait to get back to it."

At the seafood restaurant Middendorf's, co-owner Horst Pfeifer is seeing a surge in older residents coming to enjoy their freedom to eat out once again.

"They told us they were here to celebrate. It was so exciting for them, and it was exciting for us too," Pfeifer said.

Workers at seafood processing plants in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island will be part of the next phase of COVID-19 vaccinations, the CBC reports.

PEI health officials have said they will be reaching out to the plant operators with details in advance of the May 1 start to the season for several lobster fishing areas around the province. The officials said the logistics of the clinics for plant workers are still being discussed.

The PEI Seafood Processors Association reportedly sent a letter to the PEI Chief Public Health Office, asking if the processors could be considered once vaccinations are complete for front-line workers and vulnerable islanders.

"We’ve all done a tremendous job of securing our locations with proper protective equipment for our workers, but certainly it's an environment where it's very difficult to keep people six feet apart … throughout the whole day." Jeff Malloy, CEO of Acadian Supreme and the past president of the association, said.

"We need all the production capacity in order to be able to handle the lobsters that people are bringing in," he said.

The Global Fishery Forum and Seafood Expo Russia is set to go ahead from July 6-8 this year, with registration for the event now open.

Organizers of the event, which had been held annually in St. Petersburg prior to the pandemic, report that 80% of the exhibition space has already been reserved for what will be one of the first major industry events to take place since the COVID-19 outbreak began last year.

Many of the country's largest fishing companies are expected to be in attendance, including Gidrostroy, Russian Fishery Company, Norebo and Okeanrybflot.

Other businesses, including state-owned Rosrybflot, suppliers Ostrov, and Avangard will also be making their first appearances at the event, among others.

Organizers have said the main aim of the event is to maximize the potential of the Russian internal market, with "special attention to be paid to the normalization of product distribution channels". The forum will therefore also play host to an enlarged fish supermarket purchasing zone.

Global fishing effort slowed dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic as European and Chinese fleets reduced efforts, data from the group Global Fishing Watch shows.

The non-profit, which tracks vessel activity using satellite and transponder data, said in a press release that some 63,000 vessels fished for around 50 million hours in 2020, a decrease of 9% and 5%, respectively, year-on-year.

"We believe these numbers are an undercount because in a normal year, fishing activity in our data should have increased over the previous year," the group said.

In part, fishing activity as tracked by its data has increased in recent years as more vessels are required to use transponders due to measures to clamp down on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.

"We can't be sure, however, how the global pandemic affected the number of fishing vessels that would have been added to our database in 2020, so we are unable to determine exactly how much fishing decreased," the group said.

The Australian government will extend its financial support for international air freight for another three months.

The International Freight Assistance Mechanism (IFAM) was set to expire on July 1, but now will be extended to the end of September, according to Australia's Seafood Trade Advisory Group (STAG). The body said the extension would allow firms to maintain global air connections and protect market share.

In early April of last year, the Australian government committed AUD 110 million ($67.24m) to support the air freight sector, as the pandemic grounded passenger flights.

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted Thunder Bay, Ontario's Eat The Fish, a supplier of locally caught species to area restaurants to change its business model, Canada's CBC reported.

The news service said that founder Paul Drombolis saw success after founding the business in 2018 — until the pandemic hit.

"It was an idea that kind of sprung up between myself and a friend while we were out actually camping and fishing," Drombolis said. "And we kind of thought, ‘you know, why isn't there an easy way for people to connect with fishermen that want to sell their catch locally?’ So we created this idea to bring more fish to the Thunder Bay Country market."

He said that given the weakness in the foodservice business due to the pandemic, he's hoping to make a change.

"We’re hoping to shift towards what's known as a community supported fishery," said Drombolis. "So this will allow customers an opportunity to — at the beginning of the season — purchase a package from us that will ensure they have access to a portion of a fisherman's catch. So they’ll be able to say, ‘you know,I want 10 pounds of whitefish each month’ and they will be able to subscribe to a plan that will give them the opportunity to do that."

Those relying on the US West Coast ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, Caflifornia, remember all too well the congestion of vessels they faced when a labor dispute happened in 2015, forcing many to shift their business to East and Gulf Coast ports, Freightwaves reports.

At the labor dispute's height, in mid-March of 2015, there were 28 container ships anchored in the two ports. Though the backup cleared quickly once a settlement was reached.

What's happening now, as a result of the pandemic, is way worse, and problems are growing by the day, according to the shipping news service.

This year, the number of ships at anchor in the San Pedro Bay has consistently hovered around 30, reaching a high of 40 on Feb. 1, based on data collected from the Marine Exchange of Southern California.

Also, the vessels are larger. Of the 29 container ships at anchor on Sunday, 11 were over 10,000 TEUs (short for 20-foot equivalent units). Five boasted capacity of 14,000-15,000 TEU. One vessel topped 16,000 TEU.

Also, the duration of the backup has been worse.

Freightwaves explains that the change in consumer spending caused by COVID — more goods bought to compensate for less services — began pushing up the number of ships at anchorage in the fourth quarter of 2020.

The news service also suggests that there are some signs that the crunch may be easing, however.

"The Container Availability Index produced by Container xChange shows a marked improvement in container-equipment availability in Shanghai. An industry source confirmed to American Shipper that box availability has improved," the publication reports, noting a related news service.There are also reports that carriers are not hitting shippers with as much premium charges.

A mounting worldwide shortage of available shipping containers is adding fresh complications to global trade flows and could have lasting economic repercussions, Singapore's Business Times.

Empty shipping containers have piled up in US ports even as the shortage is being acutely felt in Asia.

Additionally, vessels are being stalled by "floating traffic jams" as ports and supporting infrastructure are congested.

"I’ve never seen anything like this," said Lars Mikael Jensen, head of Global Ocean Network at AP Moller-Maersk, the world's largest shipping company. "All the links in the supply chain are stretched. The ships, the trucks, the warehouses."

A salmon wellboat contracted to Leroy Seafood Group in Norway has suffered three cases of coronavirus onboard, its owner, Froy Group, has said.

The Gaso Viking was working on behalf of one of Leroy's aquaculture branches, Leroy Midt, when three staff came down with the illness.

The source of the infection has been found, and the three positive cases have been isolated on land, it said. The rest of the crew have been quarantined.

The Viking's staff has been aboard the wellboat for four weeks, with limited contact with anyone else, it said. "Based on this, we consider the risk of infection to be low". The ship will now be quarantined until its next operation.

The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI), a fishermen-funded group in the US state that works to promote the industry, has launched a pair of sector surveys that aim to gauge the commercial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

ASMI said in a press release that it has launched separate surveys for fishermen and processors, each of which closes on March 18.

The surveys take 10 minutes to complete and will be used to guide policymakers’ response to the pandemic, the organization said.

Tokyo plans to extend a state of emergency for two weeks due to a slowdown in the decline of coronavirus cases, reports Japan Times.

In early January, Tokyo hit a record of 2,500-plus daily new COVID-19 cases. The Japanese government placed 11 of its 47 prefectures under emergency restrictions, scheduled to be lifted this coming Sunday (Mar. 7).

The Tokyo metropolitan government has set a target to fall to 70% of daily news cases confirmed the previous week. However, the rate is currently close to 80-90%.

"We have not been catching up to our schedule," said Yuriko Koike, Tokyo governor. The capital reported 121 new COVID-19 cases on Monday (Mar. 1), the lowest daily case total since early November.

But then the number of new infections rebounded to 232 cases on Tuesday (Mar. 2). Tokyo will ask the central government for a two-week extension of emergency restrictions, along with three neighboring prefectures, Kanagawa, Saitama, and Chiba

The hosts of the Fish International trade show, usually held annually each year in Bremen, Germany, have announced they will be holding a one-day Digital Seafood Meeting on April 21.

The meeting, described by Fish International as a "dating platform for the fish industry" will be an opportunity for one-on-one talks with trade partners, according to Sabine Wedell, Fish International's project manager.

The focus of the event will be on matchmaking sessions between buyers, product developers and sales managers, who can each arrange meetings with other participants online.

There will also be three sessions of talks, centered on out-of-house sales, retail product launches and innovations such as plant and cell-based seafood.

Fish International said it hoped the matchmaking event could bridge the gap until the next in-person event, which is scheduled for Feb. 13-15, 2022.

Companies can register for the virtual event here.

Alaska state lawmakers are investigating a decision by Department of Labor commissioner Tamika Ledbetter to block nearly $450,000 in fines against Copper River Seafoods for alleged willful violations of COVID-19 workplace safety standards, the Alaska radio station KTOO reports.

Zack Fields, an Anchorage Democrat in the Alaska state House of Representatives who used to work for the Department of Labor, is reported as saying that the Labor & Commerce Committee on which he serves received a complaint from a whistleblower that Ledbetter was blocking enforcement of state workplace safety standards.

The committee is holding a hearing to address questions about a Copper River Seafoods plant in Anchorage and also a Juneau-based Alaska Glacier Seafoods plant. Both companies had large COVID-19 outbreaks last year.

According to Department of Labor documents, inspectors were asked to visit the Copper River plant after the health department flagged that 77% of the company's Anchorage plant employees had contracted COVID-19.

State contact tracers reportedly told inspectors that 19 employees had complained about the plant when they were being interviewed. Workers described crowded working conditions, having to purchase their own masks and said their complaints to management fell on deaf ears, according to inspection records.

State inspectors proposed nearly $450,000 in combined fines after a site visit, both for COVID-19 issues and other safety problems. But, the commissioner nixed them, saying that they weren't adequately supported by the documentation that inspectors provided.

In an internal memo to Joe Knowles, director of the Labor Standards and Safety Division, Ledbetter said she was concerned about the way she was notified about the citations. She directed a change in the way that citations are handled going forward, requiring her approval of any proposed citations of more than $50,000.

Reached via email on Tuesday, Ledbetter reportedly said the type of citation that inspectors wanted to issue against Copper River Seafoods for its COVID-19 violations is unprecedented in Alaska. She said her department is working with the federal Occupational Health & Safety Administration to figure out who has what authority.

Copper River Seafoods officials did not return phone calls seeking comment, according to the radio station.

New figures published by the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO) have shown the limited extent to which salmon producers have used the derogations authorized by environmental regulators last year to help the sector cope with the coronavirus pandemic.

Only one in five Scottish salmon farms have had to use new rules allowing them to keep fish in the water for longer, and only one in 20 have used the flexibility on medicine use, said SSPO.

The willingness of Scotland's environmental regulator to introduce a more flexible approach had helped salmon farmers cope with the impacts of both COVID-19 and Brexit even though only a small minority of sites had used the new flexibility, it said.

"Working collaboratively with the salmon farming sector the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) introduced a new level of flexibility on positions in March 2020 to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. The relationship has allowed both parties to anticipate changing circumstances and led to agreement on temporary positions regarding biomass limits (the weight of fish in pens), treatments and compliance monitoring while Scottish salmon farmers maintained a crucial supply of fresh food to customers."

The newly released figures show that across the sector, 21% of a total 210 farm sites applied to make use of the additional peak biomass position, of which only 36 sites have, to date, made use of the position.

This gave farmers the option of increasing peak biomass across those sites by an average 16%, approximately 13,000 metric tons to 92,000t. The average length of time where biomass volumes were increased was just 40 days, said SSPO.

In terms of the position on medicine use, just nine sites used the option which provided the opportunity for treatments at these sites to be performed in a shorter time period.

"This regulatory flexibility, which has been used sparingly by our members, has supported the salmon farming sector while safeguarding fish health and welfare throughout this extraordinary period. The decision of companies to conduct site risk assessments has also protected the environment."

Two Trident Seafoods factory trawlers hit by COVID-19 outbreaks are now fishing for pollock as the A season ramps up.

"Our factory trawlers are all fishing now," Stefanie Moreland, Trident's vice president of government relations and corporate social responsibility, told Undercurrent News.

Island Enterprise and Kodiak Enterprise, Trident's largest two factory trawlers, were hit with outbreaks as the company was also forced to close its giant Akutan plant. Akutan has recently re-opened, but Moreland declined to comment to Undercurrent on how many staff are in the factory. Undercurrent sources have given a figure of around 400, but the plant would need 1,400 at full capacity.

Seattle Enterprise, the third trawler, was not impacted and has been fishing for all of the A season.

In an effort to ride out a business slump caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, South Korea's major seafood retailer, Sajo Seafood, will launch a delivery service for tuna "Hoe", a raw fish fillet served in a Korean style, reports Aju.

Tuna restaurants in South Korea are normally regarded as high-end, operated by skilled chefs. Because of such characteristics, delivery services are only available to a limited number of customers who live near such outlets.

Sajo, which provides frozen tuna to restaurants, has changed its business tactic to launch a home delivery service. A pilot delivery service will begin at its high-end tuna restaurant in western Seoul through popular food delivery apps.

"By expanding our online retail channels, we will become the leading brand in the online tuna meat delivery market," Sajo said, adding that it would diversify its selling channel.

According to the Korea Foodservice Industry Research Institute, the COVID-19 pandemic has dealt a serious blow to South Korea's offline foodservice industry. The average monthly sales of restaurants fell 16.5% year-on-year to below $25,000 in 2020. Meanwhile, the food delivery service app industry thrived, seeing some 17.3 trillion transactions in 2020, up 78.6%.

The US state of Maryland, one of the country's biggest sources of eastern oysters, sold 39,913 bushels in 2020, down 27% from 2019, the Capital News Service, an Annapolis, Maryland-based newspaper, reports.

The quantity includes oysters sourced from both wild-harvesting watermen and farmers working leases. Oysters are grown in the US’ Chesapeake Bay, the US’ largest estuary and a body of water shared by the states of Maryland and Virginia. There are are roughly 100 oysters in a bushel.

After restaurants reduced their capacity and a stay-at-home order was issued last spring, restaurant sales essentially went to zero within a matter of a week, Scott Budden, founder of Orchard Point Oyster Co., in Stevensville, Maryland, is quoted as saying. Since April, his business has transitioned to directly selling to the public, through local pick-ups and cold shipping.Robert Brown, a waterman, oyster grower and president of the Maryland Watermen's Association, said he sells the majority of his oysters to packaging houses, which aren't working at capacity because they can't sell the oysters once they shuck them. It might be a few years before things get back to normal, he believes.

Harvesters have been left with a ton of supply, said Karis King, public relations and event manager for the Oyster Recovery Partnership (ORP). King explained that the sweet spot for growing oysters is between 3 and 4 inches, but they don't stop growing if not harvested.

ORP has been working with oyster farmers to connect them directly to consumers and educate the public on how to shuck at home.

Pirate's Cove Oyster Co.,in Easton, Maryland, has pivoted to online sales.

"Some weeks are great, some weeks are nothing," founder Jason Wilford is quoted as saying.Oyster restoration efforts also have been affected. The Chesapeake Bay Foundation works for six months every year putting oysters in the bay, but it started three months late in 2020 due to a state freeze on non-essential activities. As a result, the group was able to put 14 million oysters back in the bay last year, 10m less than usual.

The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) announced Friday that it is extending its allowance for the use of remote audits until March 28, 2022 due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

"Temporary requirements introduced last year helped MSC-certified businesses maintain credible performance while dealing with unprecedented practical and legal challenges," the organization said in a press release.

"These changes to the MSC's requirements (referred to as derogations), did not change the standards the MSC sets for protecting fish stocks and the environment, but provided alternative ways for fishers and suppliers performance to be assessed."

MSC has been permitting remote audits since March 2020 as a response to the pandemic.

The organization clarified that the use of remote audits are only permitted if they are "required because of COVID-19 restrictions or health concerns", adding:

"The MSC expects independent assessors to resume on-site visits where possible, with extra reviews remaining in place for initial assessments not carried out in person."

"As the world enters a second year of dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, we acknowledge the efforts of our fishery and supply chain partners who have continued to operate under difficult circumstances," said Rohan Currey, MSC's chief science and standards officer.

"Travel restrictions, temporary business closures and other COVID-19 restrictions are disrupting the work of the seafood industry in many countries. At the same time, the MSC is keen to ensure consumers can continue to trust that MSC certified products are sustainable.

"Also, due to the challenges presented by the pandemic, MSC said the time to complete improvements related to actions or decisions by external management agencies will be extended by 12 months.

"During that time period, fisheries will still need to continue to meet the MSC Fisheries Standard," MSC instructed. "This does not change the length of any certificates, with fisheries still needing to be reassessed at the scheduled time to stay certified."

It stressed that supply chain businesses that need to be audited for the risk of forced or child labor can proceed with an audit through a recognized program or complete a detailed self-assessment instead. The MSC said it's also allowing extra time as labor audits usually need to be done in-person.

The new derogations go into effect on March 27, 2021.

2020 was a record year for Norwegian salmon exports to Spain despite the pandemic, which is why the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) is investing heavily in further increasing Spanish salmon consumption with the biggest marketing campaign in the country.

"Solid development in salmon exports, strong position in the market, very good response to previous campaigns, and not least the opportunity to lift salmon sales to an even higher level are the main reasons why Spain was chosen in 2021," Bjørn-Erik Stabell, the NSC's envoy in Spain, said.

The NSC's major investment in Spain will start small at the end of March, but the main pressure will be put on in the months leading up to Christmas to create solid demand so that Norwegian exporters can launch new products in the market and further strengthen demand.

In 2020, Norway exported more than 86,000 metric tons of salmon to Spain to a value of over NOK 4.6 billion (€445.2 million/ $540.8m), up 5% in volume and 2% in value compared to 2019 figures.

"It is not enough that exports increased in a year where the corona pandemic hit an entire country, but 2020 was also the year when more than 60 million tourists were absent from Spain. That says something about how much salmon the Spaniards eat at home," Stabell added.

Mike Dunleavy, the Republican governor of Alaska, has tested positive for COVID-19 and is suffering "mild symptoms", according to a statement issued by his office on Wednesday.

Alaska is the US’ biggest commercial fishing state by far, accounting for nearly $1.8 billion in landings value in 2018, based on the latest data available from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The state recently has been dealing with a troublesome number of outbreaks at major fish processing plants.

Also, Dunleavy, elected in 2018, is well known in the commercial fishing community, most especially for his recent appeal of a decision by the US Army Corps of Engineers to halt the development of the Pebble Mine. The project is seen as a threat to the world's largest sockeye salmon fishery.

Dunleavy, who is 59, was exposed to a person who later tested positive for the virus on Saturday, according to the statement. He received a rapid test on Sunday, which came back negative, but has been quarantining at home since then nonetheless.

"He had been feeling well until Tuesday night," the statement said.

"Wednesday morning, he tested again, and this time tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 infection."

The governor's office has not provided any details about Dunleavy's close contact who tested positive for the virus.

Dunleavy is being monitored by his "attending physician", chief medical officer Anne Zink, and "they will provide the public with updates as needed," the statement said.

Scotland's seafood processing industry has demanded a much clearer timeline from the Scottish government for the reopening of the economy.

It follows a statement from the country's first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, which "failed to spell out even indicative dates that would allow ailing sectors to plan ahead", according to the Scottish Seafood Association (SSA).

"We do acknowledge the need for caution to get us out of the COVID-19 pandemic once and for all, and accept that the process will be driven by data," said SSA chief executive Jimmy Buchan.

"But industry needs at least an indicative timeline like that laid out for England to allow businesses to make plans, whether that is ramping up to fulfill orders, hiring staff, launching new marketing campaigns, etc."

Many sectors are on the brink of collapse due to market volatility, and the industry needs at least a degree of certainty to prevent the situation from deteriorating, he said.

As mentioned, England has laid out plans to reopen the country from lockdown. This will see schools reopen from March 8, and small outdoor gatherings allowed from March 29.

May 17 should see "indoor hospitality and hotels" reopen, with foodservice vital to many seafood businesses.

Norwegian salmon farmer Kvaroy Arctic reports that it has agreed to donate one to two pallets (1,500-2,000 pounds) of salmon per month, equal to more than 8,000 meals per week, to New York-based Rethink Food.

The organization's Rethink Food Commissary aims to produce more than 4,000 meals per week for eight of its over 75 community-based organization (CBO) partners throughout New York.

Since April 2020, Rethink Food has invested more than $11.5m into 55 independent restaurants and has provided over 2.5m meals for those facing food insecurity.

"Kvarøy Arctic is our first seafood donor and this is the first time we’ve received a reliable, recurring donation commitment for a full year," said Maddie Metzger, Rethink's director of food sourcing.

Also, starting in February for Heart Month, and continuing throughout the year, the donation-based Rethink Café, in Brooklyn, will make at least one meal per week with a 4 oz. portion of Kvarøy Arctic's American Heart Association Heart-Check Seal Certified salmon. The cafe serves 1,000-2,000 people per week, charging $5 per meal.

"We made our first donation to Rethink Food at the start of the pandemic in 2020," said Kvarøy Arctic strategic development officer Jennifer Bushman. "Since then, recognizing the growing need for nourishing food, we’ve continued to donate to their network."

As the second crawfish season to occur during the COVID-19 pandemic approaches, restaurants in the US city of New Orleans, Louisiana, are hopeful it will again draw in customers.

According to NOLA.com, even though tourism and events that the city relies on have dried up, locals came out in full force last year to pick up crawfish, a local tradition during Lent. Last year, consumers quickly pivoted to drive-throughs and take-away for the species.

"We can't do normal business but we can still do this," David McCelvey, the owner of Frankie & Johnny's restaurant, said. "New Orleans people are going to be getting their crawfish, somehow, some way."

A UK firm set up in 2020 to try and get local catches to consumers across the country has witnessed "huge growth" in demand for its service.

Pesky Fish has put out a call to fishing boat owners and skippers across the southeast and southwest UK to make contact. It pointed to a "new opportunity" for fish to be landed at its marketplace and sold, "with fair prices to the fishing industry".

The firm said it had recorded massive growth in sales and consumer demand. It added there was an "urgent need for further boats to land fish catch" across the UK.

In March 2020 — when the first coronavirus lockdown commenced — Pesky Fish launched a home delivery service to bring seafood caught in British waters directly from fishermen to the final customer.

The COVID-19 pandemic has benefitted a seafood retailer in the central region of the US state of Pennsylvania, further evidence that many consumers are trying seafood amid foodservice closures.

According to WNEP 16, Louie Louie Seafood, a market in Springettsbury township, York county, has seen "booming" business amid the pandemic.

"Very busy–we definitely saw an increase of customers and sales," co-owner Zoe Whitesall said.

She estimates that sales have doubled over the previous period. Meat shortages that struck early last year helped boost seafood sales, she said.

"There was nothing on the shelves for a while, particularly proteins. so people started looking and sourcing for meats and seafood products within their own communities," she said.

Incoming foreign seafood processing workers bound for Canada's Maritime provinces will not have to quarantine in hotel rooms immediately upon arrival and will instead be allowed on to their final destinations to quarantine there.

According to the CBC, the federal government's decision to exempt foreign workers from the hotel quarantine requirement is in place until March 14.

But Nat Richard, the executive director of the Moncton, New Brunswick-based Lobster Processors Association said that uncertainty remains as many workers won't fly in until shortly before the spring lobster fishery opens in May.

"We continue to be quite vigilant in terms of what requirements we’ll have to meet after this period as well. But it's a welcome change," he said.

China's foreign ministry has dismissed criticism from the US and the UK regarding data sharing and access for World Health Organization (WHO) experts, claiming Beijing had cooperated with its team during its trip to Wuhan, reports Bloomberg.

"This is yet another case in point of political interference in science," China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in response.

"The WHO experts have applauded the high degree of cooperation they received from the Chinese side," she said. "They said they had met the people they want to meet, and they share important new data. I believe this is what professionalism means."

Additionally, both the US and the UK have asked China to make public its raw data relating to the outbreak. For its part, the US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the US has "deep concerns about how the early findings of the COVID-19 investigation were communicated and questions about the process used to reach them."

UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab also said Beijing must cooperate with the WHO to determine the virus's origins.

"We do share concerns that they get full cooperation and they get the answers they need, and so we’ll be pushing for it to have full access, get all the data it needs to be able to answer the questions that I think most people want to hear answered around the outbreak," he said.

The coronavirus pandemic is pushing Bangladesh's shrimp and mud crab harvesters back into poverty, the Telegraph, a United Kingdom-based newspaper, reports.

Farmers in the South Asian country already have confronted numerous issues related to climate change, including rising sea levels, saltwater intrusion, flooding, drought and super-charged cyclones. Many turned from growing rice to harvesting crabs, for which exports skyrocketed from $7.6m in 2015 to nearly $43m in 2018-19, according to the article.However, the pandemic has dramatically shrunk demand. China, which bought 85% of Bangladesh's crab exports, has banned them since January and Bangladesh's airports remain shut.

As demand has fallen, the price of crabs in the domestic market has dropped by two-thirds, according to the Telegraph.

In 2019, crabmeat in Dhaka's farmgate market reached 2,500 taka ($30) per kilo. However, by October 2020, the price had fallen to between 800 and 900 taka ($9.40-$10.50).

Local sales also are difficult, the article explained. For cultural reasons, eating crabs is not popular in the Muslim-majority country, and higher caste Hindus also avoid the shellfish.

"Crab farmers and traders in Bangladesh's coastal areas are on the brink of destitution," one source is quoted as saying.

The Agence France-Presse reports that the Bangladeshi crab industry involves some 500,000 farmers.

Another day, and another study into how the seafood supply chain might learn from the system shock that has been COVID-19.

New research published in Global Food Security on the impacts of COVID-19 disruptions to a highly globalized seafood sector reveals crucial lessons for making food systems more resilient in the face of future shocks, according to NGO Worldfish.

The study outlines a food system resilience ‘action cycle’ framework to explore three central issues: 1) the impact of COVID-19 on seafood systems at different levels; 2) the types of responses and actions to restore critical systems functions; and 3) distill critical learnings from current and past shocks to inform the way in which various actors and institutions can build resilience to effectively respond to future disruptions or large–scale food system disruptions.

COVID-19 disruption to the seafood sector—particularly in low- and middle-income countries—has exposed critical food systems vulnerabilities, including power imbalances, disparities in nutrition and public health, and broader socio-economic inequalities, the authors write. Disruptions in some regions are also magnified by existing stressors such as climate change, natural hazards (Pacific cyclone season, African locust season), resource management, and political or economic instability.

One of the paper's authors, Ben Belton — WorldFish value chain and nutrition senior scientist and associate professor at Michigan State University — said:

"In order to rebuild toward a more resilient food system, it is necessary to understand the scope of recent disruptions, impacts, and range of responses. We mapped out the seafood sector's early reactions to COVID-19 during the first five months of the pandemic; looking at impacts to demand, distribution, labor and production in the low- to high-income economies."

"Researchers, policymakers, and businesses can use the current responses combined with lessons from past shocks in order to build resilience. The paper proposes ways of learning from, anticipating and preparing for future impacts with a special focus on those most vulnerable."

Volume and sales for fresh, frozen and shelf-stable seafood all grew in the US in 2020 as COVID-19 pushed consumers to the grocery store, reports Winsight Grocery Business, an online business-to-business news service.

Based on data from IRI and 210 Analtyics, frozen seafood, which has seen its dollar-sales trajectory accelerate since 2017, recorded the strongest gains in both volume and dollars last year. Frozen seafood saw $7.0 billion in sales, 35.3% better than 2019, as volume increased 30.4%, according to the article.

It was a good year for all frozen food, as consumers "sought the flexibility of frozen meal and snack options—especially in familiar flavors or from trusted brands—that they could prepare on an as-needed basis", the news service explained.

However, seafood's share of total store sales grew more than any other frozen item's, ahead of frozen novelties, pizza, breakfast foods, processed poultry and appetizers, the article added.

Fresh seafood sales volume was up 22.5% in the US in 2020, accounting for $6.7bn in sales, a 24.5% improvement, the news service reported.

Shelf-stable seafood, from a significantly saw its volumes reverse a five-year decline to climb 17.3%, accounting for $2.8bn in sales, a 20.3% increase.

Nearly 73% of US consumers were frozen seafood buyers at the end of 2020, up 5.6% from the year before, according to IRI and 210 Analytics. More than half — 50.7% bought fresh seafood, up 3.8% from 2019. Boomers, African Americans and Asian Americans all overindexed on seafood purchases, Winsight reports.

As for species types, salmon was the biggest seller, accounting for $2.2bn (up 19.2%), while crab saw sales of $1.3bn, up almost 63%. Shrimp saw sales of $898bn, up 10.8%, and lobster saw sales of $447m, up 56.1%. Other big sellers were catfish, tilapia, cod, scallops, tuna and trout, according to the news service.

The coronavirus pandemic has substantially increased the vulnerability of those groups working in and dependant on the seafood sector, according to a new study conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future (CLF) in the US city of Baltimore, Maryland.

"The seafood sector is an important source of employment and nutrition, particularly in low-income countries. Additionally, seafood is a highly traded commodity with shocks to seafood production, distribution, labor, and supply felt all over the world," said Dave Love, lead author of the study and associate scientist of CLF's seafood, public health and food systems project.

"With this research, we wanted to understand better how the seafood sector has fared in the first five months of the COVID-19 pandemic and explore what types of coping or adaptive responses were being used in low, middle, and high-income countries."

According to the study, the pandemic's impacts on the global seafood sector were found to be wide-ranging at different stages in the supply chain.

"Lockdowns disrupted seafood demand, followed by impacts to production, labor and livelihoods, and distribution. These impacts sometimes occurred simultaneously, while others showed cascading, networked, or lagged impacts," it said.

The administration of Alaska governor Mike Dunleavy has allowed the US state's state of emergency distinction due to the COVID-19 pandemic to expire, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The expiration, which, in addition to Michigan, makes the state the only one in the US to lack such a declaration, means a loosening of restrictions that critics say have damaged the economy. The action comes as case counts are declining and vaccination rates are rising.

But uncertainty remains as to what the expiration will mean in practice. Some restrictions removed by the declaration could be reinstated by legislative action, for example.

"Alaska is definitely in uncharted territory here," the newspaper quoted Emily Ford, government relations director with Providence Alaska Medical Center, as saying.

One of Europe's largest specialized industry events, Polfish, has been postponed until 2022, given the continuing uncertainty caused by the pandemic in Poland.

Instead, the event will be held on between June 1 and 3, 2022.

The event has been prevented by a lack of forecast regarding the date of lifting the formal ban on the organization trade fairs, difficulties in travel, and the analysis of the exhibition industry's situation with other postponements in Poland and abroad.

"We would like to thank companies interested in participating in the fair for their commitment to date," the organization said. "We believe that the Polfish fair in 2022, like in previous years, will allow you to achieve the assumed business goals of the fair."

The Global Aquaculture Alliance announced on Monday that its next signature GOAL conference will begin as a hybrid experience, featuring several virtual events, before culminating with a live conference in Seattle, Washington, later this year.

The first virtual session, which is scheduled for April 15, is tentatively titled "Tomorrow's Aquaculture Will Be Shaped by Today's Emerging Technologies". It "will explore how new tools can make aquaculture efficient, profitable, sustainable and humane", the organizers said. The speakers and agenda are to be announced in March.

The actual date and location of the live event has yet to be revealed.

The COVID-19 pandemic and the corresponding drop in global tourism is only partially responsible for plummeting seafood sales volumes at Tokyo, Japan's Toyosu wholesale market. Difficulties that locals face in accessing the market, which was relocated in 2018 from a more popular site, Tsukiji, also play a big role, according to Asia Media International.

Even though seafood consumption in Japan has increased during the pandemic, consumers aren't always sourcing it from Toyosu.

"Access is really bad. By public transport, it takes twice as much time to get here than it would to get to our old location in Tsukiji," shop owner Toshiyuki Kawame said, according to CTGN.com.

Japan is set to hold the Summer Olympics later this year, which seafood suppliers at the market hope will offset some of their losses.

Representative Chris Pappas, a New Hampshire Democrat, is leading a group of 10 lawmakers in a call to insert $100 million for the National Sea Grant program as part of the next COVID-19 relief bill.

"Across the country, Sea Grant programs have played an instrumental role in supporting our coastal communities and fisheries who have been disproportionately impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic," Pappas said in a two-page letter sent Thursday to House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi and minority leader Kevin McCarthy.

The letter credits the $80m provided by the program in 2019 for generating a $412.4m economic benefit and supporting 10,404 jobs and 998 businesses across the US.

It notes that, since the beginning of the pandemic, the program has redirected $3.4m in federal funding to support rapid response initiatives, including identifying specific barriers to the seafood supply chain, conducting fishing industry needs assessments, and purchasing aquaculture-grown oysters for ecosystem restoration.

"These efforts have already had a profound positive impact on our coastal communities, but we must do more to provide dedicated, emergency funding so that Sea Grant can ensure our coastal and Great Lakes communities and our seafood and aquaculture industries have the support they need to be poised to emerge from this pandemic stronger than ever," the letter continues.

The letter is signed by eight Democrats and two Republicans. The Democrats also include representatives: Peter DeFazio of Oregon; Ann McLane Kuster of New Hampshire; David Cicilline of Rhode Island; Peter Welch of Vermont; Deborah Ross of Pennsylvania; Ed Case of Hawaii; and Gerald Connelly of Virginia. Republicans include Don Young of Alaska and Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon, the 20th resident commissioner of Puerto Rico.

In a policy shift that's good news for the seafood industry, the US state of Alaska announced Wednesday that it will now allow seafood industry workers from other states equal access to COVID-19 vaccines, the Anchorage Daily News reports.The change comes amidst several recent outbreaks at plants and on offshore processing vessels.

"While working in our state or fishing in our waters, we intend to protect your workers with the same standard of care we are extending to all Alaskans," said an email sent Wednesday by the office of governor Mike Dunleavy to seafood and other industry officials.

Alaska on Wednesday also announced changes in eligibility timelines, which could enable some seafood workers 50 years and older to start getting vaccines as soon as this week.

For weeks, state officials have told seafood industry representatives that their employees, if they come from other states, will not be eligible for receiving vaccines when other industry workers from Alaska are offered shots, the article notes.In a Wednesday evening news briefing, Anne Zink, Alaska's chief medical officer, said the state received additional "clarity" from the federal government on whether Alaska could restrict vaccines to residents. She said that the state will now coordinate with Washington state and the federal government on the vaccination effort for seafood processing and other "critical workers."

"It's not going to happen overnight. It's not going to happen all at once," Zink said.

Whether enough vaccines are available, however, remains a question.In a letter earlier sent to industry officials, Dunleavy's chief of staff Ben Stevens and Commissioner of Alaska Health Adam Crum had said the state has not received any additional vaccines from the federal government to cover workers from out of state.

The Norwegian government is looking to steer unemployed people into seasonal jobs in fisheries and agriculture with a new scheme.

"The corona[virus] epidemic has made it more difficult for the seafood industry to obtain foreign labor. At the same time, we are in a situation where many Norwegians are out of work," noted fisheries minister Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen.

A key problem for Norway was that coming off of unemployment benefits to take a job in the fishing industry would actually mean individuals losing out in terms of a weekly income.

"To increase the supply of domestic labor, the government proposes a temporary scheme where unemployment benefit recipients who take up work as seasonal workers can keep half of the hours they work on the report card. In practice, this means that those who take a job in agriculture or the fishing industry will earn more from it," the government said.

The need for fishery workers is particularly acute in the north of Norway over the winter months, it said.

The regulation is set to come in until June 1 for the fishing sector.

The Japanese government is considering lifting its coronavirus state of emergency in Aichi and Gifu, in central Japan, and Fukuoka in the southwest, due to a substantial drop in new positive cases in these areas, reports The Japan Times.

However, even though the government is considering lifting the emergency state in these three prefectures before its new expiration date on March 7, a final decision has not yet been made, according to the country's prime minister Yoshihide Suga.

The government is also considering the high occupancy rates of hospital beds for citizens infected with the virus since hospital bed capacity in Aichi and Fukuoka has been strained enough to warrant a state of emergency.

The 10 prefectures now under the state of emergency other than Aichi, Gifu and Fukuoka are Tokyo, Saitama, Chiba, Kanagawa, Osaka, Kyoto and Hyogo.

Unalaska's largest seafood processing plant, UniSea, reopened for crab and pollock deliveries on Feb. 1 after a spate of 60 COVID cases.

The plant in the US state of Alaska saw 60 cases — 10 from entry quarantine and 50 from community spread, UniSea president Tom Enlow told Undercurrent News.

UniSea, which is testing its workforce every three days, currently has 25 active cases. It hasn't seen any new cases since Feb. 4, Enlow said.

"We are still in a ‘hunker-down’ mode, with the campus under a lock-down with only essential travel in and out," he said.

The plant maintains a year-round workforce and handles multiple species, including cod and crab.

Processor OBI Seafoods said it has recorded one case of COVID-19 after testing its workforce at its crab-focused plant in Petersburg, a community in the US state of Alaska.

The employee was "immediately isolated" and workers who may have come into contact are also being quarantined as a precaution, OBI said.

The company said that it has hired a "completely local" workforce ahead of the upcoming tanner and golden king crab fishery, which kicks off Feb. 17.

That workforce has undergone pre-screening and will be subject to continuous COVID testing, the company said.

With the Chinese New Year fast approaching, US lobster exporters are reporting a considerable amount of pessimism about how their sales will fare, the Associated Press reports.

Normally the holiday, on Feb. 12, is marked with millions of dollars worth of US lobsters making their way to China. And exports of lobster to China have improved somewhat in spite of the trade war with the US.

But shipping has become complicated and expensive as China has been enforcing strict rules about food importation due to the coronavirus. Additionally, tighter government travel restrictions in China means fewer celebrations.

"It started in spring, and it held right up until a couple weeks ago," Mike Marceau, vice president of The Lobster Co., in Arundel, Maine, is quoted as saying. "We sold a lot of product. We’ve just lost getting a Chinese New Year because of COVID."

"American shippers are prepared for a year in which it's going to be difficult to send lobsters to China, Mike Tourkistas, chief executive officer of Truefoods, a Topsfield, Massachusetts, exporter, said.

"I think in the U.S. we are going to do less than a year ago, and I think that is mostly due to lack of air cargo," Tourkistas said. "A lot of flights are not available to us anymore."

Fishermen, aquaculturists, processors and other members of the seafood sector in the US state of New Jersey are splitting a pot of some $11 million in economic relief from the federal government's CARES Act, the Ashbury Park Press reported.

The New Jersey newspaper said that $6.1m of the total will go directly to commercial fishermen and fish farmers with another $3.8m set aside for dealers and processors. Around $1.1m will benefit the recreational fishing sector.

The monies, which were first allocated in March 2020, are set to be disbursed this month by the state's Department of Environmental Protection.

Businesses were eligible if they suffered a more than 35% loss in fishery-related revenues between March 1 and June 30, 2020, compared to a five-year average.

Seafood processors in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island (PEI) are waiting with bated breath to see if their labor pool of temporary foreign workers will be able to reach their plants with minimal disruptions.

According to the CBC, workers will have to take international flights into cities in other provinces, Montreal, Toronto, Calgary or Vancouver, quarantine there for three days, and then travel onward to PEI

"It's that three extra days that people are kind of focusing in on. What does that mean? Who pays for that?" said Robert Godfrey of the PEI Federation of Agriculture.

He suggested that the Canadian government should cover the cost of the quarantines.

Trident Seafoods significantly increased the number of nurses it employs at its massive processing plant in Akutan, Alaska, to handle its outbreak of COVID-19 there, the Anchorage Daily News reports.

ADN said it heard from several workers who said the outbreak immediately overwhelmed the sole health care provider staffing the plant's medical clinic. The clinic needs to be self-sufficient because there's no hospital within hundreds of miles and just a small clinic in the nearby village itself.

However, Trident since has hired six advanced registered nurse practitioners and an aide to work at the plant's medical clinic, according to company officials. It also has flown in additional supplies, like ventilators and breathing machines.The newspaper shared one of the job advertisements posted on Trident's behalf. It read: "Are you interested in an Alaskan ADVENTURE? Seasonal positions available! If you are energetic, professional and would be interested in a remote setting, this assignment might be the spot for you!"

At least 307 of the 706 workers at Trident Seafoods’ processing plant in Akutan, Alaska, have tested positive for COVID-19 since the outbreak began, as of Tuesday, and one employee has died, according to the newspaper. Three infected employees required medical evacuations last month.The company reportedly said the outbreak is now coming under control, as daily test positivity rates at the plant have reportedly dropped to a low level of 1%. Also, Trident is working on plans for employees who have finished isolation and quarantine to return to work, and is arranging lodging, meals and monitoring for employees who want to leave.

Bremerhaven, Germany-based processors Frosta Aktiengesellschaft and Deutsche See have each suffered an outbreak of coronavirus this week, reports Weser Kurier.

The city council reported on Tuesday that Deutsche See had experienced 26 positive tests among staff, after 29 had come down the infection at Frosta on Monday.

This past weekend Frosta's plant was closed for business, and has reopened in the week under increased precautions.

"We are in close contact with both companies, environmental investigations were initiated at an early stage and will continue to take place," said Ronny Mockel, head of the city's crisis team and the health department. "Further cases are to be expected in the coming days."

A team led by the World Health Organization (WHO) visited the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China, on Jan. 31, 2021, as part of a mission to trace the origins of the pandemic, according to a video report from the South China Morning Post.

14 scientists and WHO officials are spending a month in China as part of the investigation.

The Huanan market was linked to the earliest known cases of COVID-19. The virus may have crossed from animals to humans, but the market's role remains unknown.

The WHO probe is part of a long-delayed effort to trace the origins of the pandemic.

Mara Media, the organizer of Irish Skipper Expo 2021 in Limerick and Scottish Skipper Expo 2021 in Aberdeen, has decided to postpone this year's fishing shows and carry them forward to 2022, given the continuing uncertainty caused by the pandemic, it announced.

Hugh Bonner, Mara's managing director, said: "We are extremely disappointed at having to make this difficult decision, but there are still too many issues surrounding mass gatherings and travel. The safety of exhibitors, visitors and the wider public is our first priority."

"Making this decision now will also remove any uncertainty about the 2021 expos and provide the fishing industry with the opportunity for clear forward planning," Bonner added.

Mara Media said it would announce the new 2022 show dates in the near future.

The UK lost around 6,000 pubs and licensed premises last year, the latest Market Recovery Monitor from CGA and AlixPartners reveals—nearly triple the number in 2019.

It shows that the COVID-19 pandemic and wave of lockdowns contributed to a net decline of 5,975 sites in 2020. This represents a 5.1% contraction in the market since the end of 2019 and a 175% increase on the 2,171 drop in sites that year.

The turmoil of 2020 led to the permanent closure of 9,930 sites, with only 3,955 openings for the first time. It means that for every new opening in the market last year there were 2.5 closures—close to double the ratio of 1.3 in 2019.

The Market Recovery Monitor measures the scale of the damage wrought by the pandemic on hospitality businesses and forecasts many more closures in 2021.

It highlights in particular the significant impact on the casual dining sector, where total site numbers dropped by 9.7% in 2020, and 3.8 permanent closures for every new opening. The community, food and high street pub segments all saw numbers fall between 3.9% and 5.1%. The sports and social club sector, which has suffered from bans on events and socializing, recorded a decline of 6.2%.

Twenty crew aboard a 40-member factory trawler operating in waters off the US state of Alaska have been sickened with COVID-19, The Hill newspaper reported.

The vessel Araho, owned by the O’Hara Corporation, returned to Dutch Harbor, Alaska after fishing in Aleutian Islands waters.

Testing revealed that 20 crew members were confirmed to have COVID-19 and are now being cared for, the newspaper said, citing officials in the City of Unalaska.

Barbara Chifici, the owner of Deanie's Seafood restaurants in the French Quarter of New Orleans and also in Bucktown, Louisiana, has died from complications suffered as a result of contracting COVID-19, the Times-Picayune reports.

Chifici, who was 77, passed away Saturday while staying at the Ochsner Medical Center Kenner.

The Chifici family, in 2020, marked 38 years as owners of Deanie's, which includes three locations and employs 300 people. The operation is known for serving up overflowing fried seafood platters and mountains of boiled seafood, the newspaper reports.

Born Barbara Anselmo, Chifisi married her husband Frank Chifici in 1963.They purchased Deanie's Seafood Restaurant & Seafood Market in Bucktown in 1982. Frank Chifici died in 1985.Other restaurants were opened in New Orleans in 2001 and in 2018.

Five of Barbara Chifici's seven children were involved in the business. A sixth is a restaurateur in Mandeville, according to the article. She also is survived by 12 grandchildren, two brothers and a sister-in-law. "My mom was an inspiration to generations of culinarians and hospitality workers," her son Darren Chifici, Deanie's general manager, said in a statement. "She instilled a genuine sense of hospitality, quality, family and pride into everything she did."

The 145-meter freezer trawler Annelies Ilena, operated by Dutch fishing giant Parlevliet and van der Plas (P&P), has quarantined its crew of 60 onboard while docked in Ijmuiden, the Netherlands, reports Aflafrettir.

After some of the crew reported feeling unwell, COVID-19 tests were carried out, with half the 60 staff testing positive. The entire crew will now remain on board — with those who tested positive kept separate from the others — until next week.

Diederik Parlevliet was quoted as saying morale onboard was good, as there was plenty of space, food, and drink for the crew.

Alaska's Board of Fisheries, the group that oversees the state's Department of Fish and Game and sets fishing rules, has postponed itsin-person meetings planned for Ketchikan, Cordova and Anchorage this spring until the coming fall due to COVID-19-related concerns, Laine Welch's Fish Factor reports.

The board voted for the delay on Monday.

"I’m just basing on the most logical assumption that this year, this spring anyway is pretty much toast as far as how this COVID thing is going up and down, and one day it's good and the next day it's not," board member John Jensen is quoted as saying. "It’d be irresponsible to try and continue these meetings like we had planned." The board focus on regional issues every three years for commercial, sport, subsistence and personal use fisheries. The current lineup includes 79 proposals for Prince William Sound, 155 for Southeast Alaska and 42 for statewide shellfish issues.

Japan's ruling party increasingly feels it will be necessary to extend the state of emergency for parts of the country continuing to see a high number of coronavirus cases, sources familiar with the matter told Japan Times.

The state of emergency, which entails urging the public to refrain from going outside unnecessarily and asking restaurants and bars to shorten their opening hours, could remain in place until the end of February, the sources said. The current end date is Feb. 7.

The Tokyo metropolitan government reported 1,026 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Jan. 26, with the count exceeding 1,000 for the first time in three days.

The capital has seen four-digit daily increases almost every day since entering January, but the figures had been trending downward in recent days as people were urged to obey emergency measures. Tokyo's cumulative cases now stand at 95,534.

Seattle, Washington-based Trident Seafoods is continuing to test workers at its remote 700-employee processing plant in Akutan, Alaska, but of the 307 tested so far, 135 have been confirmed to have COVID-19.

The Seattle Times reported that the plant, which has closed temporarily along with nearby facilities operated by Westward Seafoods and UniSea, hopes to complete testing in the coming days.

"We have a great team focused on making sure we’re preventing further spread of the virus while we continue to assess each individual employee's health, care for the sick and understand who had been infected," Trident CEO Joe Bundrant said in a statement.

Diversified Communications has canceled another of its portfolio of seafood shows, this time pushing Aquaculture UK from May 2021 to May 2022.

The show, which was due to take place on May 19-21, will be deferred to the new dates of May 3-5, 2022 at the Macdonald Resort in Aviemore, Scotland.

The decision follows the ongoing impact of the coronavirus pandemic and comes after close monitoring of information from the government, as well as consultation with the aquaculture community, it said.

"Although all the signs are positive for a restart of events from Easter, we feel running Aquaculture UK in May is too early. We want to give everyone the best possible chance for a great show, so it is important we have a clear run into the event," said event director Cheri Arvonio.

Instead, it will launch a "virtual sustainability seminar" to take place over the 2021 dates.

Diversified has previously had to cancel Seafood Expo Asia in November 2020, the Boston and Brussels seafood shows, as well as what would have been the first Aquaculture UK event since it acquired the rights to that show.

Both oyster farmers and the watermen who catch them wild in the Chesapeake Bay, a body of water shared by the US states of Maryland and Virginia, are seeing their prices drop precipitously, the Bay Journal reports.

Oyster sales picked up during the late spring and summer, as restaurants reopened on a limited basis, but demand has grown softer since the 2020–21 wild harvest season opened on Oct. 1, 2020, according to the article. A wild-caught bushel that was worth $50 dockside in the fall of 2019 is now fetching only $30.

"Come Oct. 1, the bottom just fell out of the market," Fred Tull, who raises oysters on 10 acres in the Little Annemessex River by Crisfield, Maryland, reportedly told the newspaper.

By mid-December, when holiday demand for shellfish is usually strong, he had oysters to sell but no market, he added.

The drop in demand, which has hit both shucked and half-shell oysters, is due to the surge in COVID-19 cases bringing renewed restrictions on dining at restaurants.At Mobjack Bay Seafood, a family-run wholesaler in Ware Neck, Virginia, sales are down as much as 70% this season, owner John Vigliotta told the news service.

The 2019-2020 wild oyster harvest ended a couple of weeks before the official March 31 close due to the first wave of COVID-19 hitting and seafood wholesalers cutting off their purchases. It couldn't have come at a worse time.

The bay's oysters appeared to be rebounding after heavy rains in 2018 and the first half of 2019 had diluted salinity in the Chesapeake, killing some of the bivalves and hampering reproduction for others. But weather conditions had turned favorable and Maryland watermen were able to rake in 270,000 bushels of oysters, nearly double the previous year's landings.

In Virginia, public and private oyster grounds have yielded a steady harvest of between 500,000 and 600,000 bushels a year, the Bay Journal reports.

The crawfish harvest season in the US state of Louisiana is getting off to a slow start but suppliers are hopeful that 2021 will bring a better year than the previous season, which coincided with the early period of the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the Beaumont Enterprise, the season has so far been marked by small crawfish, which means that suppliers have to consider what demand will be like in a few months.

"The weather has been cold," Mark Partin, the manager at J.T.'s Seafood said. "Farmers don't want to fish all of their small crawfish now. They want them to grow, and farmers don't want to harvest when the crawfish are molting. However, crawfish won't grow if fields are over-populated. It's a balance. There are a few older ones in there, but the size of the young ones we’re seeing is about two to two-and-a-half inches."

Another processing plant has closed on the Aleutian Islands following an outbreak of coronavirus, reports KTOO.

This time, it is the turn of the Westward Seafoods’ plant on the island of Unalaska, which closed on Jan. 22 based on a cluster of positive cases identified through surveillance testing.

On Jan. 20, industry giant Trident Seafoods shut its huge plant on the nearby island of Akutan, while the biggest plant on Unalaska, UniSea, has been closed now for nearly three weeks after a separate outbreak.

Fishermen are growing increasingly frantic, with the lucrative pollock A season underway and a diminishing list of plants open to sell their catch to.

Only two processing plants now remain open on Unalaska: Maruha Nichiro-owned Westward Seafoods’ second facility, and Icicle Seafoods’ floating plant.

And while some vessels are waiting for the plants to reopen before they start fishing, others have already returned from voyages with their catch only to discover the plants have shut.

Many states across the US are making food and agricultural workers eligible to receive COVID-19 vaccinations as "essential" workers in the latest distribution phase.

The vaccines, which have previously been distributed largely to health care workers and the elderly, are being rolled out to other high-risk groups as more vaccines become available. According to the website JD Supra, many states define frontline food and agricultural workers, which presumably includes fishermen and seafood processing workers, as essential making them eligible for distribution phase 1B, which is ongoing.

The website lists state-by-state vaccine distribution plans.

As the pollock A season gets underway, Trident Seafoods announced a three-week pause in operations at its processing plant in Akutan, Alaska, to contain a coronavirus outbreak.

The move will "enable comprehensive testing and support a preventative quarantine for its 700 workers there", the company said.

On Monday, Trident revealed four staff at the plant have tested positive for COVID-19.

Click here for the full story.

Some 30 combined positive coronavirus findings among the crew members of at least five squid fishing vessels has delayed trips from Vigo, Spain, to the Falkland Islands for some of them, the Merco Press reports.

One vessel reportedly had 18 members of its crew test positive.

Some of the infected are foreign workers who arrived in Vigo just a few weeks ago, though the Galician Health Service, Sergas, has said that protocols are being followed. The arriving crewmembers are "isolated" in hotels until the moment they embark.Additionally, all vessels are required to make health declarations to Customs and Immigration prior to arrival in Stanley and after 21-23 days spent sailing from Vigo.

As most vessels will not arrive in the Falkland Islands until the weekend before the start of the season, on Feb. 24, it is too early to estimate whether or not there will be any delays or undue impact, the newspaper noted.

China's General Administration of Customs has halted import declarations from the Chilean and Indonesia aquatic product manufacturers Pesquera Reymar and Karya Argun over frozen food imports that tested positive for the novel coronavirus, Global Times reports.

More specifically, a sample of a batch of frozen king crab from Chile was tested positive, as a sample of frozen hairtail imported from Indonesia did too.

The announcement took place on Jan. 20 and the suspension will last one week, after which imports will automatically resume.

Unalaska's largest seafood processing plant, UniSea, remains locked down after 20 more employees have tested positive for COVID-19, Alaska Public Media reports.

Unalaska reports having tested 475 workers over the past few days after a number of other employees were found to be positive with the virus earlier this month, cases believed linked to a New Year's gathering in company housing.

The plant maintains a year-round workforce and handles multiple species, including cod and crab. It's gearing up for one of its busiest times of the year. The winter pollock fishing season is set to begin on Jan. 20 and involves flying in about 500 workers to Unalaska, UniSea president Tom Enlow reportedly said in an email to the news service.

The company has strict protocols to prevent the spread of the virus, he said, including a mandatory two-week quarantine after workers arrive, paired with a three-test strategy and daily monitoring.However, many employees have families who do not live on company property, he also noted.

"It's nerve-racking," Enlow said. "Not knowing how and where the virus is getting introduced will make everyone on edge until we’ve got everyone inoculated and have achieved herd immunity." The news coming out of Unalaska pairs with reports of an outbreak at Trident Seafoods’ plant in Akutan, which employs 1,400 in peak times. Four workers there were found to have tested positive, as reported by Undercurrent News on Monday.

Major US grocer Albertsons saw its same-store sales rise by 12.3% for the period endings Dec.5 as its digital sales rose by 225% year-on-year, Progressive Grocer reported.

The company invested $1.1 billion in initiatives during the first 40 weeks of 2021 including on such technologies as an automated and contactless grocery pickup kiosk, which is being pilot tested at an Albertsons store near Chicago, Illinois.

"We are supercharging our digital and omnichannel offerings to serve customers however they want, whenever they want," said Chris Rupp, executive vice president and chief customer and digital officer at Albertsons said. "This innovative and contactless PickUp kiosk makes it even easier for customers to shop with us in a way that is convenient for them."

The chain also plans to expand its Drive Up & Go offering to around 1,400 stores by the end of its fiscal year.

Many seafood players are hoping COVID-19 vaccines can bring some sort of normality back to the industry as soon as May or June 2021, but in January, several countries are reporting increased numbers of daily cases.

Widespread vaccination should allow for the reopening of the foodservice sector, while the resumption of air travel will help tourism flourish, as well as ease air freight woes.

However, the timescale of this process remains uncertain and will vary from country to country.There are still many bumps on the road before the seafood sector is able to return to normality, warned Flavio Corsin, director of partnerships with aquaculture-focused investment fund Aqua-Spark.

Corsin, an aquaculture specialist with almost 30 years’ experience in the sector and a PhD in epidemiology, told Undercurrent News some COVID-19 related disruptions are likely to continue throughout 2021, and possibly into 2022 and the following years.

He pointed to multiple sources of uncertainty, such as the speed and quantity of vaccine production and distribution; the lack of accurate data on present infections; and the fact that multiple vaccines are available in different parts of the world.

"There are about 150 vaccines under development," Corsin pointed out, adding it might take until 2023 or 2024 until the whole world's population has been fully protected.

"Even if the vaccine has been given to a percentage of the population, not knowing how many people have been infected, it won't be clear when the population of one given country will have reached herd immunity," he noted.

Vaccinated people may still be infectious, so international travel is likely to remain off-limits for a long time yet. Seafood supply chains’ global integration could slow down the resumption of normality, Corsin said.

According to Corsin, this uncertainty will lead to more investments in aquaculture projects closer to markets, like recirculating aquaculture systems in Europe or tilapia farming in Africa.

Trident Seafoods is working to contain an outbreak of coronavirus in its massive plant in Akutan, in the US state of Alaska.

The company confirmed four workers at the remote Akutan plant, which can employ 1,400 in peak times and is the largest seafood processing factory in North America, have tested positive for COVID-19.

Joe Bundrant, CEO of Trident, told Undercurrent News that "so many people in the company have worked so damn hard" to contain the spread of COVID-19 in its facilities.

Click here for the full story.

After the COVID-19 pandemic decimated tourist arrivals in the US state of Hawaii leading to job losses for timeshare salesmen Edward Blum and Jared Dufault, the pair have pivoted to seafood, West Hawaii Today reported.

Four months ago Blum and Dufault opened the Kona Seafood Market on "the big island" of Hawaii to sell locally supplied product including ahi tuna and other species that local harvesters previously sold on the side of the road.

"It got to the point where we thought there has to be a better way. This can't be the best solution for the locals who go out there and fish days on end trying to make ends meet," Blum said. "For the locals who should have so much access to fresh fish, their options are the grocery store or someone on the side of the road just didn't seem right to us. There's got to be something better."

Alaskan processor UniSea remains closed after a COVID-19 outbreak grew by 20 employees who tested positive for the virus on Jan. 15, reports KUCB.

The firm tested 475 employees over the past few days after a number of workers tested positive in early January, said UniSea president Tom Enlow.

The original cases were linked to a New Year's gathering in company housing. With no recent travel or known contacts with infected people, those cases are considered community spread.

"It's nerve-racking," Enlow said in an email. "Not knowing how and where the virus is getting introduced will make everyone on edge until we’ve got everyone inoculated and have achieved herd immunity."

Unisea's ramp-up for pollock season, which begins Jan. 20, entails flying about 500 workers to Unalaska, he said.

The company has strict protocols to prevent the spread of the virus. Those include a mandatory two-week quarantine after workers arrive in Unalaska, paired with a three-test strategy and daily monitoring.

A group of shrimp harvesters in the US state of Mississippi and the non-profit Extra Table recently worked together to provide 36,000 meals to families in need across the state, The Northside Sun reported.

The initiative supplies locally caught shrimp to over 50 food banks including several in the cities of Hattiesburg, Jackson, Biloxi and Gulfport.

"These types of community efforts have never been more important," Martha Allen, the executive director of Extra Table said. "Hunger was a critical issue well before the pandemic and we are grateful to be working with Mississippi shrimpers and other organizations to help our neighbors during this time of crisis."

Last year's decision by Louisiana governor John Bel Edwards to limit the US state's restaurants to take out and delivery only had big, unfortunate consequences for crawfish suppliers, and uncertainty remains over the 2021 season, the Daily Advertiser reported.

The newspaper reported that while restaurants learned to live with the new rules and adapted to small crawfish boils and takeaway services, hurricanes, cold weather and the economy mean that it's unclear how the 2021 season will end up.

"There's a lot of ifs. COVID is a big if," Mike Frugé, owner of Frugé Seafood said. "A massive shutdown like last spring means all bets are off."

But demand remains high according to Laney King, co-founder of The Crawfish App.

"The demand for crawfish is very high since many people had to miss out on their planned crawfish boils with friends and coworkers last season," King said. "… We are predicting that by mid-March, crawfish prices and supply will be right in line with where they usually are during the heart of the season."

A virtual seafood industry trade show in the Canadian province of British Columbia came off as a success when the in-person event had to be canceled due to the ongoing pandemic, Canada's Business Examiner reported.

The three-day 2020 BC Seafood Festival, held beginning on Nov 17, served as a bridge between the last in-person event and the next one, which will hopefully be held in June, organizer Invest Comox Valley said.

"Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures, and I’m very pleased that our team pushed forward to create the event virtually, which provides continuity for 2021," John Watson, the organizer's executive director said. "We know seafood companies have been hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, and we wanted to do whatever we could to help them connect with new international buyers."

Washington, D. C.-area grocer Giant Food is rolling out a 14-item line of "cook-in-bag" meals as part of its private brand portfolio that includes four seafood options.

The seafood meals can be prepared in the oven in an hour or less. The items include Mediterranean cod, lemon dill scallops, Chesapeake Bay style shrimp and bourbon salmon, the grocer said.

"Our cook-in-bag products offer flavorful and simple meal solutions, particularly at a time when many are experiencing cooking fatigue at home," Tonya Herring, Giant's senior vice president and chief merchandising officer said.

As Tokyo's state of emergency compels restaurants to cut their business hours, suppliers may soon be eligible for financial aid, reports Japan Times, citing government sources.

Under the plan, up to JPY 400,000 will be given to small businesses and up to JPY 200,000 to sole proprietors, informed sources said. The government is expected to announce the aid program after the end of the three-day weekend, on Jan. 12.

Businesses eligible for the aid will include those whose sales have dropped by about half or more from January or February last year as a result of eateries shortening operating hours. Possible recipients include suppliers that have direct business deals with eateries in Tokyo and three neighboring prefectures — Saitama, Chiba and Kanagawa — and indirect suppliers such as farmers and fishers.

All domestic firms will be able to receive the aid if they fulfill the required conditions, according to the sources.

US quick-service restaurant chain Pokeworks is experimenting with an expansion of its to-go offerings testing a prototype mobile order pick-up lane it's calling a "cruise-thru" lane.

The Irvine, California-based chain, which has over 60 locations and 130 others in development, said in a press release that its first cruise-thru lane will be tested at its location in Knoxville, Tennessee in the coming months.

The lane's pickup window will service guests who have preordered through the chain's mobile phone app and allow them to order and leave without leaving their vehicles. The chain plans to roll out similar lanes at its future locations in suburban areas, it said.

"It's our responsibility to listen to our guests and their needs while providing a solution without losing sight of the essence of our brand, which is the epitome of what the cruise-thru lane is for Pokeworks," Peter Yang, the company's chief development officer and co-founder said. "We look forward to testing the prototype and continuing to grow as we continue to serve communities nationwide."

Alaska-based processor UniSea entered a partial lockdown and has shut down all non-essential work after four employees tested positive for COVID-19 last week, reports KUCB.

Four "non-quarantined" individuals tested positive for the illness, raising the firm's risk level to ‘high’ and causing UniSea to confine workers to their housing quarters, said Tom Enlow, president and CEO at the Nippon Suisan Kaisha-owned firm.

KUCB's latest update saw the firm tracing roughly 50 close contacts who were to be tested on Jan. 6, with UniSea working to determine if the virus was contained to a "small group" that gathered to celebrate the New Year or whether the positive cases are indicative of more widespread community transmission.

Pre-cooked seafood from the US state of Florida is being incorporated into food aid distributed as part of the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Farmers to Families Food Box program, The Capitolist reported.

Distribution of the food boxes began in May 2020 with 132 million handed out since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Some $1.5 billion was provided in the fifth round of funding for the program which will include fresh produce, meat and Florida seafood, the news site said.

"This new round of Farmers to Families Food Boxes will go a long way in helping American families access nutritious and healthy meals as we recover from the COVID-19 pandemic," USDA secretary Sonny Perdue said in a statement.

Thailand's Thai Union Group has performed COVID-19 testing on 23,630 of its 27,552 workers in the province of Samut Sakorn in the wake of an outbreak there, the company told its shareholders.

"In this regard, the company received only 0.29% or 69 confirmed positive cases by PCR testing. Those infected employees have been treated as per the government measures," Thai Union said in an exchange filing.

It hopes to have all of its employees tested in the next week.

"Operations are all ongoing but in-person meetings for employees, contractors and visitors are cut down to essential business and only with permission from the management team. In addition, the company limits employee movement among working locations within factories and manages support functions to work from home," president and CEO Thiraphong Chansiri said in a statement.

For months, Thailand had been seen as a success story in the global fight against COVID-19 but during the past two weeks, cases have more than doubled to 9,331 this week, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Many of the new infections have been linked to migrant workers at a seafood market in Samut Sakron.

An official at China's Ministry of Agriculture emphasized that the Chinese government does not view seafood as a transmission vector for the coronavirus.

This follows a consumer backlash against imported seafood which has left some in China's own seafood industry blaming state media for fuelling those fears.

Speaking at a webinar by the organizers of the China Fisheries and Seafood Expo on Wednesday (Jan. 6), Ma Hongtao, director general of Agricultural Trade Promotion Center of China's Ministry of Agriculture, said experts have clarified on media that seafood and aquatic products themselves will not be infected with COVID-19

This followed government reports into outbreaks in Beijing and Shenyang showed packages or environmental pollution were the source of infections, not the seafood itself, she said.

"I think there is no necessary correlation between seafood and COVID-19," said Ma.

"Chinese consumers welcome safe, high-quality, and delicious [imported] agricultural and aquatic products," she added.

She added that exporters will be welcome to showcase and reaffirm the safety of their products at the China Fisheries and Seafood Expo, which is set to be held in October.

To read the full report click here.

After India's public health ministry had confirmed that more than 900 new positive coronavirus cases were found in a canned tuna factory in Samut Sakhon province after 3,800 tests, it said the figure was old information already included in previous reports, the Bangkok Post reports.

The figure — which was spread through social media sparking public panic on Jan. 6 — included a total of over 500 new cases in the area that the Centre for the Covid-19 Situation Administration made public a few days ago.

Opas Karnkawinpong, director-general of the disease control department, confirmed the information and identified the factory as belonging to Pataya Food Group, the leading shelf-stable seafood manufacturer and distributor in Thailand.

The firm confirmed some infections among its employees, who are currently isolated along with people who had been in close contact with them, it said.

Besides, canned tuna producer Thai Union Group also said its factories were continuing to operate normally after 69 people out of more than 23,000 workers at its plants in southwest Bangkok tested positive for coronavirus.

The Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre (SAIC) announced a major milestone as it grew membership beyond 150 organizations for the first time.

Marine engineering specialist Malin Group and the Isle of Skye Mussel Company are the latest to join the consortium, which acts as a connecting point between the aquaculture sector and other peripheral firms involved in biotechnology, equipment supply and logistics.

The SAIC has been growing rapidly during the COVID-19 crisis, as the sector turns to more collaborative research efforts during difficult times, it said.

Consortium membership has grown by roughly 25% since February 2020, after it launched its ongoing rapid-response funding program to support investment into new innovations.

"The growth of SAIC's consortium reflects the increasing commitment from aquaculture — as well as the many industries that support it — to innovation and collaboration," said Heather Jones, CEO of the group. "It also highlights the growing diversity of the sector, not only in terms of geography, but also in the types of businesses involved, their size, and areas of focus."

"That innovation is a priority for organizations throughout aquaculture — from fish feed producers to food retailers — reflects the growing recognition that the sector is more inter-connected than it has ever been."

"That innovation is a priority for organisations throughout aquaculture – from fish feed producers to food retailers – reflects the growing recognition that the sector is more inter-connected than it has ever been.

The priciest tuna sold at the New Year's auction at Tokyo's Toyoshu fish market fetch just ¥20.84 million ($20.2m), down 10% of 2020's top catch, due to the pandemic negative effect on the foodservice industry, The Japan Times reports.

The price for the 208-kilogram bluefin tuna is well below the previous year's ¥193.2m paid by a Tokyo-based sushi restaurant chain operator.

"It was a good result amid a lot of negative news. It is a good tuna," Yukitaka Yamaguchi, president of intermediate wholesaler Yamayuki, who was the successful bidder on the tuna, said.

However, this is not the only effect the pandemic has had on Japan's tuna industry as exports fell by 18% y-o-y in the first six months of 2020, Reuters also reports.

The Thai province of Samut Sakhon, a seafood processing hub, reported 541 more confirmed COVID-19 cases on Sunday afternoon, reports the country's Bangkok Post.

The additional infections brought the total in the province to 2,401, with the Mahachai shrimp market the epicenter.

The market is sealed off and a curfew is in place in Muang district, where it's located.

The new caseload included 448 migrant workers who were diagnosed through active testing, and another seven at hospitals. The rest were Thai nationals.

Chilean aquaculture fair AquaSur has been pushed back to March 2022, organizers said.

The event scheduled for Mar. 3-5 this year will be held online in place of this year's in-person show in Mar. 24-26.

Originally scheduled for October 2020, the show — which is usually held every two years — is now slated for almost two years later due to the pandemic.

A newly launched program in the US state of Maine is helping to support struggling groundfishermen deliver catches to food banks and others in need across the state as the pandemic has walloped demand.

According to Maine Public, the program Fishermen Feeding Mainers, which was organized by the Maine Coast Fishermen's Association, has paid a minimum of around $2 per pound for species such as Atlantic pollock in a tough year for harvesters.

"I didn't fish all summer. I didn't start fishing until the project came about," fisherman Bryan Pearce said. "So once that happened I started going full time. I had a guaranteed price, I knew what I could make. I said, ‘Well, that takes all the guesswork out of it, I’ll go. I’ll do it’".

The program was launched with an anonymous donation of $160,000, which was supplemented by $200,000 in pandemic aid and other donations.

A number of positive coronavirus cases have been reported among staff at Warminster, UK-based Lyons Seafood, reports Wiltshire Times.

Shrimp processor Lyons is the second UK subsidiary of French downstream giant Labeyrie Fine Foods to see reports of positive cases in the past fortnight, with sister company Farne Salmon & Trout dealing with a similar coronavirus outbreak at its plant in Duns, Scotland as of Dec. 23 (below).

Staff members identified as being in close contact with the positive cases have already been told to self-isolate by health officials. Staff at Lyons’ plant have been routinely, but were re-tested in light of the new confirmed cases.

Further investigations into the source of the outbreak is ongoing, with the total number of positive cases linked to Lyons not yet confirmed.

"The safety of our colleagues and of their families is our highest priority and Lyons Seafood will continue to work closely with the statutory bodies to ensure we continue reducing the risk of Covid-19," said Lyons’ managing director Mark Newton.

Good news may soon be coming for Australian rock lobster exporters who have long relied on China as a lucrative market. The business was hit hard first by the COVID-19 pandemic and more recently by a trade dispute between the two countries.

But, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi recently said that China wants to see ties between the two countries improved "as early as possible".

Wang added that Australia has to make efforts to improve the relationship. The newspaper previously reported on a list of 14 alleged grievances that China has with Australia including the funding of "anti-China research", support for an investigation into the origins of COVID-19 and blocking certain Chinese foreign investment deals. Earlier this month, Australia asked the World Trade Organization to investigate tariffs China had imposed on Australian barley in May.

Thailand has said it would allow undocumented migrant workers from Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar to work in the country legally for about two years to curb the spread of COVID-19, reports Reuters.

Migrants have to sign up online and be registered by an employer before mid-September in order to receive a work permit until February 2023, according to a resolution by the cabinet.

They will first have to undergo health checks at a cost of about 7,200 baht ($240), a Thai government spokeswoman said.

The announcement came as Thailand deals with its worst coronavirus outbreak to-date, with more than 1,500 cases since mid-December having been linked to mostly Burmese migrant workers at a seafood market in central Samut Sakhon province.

Perceived links between the COVID outbreak and migrant workers has prompted some ugly flashpoints in the country.

Maryland's Department of Agriculture and Department of Natural Resources (DNR) will distribute a combined $9 million in COVID-19 relief funds to the US state's agricultural and seafood sectors, WMAR reported.

DNR will distribute $3m in direct payments to commercial, for-hire, aquaculture, and seafood processing operations where 2020 sales fell by more than 35% due to the pandemic.

DNR will also allocate $1m to support seafood marketing and business support, the station reported.

The surge in COVID cases at the Talay Thai wholesale shrimp market in the coastal province of Samut Sakhon, near Bangkok, has stirred up anti-migrant sentiment among a large number of workers from Myanmar, Deutsche Welle reports.

"Shoot all of them down since they don't follow the rules," one Thai citizen commented on a Facebook post, which also claimed three Burmese men had fled Samut Sakhon. "Kick them back to their country," read another Facebook post, referring to them.

Both the country's prime and health ministers, Prayuth Chan-ocha and Anutin Charnvirakul, also blamed the flare-up on "illegal immigrants."

However, Thailand's economy is highly dependent on the low-wage labor provided by migrant workers and some officials have spoken out against these behaviors.

"The Myanmar people living in the Central Shrimp Market are not convicts, nor are they criminal suspects. They did not commit any wrongdoing," said Veerasak Vijitsaengsri, governor of Samut Sakhon.

"Migrant workers help drive our economy. We rely on their workforce. Thai people won't take the jobs they are doing," Taweesin Wisanuyothin, a spokesman for Thailand's COVID-19 task force, also said. "We are brothers and sisters, whether they are legal or not."

The US state of Alaska is preparing to decide which categories of residents should be next in line to receive vaccines for COVID-19 with representatives of the seafood industry asking to be made a priority.

According to the Anchorage Daily News, the Alaska Vaccine Advisory Committee recently received over 50 live comments and 300 written comments recommending who should be vaccinated next.

Health care workers, teachers, the elderly and seafood workers were among the suggestions.

"Our members process seafood in coastal communities and at sea, all either in or linked to remote, coastal communities off the road system and without the support of significant medical infrastructure," Chris Barrows of the Pacific Seafood Processors Association said

The next tier of people to to be vaccinated is slated to begin Jan. 4.

Rock lobster harvesters in Australia are having increasing luck selling their catches domestically as lucrative export markets in China have dried up amid the COVID-19 pandemic and trade disputes.

According to AFP News, the $500 million industry continues to suffer as China has placed a near-total ban on imports of the species, part of what some are calling a "shadow trade war".

"It has affected us drastically," fisherman Fedele Camarda said. "Our income has been reduced considerably."

Still, domestic sales of lobster for Christmas have skyrocketed albeit at average prices of $34 per kilogram, a 46% reduction from export prices.

"That's just enough to break even," Camarda said. "But we have been selling out almost every day. We are taking pre-orders as people want it for Christmas."

Many seafood suppliers in the US state of Maryland are suffering amid the restaurant closures provoked by the COVID-19 pandemic but oyster farmers have been particularly hard hit, WTOP reported.

The "aquaculture industry has been hit really hard this year," Colby Ferguson, the director of government and public relations for the Maryland Farm Bureau, said, according to the television station.

Sources cited the public's reluctance to cook certain kinds of seafood, like oysters, at home.

Jason Ruth, owner of Harris Seafood Co., an oyster grower in Chester, Maryland, says sales of oyster are down 72% this year when compared to last year.

"People are feared to death right now," Jason Ruth of oyster grower Harris Seafood Co in Chester, Maryland, said. "Fish and oysters are something that people generally don't take home to shuck themselves or clean themselves. And those two products actually had the worst years they’ve ever had."

US president Donald Trump has aired complaints over a proposed $900 billion COVID-19 relief package on the grounds that the $600 stimulus checks to be sent to most Americans are insufficient.

According to Reuters, Trump criticized the bill on Twitter.

"The bill they are now planning to send back to my desk is much different than anticipated," Trump said in a video on the social media site. "It really is a disgrace."

The aid package, which is being attached to the $1.4 trillion government funding bill known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021, was anticipated to be signed by the president when it reaches his desk. According to CNN, the $900bn aid package includes "direct payments of up to $600 per adult, enhanced jobless benefits of $300 per week, roughly $284bn in Paycheck Protection Program loans, $25bn in rental assistance, an extension of the eviction moratorium and $82bn for schools and colleges".

In addition, it also includes $300 million in fisheries aid and makes seafood an eligible use for US Department of Agriculture food purchases.

Trump, who has made meritless claims that he won the 2020 presidential election, said he wanted the bill revised.

"I’m also asking Congress to immediately get rid of the wasteful and unnecessary items from this legislation, and to send me a suitable bill, or else the next administration will have to deliver a COVID relief package. And maybe that administration will be me," he wrote.

He did not say explicitly if he would veto the bill.

Chinese medical officers are trying to reassure the public of the negligible risk of infection with the coronavirus from imported frozen food after a spate of cases among port warehouse workers.

Zhang Wenhong, director and secretary of the party branch of the Department of Infectious Diseases at Huashan Hospital, told CCTV News, China's largest state-owned television news broadcaster, that there has not been a single case of COVID-19 that has been traced back to food and the public were being overly worried.

"We have reached the point of unfounded worry, always worrying that the sky will fall, and then we can't sleep," he said.

The Chinese city of Dalian is currently mass testing residents after several workers at a cold storage warehouse tested positive for the virus. As of Dec. 21, 17 people tested positive for the virus, including 12 asymptomatic cases.

Wu Zunyou, chief expert of epidemiology at the China Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told a press conference on Dec. 21 that the risk of infection from food imported through the cold chain is nevertheless "extremely low".

He noted that live viruses, dead viruses and virus fragments may all result in positive nucleic acid tests "but that does not necessarily mean the virus is infectious".

He added that all imported cold chain foods and goods in the country are mostly only lightly contaminated.

"The prerequisite for human infection with the novel coronavirus due to contamination is that the amount of viral load is relatively large, and long-term repeated contact is required to cause infection. Therefore, among logistics workers, we are seeing some cases of infection."

"But if the average person accidentally buys contaminated food, the risk of infection is very low."

The UK's Farne Salmon & Trout is dealing with a coronavirus outbreak at its plant in Duns, Scotland.

Eight members of staff tested positive for COVID-19 at the plant, owned by France's Labeyrie Fine Foods.

Arrangements are being made for the further testing of other employees who worked in the same area as the staff who have tested positive, according to a release from NHS Borders.

"Where clusters of cases develop we must find them and act quickly to prevent further spread," said Tim Patterson, director of public health at NHS Borders.

"The people confirmed to have the infection and their close contacts in the community have been identified and advice provided. As a further precautionary measure, arrangements are also being made for the further testing of other employees who worked in the same area as the positive staff," he said.

Although France has reopened the border with the UK for lorry drivers who test negative for COVID-19, the backlog of trucks will take days to clear, reports the Financial Times.

The British army will be deployed to test lorry drivers starting on Wednesday morning. Only French and EU citizens or residents with an essential reason to travel who show a negative COVID-19 test result less than 72 hours old will be allowed into France until at least Jan. 6, the FT reports.

The sudden closure of French frontiers to all travelers from the UK on Sunday night had severely disrupted the transit of seafood.

The Scottish shellfish sector is likely to be the worst hit by the 48-hour UK-France border closure, which has decimated sales of fresh seafood to the continent during their busiest week of the year.

Due to the closure, exports have missed Europe's Christmas market, with the freight shipments only restarting in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Yet the blow has been felt particularly keenly by shellfish exporters, who have missed the major Spanish Christmas markets held in the days before.

Speaking to Undercurrent News on Dec. 22, Donna Fordyce, head of industry body Seafood Scotland, said that for Scottish shellfish the lost Christmas sales were a bitter blow on top of an already damaging year.

"The shellfish guys have really suffered throughout the whole of COVID, and prior to this weekend we were really worried about the viability of some of the fleet given the nature of the markets over the past months in Europe," Fordyce told Undercurrent.

Farmed salmon exporters have also lost business, according to Tavish Scott, chief executive of the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation.

"Some of our member companies have lost contracts already, they’ve been canceled by buyers in the European marketplace," Scott told Undercurrent.

"Now I’m not saying there's a lot but they are valuable contracts, so the impact is already real. It's not just a notional loss on paper, but a real loss for some companies, and I think it's fair to say if this continues, then that situation will clearly get worse," he said.

Scott added that it was highly improbable that insurers — already playing hardball over COVID-19 related refunds — would pay out to exporters due to the disruption. "Indeed, quite the opposite, I don't think there's any likelihood at all of that happening," he said. "I don't know why [UK transport secretary] Grant Shapps said we were all going to receive insurance, it's absolutely factually not true. He's certainly not checked out the marketplace."

The Seafood Harvesters of America (SHA) and the National Fisheries Institute (NFI) are applauding the US Congress’ passage of a $900 billion COVID-19 relief package that has been months in the making.

The aid package, which is being attached to the $1.4 trillion government funding bill known as the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021, is expected to be signed by president Donald Trump when it reaches his desk. According to CNN, the $900bn aid package includes "direct payments of up to $600 per adult, enhanced jobless benefits of $300 per week, roughly $284bn in Paycheck Protection Program loans, $25bn in rental assistance, an extension of the eviction moratorium and $82bn for schools and colleges".

In addition, it also includes $300 million in fisheries aid and makes seafood an eligible use for US Department of Agriculture food purchases, the SHA said in a statement.

"The additional fisheries assistance funds allocated will help our fishing businesses ensure they can weather the continued market disruptions in the seafood sector. We look forward to working with the Biden Administration to improve the disbursement of these funds," the SHA said.

The NFI also offered its support, its president, John Connelly, said.

"The final legislation allows forgivable loan funds to be used for covered business expenses that include accounts receivable debt. NFI has consistently urged Congress to address this issue by classifying accounts receivable debt as a forgivable expense under the Paycheck Protection Program. We are pleased that this new package includes a provision that does just that," he said.

France has failed to lift its ban on freight and passengers from the UK even as British prime minister Boris Johnson personally appealed to president Emmanuel Macron to put aside his "anxiety" over the mutant coronavirus strain, the Guardian reported.

Johnson said 20% of food, medicines, and other goods passing through British ports had been blocked by Paris's decision, triggering government crisis plans at Dover and other major pinch points.

The EU is drawing up a coordinated plan to lift travel restrictions from the UK, but no date has yet been set for when passenger, freight, and cargo movement will be permitted again, with sources in Brussels suggesting nationally imposed bans could remain in place for some time.

The US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is recommending that US residents 75-years-old and older and "frontline essential workers" be the next in line to receive limited stocks of the COVID-19 vaccines that are becoming available.

In recent weeks, the first stocks of the vaccine have been distributed to frontline health care workers and nursing home residents. NPR reported that the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices voted Dec. 20 on its recommendations for the order in which high-risk priority groups should be allocated the vaccine.

"This was a really difficult decision for me, because I truly wish everyone could get the vaccine today," Dr. Peter Szilagyi, a pediatrician at UCLA and a voting member of the panel, was quoted as saying.

US officials hope to have around 100 million doses available to the public by the end of February, enough to cover around a third of the population.

EU officials hope to establish Europe-wide measures that would allow traffic flows across the Channel to resume in the coming hours.

In a post shared on Twitter by the French Embassy in the UK, French transport minister Jean-Baptiste Djebbari said: "In the next few hours, at European level, we’re going to establish a solid health protocol to ensure that movement from the UK can resume".

European Union states have started an emergency meeting in Brussels this morning to discuss a coordinated response after Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, among other countries, shut temporarily their borders with the UK because of concerns at the spread of a new variant of coronavirus.

UK prime minister Boris Johnson has called an emergency Cobra meeting in an effort to avoid Christmas food shortages after France banned all freight and travel to and from the UK for 48 hours, reports Sky News.

France's decision came following the rapid spread of a new strain of coronavirus across the UK's south-east, which prompted Johnson's government to create a new heightened tier of pandemic restrictions over the weekend.

Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Ireland and Bulgaria have also announced UK travel restrictions of their own.

The UK government fears shortages in the flow of both food and coronavirus vaccines into the country as a result, since European lorry-drivers are reportedly unwilling to cross the English Channel if they may not be allowed to return.

Johnson's government is also monitoring the current stock on supermarket shelves, with concern that certain items may run out if the travel ban lasts longer than two days.

Efforts are underway to test hundreds of workers at Thailand's largest seafood market in Samut Sakhon following an outbreak of COVID-19, reports Khaosod.

On Friday (Dec. 18), several close contacts of a vendor who tested positive for the virus also tested positive.

Sophon Iamsirithavorn, director of the health ministry's communicable disease division, insisted these fresh domestic transmissions do not amount to a new wave of virus outbreak.

"We’re conducting an outbreak investigation, but the patient must have been infected from another patient," Sophon said, suggesting foreigners caused it.

Thailand has largely avoided a mass epidemic of COVID-19.

As of Friday, 232 coronavirus patients remain in hospitals across Thailand, while 4,005 patients have recovered so far. The country's cumulative case number now stands at 4,297, with 60 deaths reported by the authorities.

Packaging of hairtail fish imported from Myanmar has detected positive for the coronavirus by Chinese authorities in the east Chinese city of Wuxi, Xinhua reports.

Authorities detected the novel coronavirus in the packaging samples taken from the hairtail stored in a local food shop.

A total of 17 people who came into contact with the contaminated packaging are currently under isolated observation and have all tested negative for Covid-19.

The North Atlantic Seafood Forum (NASF) is being postponed from March 9-11 to June 8-10, 2021, organizers have announced.

"We have listened to the industry. Many of our regular delegates now fear that both Brexit and COVID challenges will require their full attention in Q1, thus making it difficult to attend NASF in March," said Andre Akse, NASF general manager.

The event had been holding out hope of hosting visitors, but organizers now say it will be a digital conference.

"We believe that NASF 2021 will attract a larger international audience than previous events, since it will be easy and convenient to attend the conference via your computer or tablet, from wherever you are in the world. At present we predict 2,500 delegates attending NASF 2021," said Akse.

Chinese customs continues to closely control monitor all imports for COVID-19, which is likely to slow Vietnam's exports to the country in the months to come, reports Vietnam Plus, citing the country's Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).

Chinese authorities have also recently warned that several batches of frozen Vietnamese shrimp were infected with white dot disease and failed to meet food safety criteria.

Since mid-November, competent agencies at China's border gates have sprayed disinfectant and traced the origin of all frozen aquatic products at most major ports in Shanghai, Wuhan, Tianjin, Qiangdao, and elsewhere. All products must be tested for COVID-19 soon after berth.

VASEP's Truong Dinh Hoe said that despite the growing demand in China, many batches of seafood remain stuck at ports due to the rigorous inspections and prolonged customs clearance.

Sources recently told Undercurrent News that while China remained the single most important market for pangasius this year, its customs checks were making trade tricky.

COVID-19 vaccine will reach Canada's fishing and seafood sector in the second stage of that country's vaccination rollout, but probably not until April, predicts Paul Lansbergen, executive director of the Fisheries Council of Canada, based on his reading of Canada's immunization plan.

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was approved by Health Canada last week, as cases continue to spike across the country — with 460,743 total cases and 13,431 deaths as of Sunday evening, Global News reported.

"All essential sectors, including fish and seafood, are in stage two of the immunization plan," Lansbergen told Undercurrent News in an email Tuesday morning. "Stage one, which started this week, is for the most vulnerable and frontline health care workers. I don't expect any of the essential sectors to start receiving much or any until April.

"Through the summer we should expect more immunization of essential sectors," he continued. "It is expected that Canada won't achieve herd immunity until the fall. But it all depends on the approval of the other vaccines and delivery to Canada. Canada has pre-ordered more than enough for the country so there is plenty of buffer in case some of the vaccines don't work out."

The community of Unalaska in the US state of Alaska reported eight new cases of COVID-19 involving seafood processing workers and vessel crew members.

According to the Bristol Bay Times, five of the individuals are employed at Maruha Nichiro's Alyeska Seafoods and came to Unalaska via charter flight on Dec. 1 while one worker at Nippon Suisan Kaisha-owned processor UniSea arrived in the community on Dec. 2. Two others are crew members aboard a vessel run by United States Seafoods.

All of the affected workers remain in quarantine.

Excess stocks of Australian-caught rock lobster that have been forced on domestic markets after China shut off imports due to COVID-19 concerns are ending up on local supermarket shelves at low prices.

According to ABC News, fishermen in the West Australian city of Geraldton have sold 35 metric tons of rock lobster to the retail chain Woolworth's which is selling the species for AUD 20 ($15) each.

"Before COVID and before all of the recent challenges, I think no-one would have contemplated that we would be here," Matt Rutter, the CEO of the Geraldton Fishermen's Co-Operative said.

He added that the deal will not fully replace the Chinese market.

"The volume is still only a very small proportion of the overall fishery — we are a 6,500t fishery — so in the context of that, it is relatively small but every single market is important," he said.

Two related seafood companies in the US state of Louisiana, Shirley's Crawfish Pad and Crawfish Processing, have been ordered to repay 55 workers nearly $43,000 in back wages after they were forced to quarantine due to COVID-19.

The workers, according to Big Easy Magazine, were owed the money under the Emergency Paid Sick Leave Act provisions of the Families First Coronavirus Response Act.

The magazine said that some of the workers had tested positive for the coronavirus and some were simply ordered to quarantine.

"The Families First Coronavirus Response Act is critical to ensuring the safety of workers and the public. It provides a way for employers to meet their responsibility to protect workers, including those employed in the nation's food supply system, and to take all necessary measures to ensure they are not working while potentially infected with the coronavirus and putting their co-workers and customers at risk," said Wage and Hour Division district director Troy Mouton.

Domestic prices for Australian rock lobster are hitting all-time lows of AUD 70 to AUD 100 ($52 to $74) per kilogram as once-lucrative export markets to China have dried up as the country has banned live imports over coronavirus concerns.

According to the Australian publication Boss Hunting, some rock lobster suppliers in the country's south are selling their catches for as low as AUD 30 to AUD 50, which represents almost no profit margin.

The price drop is causing domestic sales of the species to increase, the publication said.

The owners of the Twisted Lobster restaurant in the US city of Cape Coral, Florida, are asking the public to help them track down their food trailer stolen on Saturday, Dec. 5.

According to NBC2, the red trailer has a value of around $100,000. While the trailer is used primarily to cook food for events, it was parked in front of the restaurant and being used as a sign to advertise that Twisted Lobster remains open during the pandemic.

The owners have asked the public to contact the police with any information.

Australia's seafood industry has called for consumers to support their local lobster industry as it reels from the impacts of the Australia-China trade rift, and to support the entire industry by committing to switch one meal for Aussie seafood.

"It's been a hard year for Australia's seafood industry and now our lobster producers have been dealt another blow," said Seafood Industry Australia (SIA) CEO Veronica Papacosta said.

"As an industry, we’re calling on Aussies to switch one meal a week to Australian seafood in a bid to support our industry."

If 1% of the population switched just one meal a week to locally sourced Australian seafood like shrimp, salmon, or snapper, that would be more than 250,000 meals of Australian seafood on the table, she said.

"Communities in lobster-producing areas…are seeing greater access to Australian rock lobsters than they have in the past, but this doesn't necessarily mean there will be cheap lobsters at every fish counter across the country."

The bulk of lobsters that were heading to China are live, but the preference of the Aussie market is very much for fresh, cooked lobsters, SIA noted.

"We are working hard to cook and chill as much lobster as we can, but it's just not infrastructure we currently have. We have a processing issue, and we are trying to pivot and fix it as fast as we can, so we can get our lobsters onto Australian family tables in time for Christmas."

Major supermarkets account for 60% of Australian at-home seafood consumption sales. "As drivers of volume, we’d love to hear from them about how they can help us get more Aussie lobsters onto tables," said seafood trade advisory group chair Nathan Maxwell-McGinn.

Democratic senators from the US coastal states of Oregon and Rhode Island want the federal government to study what can be done to increase seafood purchases through the US Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Commodity Procurement Program.

The Democratic senators, Oregon's Jeff Merkley and Rhode Island's Jack Reed, have written to the General Accountability Office (GA) with the aim of determining "how to more effectively use federal purchasing power to support the fishing and seafood industries in the future through increases in the volume and variety of seafood products purchased".

A major issue with the USDA's current seafood buying efforts, the senators argue, is that "contracts have been awarded to just a handful of processors in a few select states—leaving many processors, and the families who rely on them, without assistance".

The senators want the GAO to study the USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service food purchasing programs, particularly under the Section 32 and National School Lunch programs, they said.

On Dec. 4, the City of Unalaska — in Alaska, US — reported eight new cases of COVID-19 among employees at two local seafood processing plants and crewmembers of a United States Seafoods trawler, reports KUCB.

Five of the individuals are employed at Alyeska Seafoods and arrived in Unalaska by charter flight on Dec. 1. Another works at UniSea and arrived on the island by commercial flight on Dec. 2, the city said. All employees have been in quarantine since their arrival, and tested positive for the virus on Dec. 3.

The two remaining individuals who tested positive are crewmembers on a US Seafoods fishing vessel currently in port in Unalaska, the city said.

Employment, sales and traffic data released by multiple sources this week confirms it, Nation's Restaurant News (NRN) reports: The US restaurant industry hit another wall in November and saw its small recent recovery stall again.

Overall national unemployment dropped to 6.7% in November, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday, but food services and drinking places lost 17,400 more jobs. The National Restaurant Association (NRA) said, in its latest monthly report, that "sales growth ground to a halt in October" and, "as a result, the restaurant industry remains 2.1 million jobs below its pre-coronavirus level", NRN reports.

Dallas, Texas-basedBlack Box Intelligence, yet another source of data, reported Thursday that November restaurant same-store sales were down 10.3% and same-store traffic was down 16.3%. The performance was a 3.8% decline from October and the worse since August, Black Box said.

NRA chief economist Bruce Grindy provided a less than hopeful prediction, too, warning that there is no immediate catalyst in the immediate future that might lead to a resumption of job growth in the industry.

"Given the rising restrictions on indoor dining and the likelihood of significantly scaled-back holiday celebrations, business conditions will remain extremely challenging in the coming months," he is quoted as saying.

An NRA survey in November found half of restaurant operators expect their staffing levels to decline during the next three months.

A group calling itself the Independent Restaurant Coalition is calling for federal assistance.

"We have warned Congress for months that winter will bring another wave of closures and layoffs – they’re here," the coalition said in a statement quoted by NRN. "Outdoor dining is a distant memory while indoor dining has been restricted in many states across the country, and — unlike in March — restaurants have already endured 10 months of diminished revenue."

Wilmington, Delaware's Cape Fear Seafood Company was started in 2008 a few months before the global financial crisis and the seafood-focused chain has expanded since into four locations, the Wilmington Business Journal reported.

Founder Evans Trawick, said that he is focused on a slow expansion with two more franchises planned in the Raleigh, Virginia, area.

"Cape Fear does everything from a good old-fashioned Calabash fried platter to some really nice dishes," Trawick said. "Back then in 2008 we started off really more, I’d probably say, on the higher end in terms of what we were trying."

He credited attention to detail for the chain's success.

"We talk weekly. They worked for me for a long time, so we’ve got a great relationship," Trawick said of the company's units. "I go up every few weeks and just, you know, stick my head in the door and that kind of thing. But every quarter I inspect their unit … make sure they’re following our standards, our recipes, you know, checking on that Southern hospitality, just making sure that they’re following the blueprint."

Wholesalers at Tokyo, Japan wholesale seafood market Toyosu are partnering with online retailers to sell their high-end fish to the public as foodservice demand remains low due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the Japan Times, wholesaler Chuo Gyorui, which is known as a supplier of pricy bluefin tuna, has linked up with online shopping website operator Shokubunka to boost its seafood sales.

The site will offer products such as blocks of domestic tuna and boxes of sea urchin in addition to fresh scallops, salmon roe and boiled crabs.

Similarly, the Tokyo Fish Market Wholesale Cooperative, which includes 480 intermediate wholesalers at Toyosu, opened the online Inaseri Fish Market in May, the newspaper reported.

The US National Fisheries Institute (NFI) is glad to see that a vaccine to stop the spread of COVID-19 is in advanced development and is making the case that frontline seafood workers receive priority over other members of the public.

NFI president John Connelly said in a statement that the group applauded a recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices that the vaccine first be provided to healthcare workers.

He then made the case for the seafood sector to be placed "near the front of the line".

"All Americans depend on these women and men to harvest and process healthy foods. As the federal agencies and state governors develop their vaccine plans, they should protect those who labor to feed America's families during this pandemic," the NFI president said. "Governments need to move from calling these folks heroes to protecting them with vaccines."

Indonesia's federal government has taken to more strictly monitoring its fish exports to China due to coronavirus contamination concerns, and could possibly expand its measures to include items being exported to other countries, too, the Jakarta Post reports.

"It will be in line with the procedure – but tighter," Fithra Faisal, a spokesperson for the trade ministry, reportedly said of the measures. "This is clearly a precedent for other export products vulnerable to COVID-19 exposure, especially animal products. We will tighten quality control related to COVID-19." The action follows import suspensions levied by China against three Indonesian fish exporters in November after contaminated samples were found, according to the Indonesian Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Ministry.

In two of the incidents, evidence of the virus was allegedly found on outer packaging, though, in a third incident, it was reported to be found on the fish product itself.

"We have asked for the results [of the inspection] from the Chinese government, but we have yet to get them because they say it is their data," Widodo Sumiyanto, head of quality control and fisheries product safety at the fisheries ministry, told the Post in a phone interview on Monday.

Indonesia is feeling the pain of the coronavirus both as a health problem and a trade concern. On Nov. 23, it recorded more than a half million illnesses. And, despite booking trade surpluses, the value of Indonesia's overall exports was down 3.3% year-on-year (yoy) to $14.39 billion in October, according to data from Statistics Indonesia.

However, amid the slump, seafood exports saw an increase of 11.6% yoy to $2.88 billion in the January-October period this year, according to the news service. China accounted for $513.7m of that figure, a 20.6% increase from the $425.9 million worth of seafood exports it took from Indonesia in 2019.

Tests at Fleury Michon's Montifaut Jambons site, rolled out after the detection of a cluster of cases in November, have brought up more positive hits for the illness, reports Ouest France.

As reported earlier in this blog, the French firm found a cluster of positive tests, which prompted it to rapidly screen all 550 employees at the factory. These tests found a further 20 cases, the news site said.

The employees that tested positive were placed in isolation and a new screening will take place on Dec. 3 at the same site.In total, since the beginning of November, forty employees of the Montifaut Jambons site have tested positive for COVID-19.

Due to new COVID-19 related safety measures, the cooler facilities at an important Chinese airport for taking seafood imports have reached capacity and are not currently accepting any new cargo that requires refrigeration, Australia's Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment reports.

The Guangzhou Baiyun airport handles about 25% of China's total fresh food imports, including more than 100 different items from 34 countries and regions, based on a press release issued in 2017 to announce significant upgrades. Lobster, abalones and many other seafood products are frequently brought to China through this airport, according to the memo.

However, in an alert sent out via email on Wednesday, the Australian agriculture agency said it has received information from the International Freight Assistance Mechanism (IFAM), which originated from the Guangzhou Airport Cargo Logistics Company Pty Ltd. It reads:

"Dear Airlines,"According to the requirements of the COVID control measures, we need to disinfectant [sic] all six cool rooms in the import cargo terminal, leading to cool rooms at full capacity."We will not be accepting any cargo that requires refrigeration from now."If there are any shipments that require refrigeration, the airline or agent will need to store them in your own refrigerated vehicle."We will notify you when the cool rooms are back in operation."Thank you for your understanding and cooperation."Guangzhou Airport Cargo Logistics Company Pty Ltd"The 2017 memo, though a bit dated, provides some indication of how important the Guangzhou airport is to the seafood industry. At the time of the memo, the import of lobsters handled by the airport had grown by 340% from the previous year, while the import of abalones had jumped 50%. The memo noted how the upgrades improved the survival rate of lobsters from Boston, Massachusetts, which drops greatly if their delivery time exceeds 48 hours.The airport bragged in 2017 that its upgrades allowed it to finish all clearance procedures, including sampling and testing, in one location at one time and that the changes gave it the ability to take only about 10 minutes to inspect and sample aquatic products.The government had invested 18 million yuan ($2.7m) building test laboratories to handle more than 300 seafood products in its inspection area, according to the earlier memo.

Executives from two of the largest players in the US state of Alaska's wild-caught salmon sector are becoming more bullish on their companies’ prospects for next year as sockeye salmon inventories are running low as 2020 ends.

According to Laine Welch of Fish Radio, OBI Seafoods CEO Mark Palmer and Trident Seafoods head of global and domestic sales Allen Kimball exhibited a similar bullishness at the recent Palmer said that OBI, which was formed through a processing operations merger of Ocean Beauty Seafoods and Icicle Seafoods, is entering 2021 without "any real big carryover".

"We’ve gone into seasons like that and it influences the new season pricing. But I think that as we go into 2021, we should have a pretty clean slate and be ready to buy and ideally put it up in a better product form than we did this last year," he said

Kimball was a bit more conservative but agreed that inventories are low and sockeye demand is strong.

"I think that we’re going to see a lot of adjustments and positive things in terms of the demand existing at retail and it's going to continue. And I think if we get this foodservice piece back to full giddy up, it's going to be quite good," he said.

Public health officials in the US state of Oregon responding to a COVID-19 outbreak earlier this year at Pacific Seafood Group's Newport plant relied on a hotline with information translated into Indigenous languages to get the word out about the virus, High Country News reported.

The Newport outbreak involved 124 cases and several of the affected workers spoke the Mayan language Mam, for which no translators were readily available.

"What we found when we were calling to do our contact tracing was that either most of them were Hispanic and spoke Spanish, or didn't speak Spanish or English," Susan Trachsel, a public information officer with the Lincoln County Health Department, said.

In response, the Oregon Health Authority and the organization Vive Northwest scrambled to set up an information line with four Mam speakers. That line fielded 35 to 40 calls weekly.

UK supply chain technology firm Pesky Fish has expanded once again, and will provide market and auction services to the fishing fleet of south coast town Hastings, it said.

The firm described the move as a "big step".

Last March, the firm launched a new home delivery service to bring seafood caught in British waters directly from fishermen to the end customer.

By selling via Pesky's market, Hastings’ fishing fleet should gain a wider audience more buyers. The move will mean "more boats, more species and more volume in every market", Pesky said in a communication to its customers.

"Over the last few months, you have driven a phenomenal change in the industry with your insatiable demand to buy fish directly from your fishermen. This demand has contributed to the development of the most open and transparent market for fishermen to sell their catch, supporting amazing food experiences at home, while returning value where it is most earned — to the fishermen," Pesky also said.

A team of 10 scientists from the World Health Organization (WHO) has been assembled ahead of a planned visit to Wuhan, China, that will include a trip to the seafood market where the COVID-19 virus reportedly originated.

According to the UK's The Week, the team will include England's former deputy chief medical officer John Watson. It "will work with Chinese experts to investigate how Covid-19 jumped from animals to humans".

Dr. Mike Ryan, the head of the WHO's emergencies program, said that the team will follow the evidence where it leads.

"We fully expect and have reassurances from our Chinese government colleagues that the trip… will be facilitated as soon as possible in order that the international community can be reassured of the quality of the science," he said.

China's biggest wholesale food market has suspended the sale and storage of chilled and frozen meat and seafood as the government ramps up inspections of cold-chain goods after several new cases of coronavirus infections, reports Reuters.

The Xinfadi market in Beijing, which was at the center of an outbreak of COVID-19 cases in the Chinese capital in June, has disposed of products and disinfected over a hundred cold storage units and shut down their power, state-backed Beijing News reported.

Although Beijing has had no recent locally transmitted infections involving the market or cold-chain food products, the move comes after several handlers of imported frozen food in the cities of Qingdao and Tianjin contracted the virus in recent months.

Market authorities are set to conduct daily checks for the virus at warehouses and cold-storage facilities.

The market, a complex of warehouses and trading halls spanning an area the size of nearly 160 soccer pitches, can trade 1,500 metric tons of seafood, 18,000t of vegetables and 20,000t of fruit on a daily basis, according to its website.

Management at French surimi-maker and food company Fleury Michon has announced a "cluster" of COVID-19 cases at its plant in Pouzauges, in Vendee, west-central France.

It found 29 of its 550 employees had detected positive for the virus in November, and on Nov. 26 it will roll out tests across the entire staff, reports France Bleu.

Those testing positive have self-isolated, with none reporting severe symptoms.

Major US processor Pacific Seafood Group has reached an agreement with Clatsop County in the state of Oregon on several issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Astorian newspaper reported that Pacific and the county's public health division signed a memorandum of understanding that sets out how Pacific's Warrenton plant, which has been the site of previous COVID-19 outbreaks, will work to prevent future cases and respond to any that occur.

"Clatsop County appreciates the partnership with Pacific Seafood in preparing the MOU and to the work we will do together moving forward. Responding to COVID-19 requires all of our best efforts; and this agreement is part of our commitment to consistently serve well," county manager Don Bohn told the newspaper.

Warrenton plant manager John King spoke similarly.

"Pacific Seafood is thankful for the collaboration of the county and Oregon Health Authority in formalizing this agreement which maintains some of the most stringent worker protections in the state and provides for coordinated rapid response contact tracing if virus cases are detected in the future," he said.

Separate outbreaks at the plant in May and September have contributed nearly a third of the county's COVID-19 cases to date, the newspaper said.

The Thai protein conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Foods has said it remains optimistic about the future demand for Thai shrimp post-COVID, and expects demand to soar as many more consumers cook shrimp at home.

In particular, CP Foods has noted that it expects its current shift away from foodservice channels and into retail to be a long-term change.

"Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, people are eating out less, and buying shrimp for cooking at home more," the company wrote. "The accelerating shift towards retailing will likely benefit those countries that are good at making retail product such as Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand."

With international trade barriers potentially remaining an issue next year, the company is also looking to grow its domestic production in key markets — hence its continued investment in the Homegrown Shrimp land-based project in Florida, US.

Taking into account the growing demand for sustainable production, CP Foods has also embarked on a project targeting zero wastewater discharge from its farms, operating in a closed-loop system, it said.

Furthermore, the firm has invested in a mangrove reforestation project; to date it has helped to reforest nearly 1,000 acres of mangrove, with plans to help preserve more than 5,500 acres in Thailand's Samut Sakhon province over the next three years.

A new study in the scientific journal Fish and Fisheries attempted to quantify just how much pain the US seafood sector felt at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. And it was a lot.

Foodservice demand declined by nearly 70%, the Associated Press, which referenced the study, said.

University of Vermont professor Easton White noted that the pandemic may ultimately benefit the industry if it conditions US consumers to eat more fish at home.

"Shifting to these local markets is something that could be really helpful for recovery purposes," White said. "The way forward is to focus on shortening the supply chain a little bit."

But the study noted that some species such as Alaska halibut suffered a 40% drop in sales and catches of other exported species like monkfish have dwindled due to a lack of foreign buyers.

As per its new coronavirus protection rules, China has suspended imports from an Ecuadorian shrimp exporter for one week after finding traces of the virus, it said.

China's General Administration of Customs said it had found traces of the coronavirus nucleic acid in a batch of frozen Penaeus vannamei imported from Ecuador, and on a sample of its outer packaging.

As a result, China will suspend imports from Ecuajjli Cia for one week, commencing Nov. 24, it said.

The UK government will roll out regional restrictions after prime minister Boris Johnson confirmed the second lockdown in England will end on Dec. 2, reported the BBC.

However, the UK hospitality industry said new COVID rules in England "are killing Christmas" and has warned pubs, restaurants and hotels face going bust.

New rules to be introduced once lockdown lifts mean pubs operating under "tier two" of a three-tier system can only trade if customers have a "substantial meal".

In "tier three", pubs must shut and can only sell goods for takeaway.

The current 10 pm curfew is set to be dropped. However, pubs and restaurants must stop serving alcohol and food at 10 pm and customers will have until 11 pm to leave the premises.

UK Hospitality's chief executive Kate Nicholls said: "The government is making a point of saying that these measures are needed in order to save Christmas."

"In reality, they are killing Christmas and beyond for many businesses and their customers who look forward to, and rely on, venues being open at this time of year. Sadly, for many staff, it will be a Christmas out of work."

Squid fishermen in the small US state of Rhode Island foresee a long winter ahead as ex-vessel prices for their catches have tumbled and stayed low amid sharply lower foodservice demand thanks to the pandemic.

According to The Providence Journal, squid ex-vessel prices usually top $1.60 per pound but are at $0.90/lb this year. In addition to lower domestic demand, export demand is off sharply too.

"We expect we are going to have a very cold winter, financially," Chris Brown, captain of the vessel Proud Mary, said.

Rhode Island accounts for 54% of all squid landings in the Northeast US and calamari is the state's official appetizer. The dish had seen a resurgence in demand in recent years although this momentum was quashed by the pandemic.

Jay Inslee, the governor of the US state of Washington, has issued a proclamation capping the fees that third-party delivery services can charge to restaurants, part of a plan to assist restaurants to cope with the effects of COVID-19.

The proclamation caps delivery fees at 15% and total fees at 18% of the purchase price of an order and will apply to services such as Uber Eats, DoorDash, GrubHub, Postmates and others.

"We recognize the challenges posed by COVID-19 to our restaurant community, and we’re grateful to third party delivery platforms that have made it possible for Washingtonians to continue supporting local restaurants, and allowed many businesses to stay open," Inslee said in a press release. "However, these are difficult times. We all must sacrifice during these uniquely challenging times to both support our businesses and slow the spread of COVID-19. We encourage Washingtonians to support their local restaurants safely through delivery and take-out options that are available."

Chile's artisanal fishery sector has, like many, suffered a tough economic situation thus far in 2020, according to the results of a survey carried out by non-profit fishery transformation organization Future of Fish.

"For the fishing sector, this is reflected in fewer middlemen added to the fall or decline in sales prices, and for vendors, it meant fewer customers at open markets," it wrote. "In both sectors, fewer days worked were observed due to fear of exposure to the virus. A high impact on supply chain disruption is perceived for both sectors."

The major impact of income reduction was furthered by insufficientstate support, in the view of survey participants.

"Following the recommendations of the FAO, this scenario should be addressed carefully by regional and national authorities, since those who participate in the supply chains of seafood products have a fundamental role to play in the food security and sovereignty of citizens in one of the greatest socioeconomic crises on a planetary scale of the last 90 years."

Future of food found:

Find the full survey results here.

Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada-based processor Quinlan Brothers will adopt purification systems for its facilities that it believes will be 99.98% effective at killing viruses and pathogens such as E. coli, salmonella, listeria, and SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

The "ActivePure Technology" system, which it purchased from the firm PFS Health Solutions was developed by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration and adapted for commercial use by the firm Aerus.

"This is a significant investment for our organization and we are pleased to assure our employees and their families that we are taking this step to enhance our public health practices and further protect our community from the spread of viruses, including COVID-19," Robin Quinlan, the seafood processor's president, said.

He added that the technology will be installed at the company's processing plants in the communities of Bay De Verde, Old Perlican and Baie Verte and its administrative offices.

A former Sri Lankan fisheries minister has bitten into a raw fish at a news conference in Colombo to encourage sales following a slump during the coronavirus pandemic., reports Reuters.

Fish sales in the country have dived after a major coronavirus cluster emerged in the Central Fish Market in the outskirts of the capital last month.

"Our people who are in the fisheries industry cannot sell their fish. People of this country are not eating fish," said Dilip Wedaarachchi, gesticulating with a medium-sized fish.

"I brought this fish to show you. I am making an appeal to the people of this country to eat this fish. Don't be afraid. You will not get infected by the coronavirus," he said, before taking a bite out of the whole fish.

The outbreak in the main wholesale market has led to thousands of infections and spread across the country, said Reuters.

UK processor Young's Seafood has reported 42 positive cases of COVID-19 out of its workforce of some 2,500 in the city of Grimsby, the Grimsby Telegraph reported.

The employees are being asked to self-isolate for 14 days as are individuals who came into contact with them.

"Out of our 2,500 employees across eight sites in Grimsby, 42 of our workers are presently isolating having tested positive for COVID-19 with most arising from family or community contact," a Young's spokesperson said.

The company has been in communication with public health officials.

"We have invested heavily and acted swiftly to prevent transmission within our facilities," the spokesperson said.

Chinese health authorities in Fuzhou, the provincial capital of Fujian province, have detected the coronavirus on packages of pomfret fish imported from India, reports Xinhua News.

The two positive samples were taken from a consignment of 2,500 cartons held at a cold storage warehouse in the city's Minjiang Estuary near Fuzhou Port.

The consignment – weighing 25 metric tons – was received by the warehouse on Nov. 14, the report states. Routine testing occurred on Tuesday (Nov. 17).

383 cartons of the pomfret had already been sold but not entered the consumer market, the report states.

Fuzhou's central disease center said the cold storage facility has been closed and relevant frozen products sealed, while the facility and surrounding environment is cleaned and disinfected.

Restaurants that spent thousands of dollars in the US city of Portland, Oregon, to upgrade their patio areas are now looking at empty tables and potentially wasted expenditures, Eater Magazine reports.

As temperatures drop and COVID-19 cases begin to spike again all over the US, Oregon governor Kate Brown on Friday announced that all restaurants and bars in her state are prevented from offering dine-in service, including outdoor or patio dining. The ban begins this Wednesday (Nov. 18) and is expected to last at least two weeks, but could be extended further, Eater reports.

Brown said the restrictions will stay in place in Multnomah County, where the city of Portland resides, for at least four weeks before being re-evaluated based on the number of cases.

The Oregon governor's declaration is more broad than most other states, where governors are banning indoor dining but continuing to allow outdoor seating.

The announcement follows at least a dozen restaurant and bar owners investing in technology and structures meant to create safe onsite dining, including outdoor patios with individual heaters or indoor air-scrubbers and HVAC systems, according to Eater.Lyf Gildersleeve, the owner of Flying Fish Seafood, in Portland, reportedly spent $10,000 on a tent, heaters, plants, lights and a fish mural painted by a local artist. But he's more worried about other local businesses.

"Since [Flying Fish] was a fish market first for eight years, the business basically shifted back to the fish market," he said. "My sales have been okay, because people were buying fish to cook at home. I’m going to be fine… I’m really concerned about the fragility of everyone else."

US quick-service seafood restaurant chain Captain D's has rolled out a new "Express" restaurant format for its franchisees that features take-out counters and drive-throughs and eliminates dining rooms.

The company said in a press release that unlike the Nashville, Tennessee-based chain's usual 44-seat,1,964-square-foot model, the Express format can fit on 0.35 to 0.5 acres of land.

"The new prototype's design reflects extensive guest feedback showing an increased demand for enhanced drive-thru and takeout options and is more relevant now than ever before following COVID-19," the company said.

The first Express units will be operated in the Atlanta, Georgia area by franchisee Anil Dossani, who already owns two units in the region. The first Express is slated to open by the second quarter of 2021 and two others will follow in the coming years, the company said.

Tuna transshipment activity in the Marshall Islands picked up in October, but remains low compared to the past six years that saw Majuro become the world's busiest port for such transshipment, reports RNZ.

COVID-19 quarantine requirements have reduced the number of purse seine fishing vessels coming into the Marshall Islands to transship their catches by 60% in 2020 compared to the past several years.

Majuro's streak of five consecutive years with at least 400 tuna transshipments annually will end this year, and no one in fisheries is predicting a return to normalcy in the immediate future.

The port's authorities said some purse seiners had chosen to transship in other Pacific ports where requirements are easier to meet than the COVID-prevention protocols in place for the Marshall Islands.

China's customs office announced Friday that it will suspend imports from the Indian company Basu International for one week after detecting the novel coronavirus on three samples taken from the outer packaging of frozen cuttlefish, Reuters reports.

Imports from Kolkata-based Basu will resume automatically after the one week period, the General Administration of Customs said in a statement.

This week China also suspended imports from the Indonesian firm Anugrah Laut Indonesia for a week after customs detected coronavirus in a sample of frozen fish products, India.com reported.

The suspension of Basu's cuttlefish imports is likely to be followed by testing of all workers involved in the import of this particular batch of product, the Hindustan Times reported.

Frozen aquatic products from at least six countries – India, Indonesia, Russia, the Netherlands, Norway, and Ecuador – have tested positive for the coronavirus, the paper reported.

The Hindustan Times noted how, earlier this month, packages of frozen hairtail fish tested positive in Taiyuan, the capital of Shanxi province in north China.

Local authorities had subsequently launched nucleic acid testing and centralized quarantine for the workers involved, according to the report, which added that the results of all nucleic acid tests were negative.

Also, on Friday, Xinhua, China's official news agency, reported that authorities in Wuhan, the capital of central China's Hubei province, found three frozen beef samples had tested positive for COVID. The batch of products, packaged in 1,006 boxes, weighing 27 metric tons each, were imported from Brazil to the eastern city of Qingdao on August 7 but had not entered the market.

Seven staff workers at Macduff Shellfish's factory in Mintlaw, Scotland, have tested positive for coronavirus, reports The Press and Journal.

Three workers for Macduff, a subsidiary of Canadian shellfish giant Clearwater Seafoods, tested positive over the weekend, with a further four employees returning positive results after rapid testing this week.

As many as 90 other employees who had contact with affected staff have been instructed to self-isolate, awaiting test results of their own.

The Macduff factory will not be closed due to the outbreak, as the two hour gap between day and back shifts has allowed the entire facility to undergo a deep clean, including the use of fogging machines, according to The Press and Journal.

A spokesperson for Macduff said they believe the protocols put in place this year, and which have been inspected by Scotland's Health & Safety Executive, have reduced the risk of the virus spreading rapidly among its staff members.

Ocean Strategies, a fishing-focused public relations firm in the US state of Alaska, is carrying out a survey of fishermen on behalf of the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration to determine the impacts to the sector from COVID-19.

The program Alaska Fish Radio reported that the survey aims to document what fishermen have gone through in order to support future federal policymaking.

"It really takes broad strokes – it's tracking big trends, things that people are able to answer quickly. We aggregate all the survey data that we receive and then deliver it confidentially to NOAA and they are able to tell a clear story about what's happening in the industry," Hannah Heimbuch, a senior consultant with the firm, said.

The online survey takes about five minutes to complete and has so far gathered about 300 responses.

Authorities in Tianjin, north China, have detected the coronavirus on the packaging of imported frozen halibut, reports Sina.

A single positive sample was taken from the outer packaging of frozen halibut from a seafood wholesale store in the city's Jinghai District, said the Tianjin Center of Disease Control's Health Committee on Wednesday.

Employees have been placed in quarantine and the surrounding area closed for testing and cleaning.

The supplying company and country of origin were not named.

It follows a confirmed case of COVID-19 among workers at a cold storage warehouse in Tianjin. On Sunday, a 38-year-old man who works at a cold chain logistics company dealing with imported German pig meat tested positive.

Last month, Dutch cold chain logistics company Kloosterboer also was identified by China's General Administration of Customs as having been the source of frozen seafood contaminated with the coronavirus. The firm disputed the report, however.

China's government has issued a detailed "work plan" for the disinfection and traceability of imported frozen seafood and food, which one Undercurrent News source said will hit the sector.

US seafood restaurant chain Red Lobster Seafood Company is adapting to the pandemic's decline n dining room visitors by trialing the use of delivery-only "ghost kitchens", it said.

The company said in a press release that it has opened its first such operation in the South Loop district of major US city Chicago, Illinois. The facility will service orders made through Grubhub, DoorDash, Uber Eats and Postmates, the company said.

"Off-premise is a huge priority for Red Lobster," CEO Kim Lopdrup said. "We tripled our off-premise sales in the two years before COVID-19 began, and we’ve tripled them again over the last eight months. Opening a ghost kitchen is a natural next step in expanding our off-premise business. It will allow us to reach new customers who want great seafood with a touchless off-premise experience."

Falling scallop prices and the availability of other jobs has meant a sharp decline in the number of boats participating in scallop fishing on Nantucket, an island in the US state of Massachusetts off the coast of Cape Cod.

According to The Inquirer and Mirror, only around seven boats participated in fishing during the second day of this year's fishing season, which began Nov. 2. Some 40 boats fished during the prior season. Prices have dropped to around $12 per pound from $16/lb due to restaurant closures amid the pandemic.

"I hear guys say, ‘I’m not scalloping this year, I’m going to take a land job,'" Bobby De-Costa, a commercial fisherman and member of the island's select board said. "If you didn't grow up in the fishery, it's a hard thing to get into."

Despite the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, businesses in Vietnam's Mekong Delta have focused on the processing of high-value seafood products, and exports are showing signs of recovery, reports SGGP News.

Statistics from the Department of Industry and Trade of Ca Mau Province show shrimp export turnover in October this year reached nearly $133 million, sending the figure for the first ten months of this year to over $783m — an increase of 6%.

Exports to the European market increased by over 33%, Canada increased by 24%, and Japan increased by nearly 13%. "Enterprises have signed some new contracts with partners in the EU to promote shrimp exports in the last months of the year," the news site said.

Huynh Thanh Tan, director of Ca Mau Seafood Processing, said the pandemic had seen low prices for shrimp raw material, and farmers had reduced stocking.

"Moreover, the recent prolonged rains and high tides have caused losses of shrimps, leading to a decrease in production. Currently, enterprises are vying each other to buy raw material shrimps, and the prices of shrimps increase because many households in the Mekong Delta have just raised them again."

Pangasius prices have also rebounded after a drastic fall this year, the news site said. From VND 17,000-VND 19,000 per kilogram, raw material prices are back up at VND 23,000/kg, according to one firm — once again profitable for the farmer.

Lobster harvesters, fishers, processors, distributors and other seafood sector players in the US state of Maine have until the end of today, Monday, Nov. 9, to apply for federal pandemic relief aid.

Television station WMTW reported that the Maine Department of Marine Resources set today as the deadline for applications for the $20.1 million that the state is distributing from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act.

Payments are likely to be made in December, the news channel said.

Seafood Industry Australia (SIA), the national body representing the seafood sector, has launched the country's first whole-of-industry marketing campaign with the support of the Australian government, it announced.

Earlier this year, Australia's governing coalition announced a AUD 4 million marketing grant, funded by the government's AUD 1 billion COVID-19 relief and recovery fund

Putting those funds to use, the SIA has unveiled a new flagship brand, Great Australian Seafood, intended to promote the domestic consumption of Australian produce. This is deemed particularly crucial at present with international demand suffering during the COVID-19 crisis.

"It's been an incredibly tough year for Australia's seafood sector and they need our support," said Jonno Duniam, Australia's assistant minister for forestry and fisheries. "The seafood industry was the first and worst hit when export markets virtually shut down overnight at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic."

"Fortunately, every Australian can play a role in helping our fishers, and it's as simple as eating some Aussie seafood. This campaign will support all sectors of the seafood industry, from fishers and processors, through to those in the foodservice sector, and it will provide a much-needed boost to ensure we have a strong, sector-wide recovery."

A new "resilience group" has been granted £1 million funding to support the langoustine (Nephrops) sector through the coronavirus pandemic, the Scottish government has announced.

The Scottish Nephrops Working Group will investigate the scale of the challenges facing the sector and develop a long-term strategic vision to "cement Scotland's position as the global leader of high-quality langoustine", according to a press release.

The langoustine sector in Scotland has been particularly badly impacted by COVID-19, with the loss of important domestic and export markets.

These challenges have been further exacerbated by the lack of clarity regarding Brexit, given that langoustine is the most important shellfish species in terms of landed value and socio-economic importance to Scottish coastal communities and the wider supply chain.

"Nephrops are critically important to the future of our seafood sector and many coastal communities in Scotland, supporting thousands of local jobs and producing the finest prawns and langoustines in the world," said rural economy secretary Fergus Ewing.

"They are Scotland's second-largest seafood export and the coronavirus pandemic has had a significant effect on the sector with markets remaining depressed and low prices throughout the supply chain. As a result, many businesses are struggling and operating on the edge of viability."

The working group is intended to provide valuable support to the future viability of the Nephrops sector in Scotland and the £1m funding is a "significant boost" to get its work underway.

Uel Morton, chair of the working group, said the work would be critical to the sector's future.

"The sector is one of the most fragile areas of Scotland's economy, yet it delivers so much in terms of employment and exports. Although this group is focussed on the particular challenges facing the Nephrops sector, the recommendations from this group will also provide valuable lessons for the wider seafood industry in Scotland at this difficult time."

The group is expected to oversee the implementation and progress of the new strategy over the next two years.

The Scottish Nephrops fleet is made up of 450 vessels. The value of their landings is approximately £80m – the second-highest value seafood product in Scotland.

The show must go on despite the pandemic for the Pensacola Seafood Festival, which begins today, Nov. 6, in the US city of Pensacola, Florida, WEAR TV reported.

The event will occur much as it has in the past with live music, food demonstrations, seafood and other exhibitions but with a wider than usual layout to encourage social distancing.

"When COVID hit, it all hit a brick wall gone, everything," Mike Philips with the vendor Simply Savory said. "So things are coming back up very slowly. This is our actual first festival that my wife and I have done since COVID. So we are very excited and curious to see."

The organization Fiesta Pensacola was mindful of the pandemic when designing the festival's layout.

"Instead of the vendors being kind of butted up next to each other, we have some footage between the vendors, as well as off of the sidewalk to allow for the physical distancing of our patrons," said Margaret-Anne West with Fiesta Pensacola.

Alexandria, Virginia's Mas Seafood has expanded with its first retail store in the city, a step beyond its roots as a seafood wholesaler, Alexandria Living Magazine reported.

The business run by Michael and Katy Ribadulla will formally launch the retail location on 809 Pendleton St. for sales of species such as salmon, mahi mahi, and cod.

The pandemic prompted their push beyond foodservice sales.

"Our business was hurting really badly," Katy Ribadulla said. "We were concerned about the fresh product in our cooler, and we didn't want it to go to waste."

So the company began direct sales on a trial basis, advertising through a post on Facebook.

"I started getting text messages: ‘Hey, when are you doing that again?’ ‘Hey, I need more fish.’ ‘When can I get more fish?’" Katy said.

The Global Aquaculture Alliance's (GAA) Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) program is rolling out the option of remote audits for seafood processing plants in response to the ongoing pandemic.

The GAA said that thanks to recent changes BAP implemented, plants can now pursue certification through full or partial onsite audits, fully remote audits or enhanced remote audits.

The group began working with assessment and certification bodies in April to begin developing the remote procedures under its Seafood Processing Standard, Version 5.0.

"Beyond the innovative remote audit methodology applied for the farm, hatchery and feed mill standards, specific new policies, procedures, requirements, timelines, questionnaires, audit checklist guidance and training materials were also developed specifically for processing plant remote auditing," the GAA said.

As of Oct. 2, BAP had performed six fully remote audits of processing plants as part of a pilot project.

Grimsby Fish Market, and the auction facilities contained therein, will remain open for the foreseeable future, Simon Dwyer — who manages the Grimsby Fish Merchants Association — told Undercurrent News.

Back in March, when the UK went into its first lockdown period, fish prices crashed as prime minister Boris Johnson told citizens they could only leave the house when absolutely necessary. The market and auction closed as a result.

But now, with England set to enter another lockdown from Nov. 5, Dwyer said Grimsby's seafood businesses were in a better position, and that the auction would remain open.

"I’ve also just been on the phone with Iceland's fisheries ministry," he said late on Nov. 3. "They fully intend to carry on supplying us with fish."

"They’ve seen a drop in demand from parts of continental Europe, where there are partial lockdowns in place," he added.

A bumper season for oyster production in the US state of Maryland is concerning watermen and suppliers there who fear that a lack of foodservice demand will lead to severely depressed prices, the Baltimore Sun reported.

In an article reprinted by the Washington Post, the state's Department of Natural Resources confirmed that watermen have pulled some 270,000 bushels of oysters from the water in 2020, nearly twice 2019's haul.

Robert Brown, president of the Maryland Watermen's Association, said that a lack of large events is hurting demand.

"The market's not there like it was last year," Brown said. "Normally, you have big oyster festivals, you have your church dinners … you’re not seeing that this year."

The Chinese government has suspended imports from Ecuador's FIREXPA, described by the news agency Reuters as a "seafood products manufacturer" after traces of the coronavirus were found on the outer packaging of one of its products.

China's General Administration of Customs said the suspension will last one week, according to Reuters.

Chinese officials have been cracking down on frozen food imports that show positive test results for the virus and recently detected virus traces on the packaging of imported frozen Brazilian pork sent to China's Shandong Province.

The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, announced a second national lockdown for England, set to begin from Nov. 5, reports the BBC.

For four weeks, pubs, restaurants, gyms and any non-essential shops will have to close across the country, although schools and universities will remain open.

Restrictions will be eased from Dec. 2, with regions returning to the previous tiered system.

Johnson reportedly told a Downing Street media conference that he was "truly sorry" for the impact this will have on businesses, and noted that the furlough system paying 80% of employee wages would be extended for the duration of November.

Under the new restrictions, people are told to stay at home unless they have a specific reason to leave — such as work that can't be done from home. Meeting indoors or in private gardens has also been banned.

This follows announcements from France and Germany that they would be pursuing similar lockdowns, which began Oct. 30 and Nov. 2 respectively. Scotland, meanwhile, brought its own five-tiered regional lockdown system into effect on Nov. 2.

Public viewing of tuna auctions at Tokyo's Toyosu fish market resumed on Nov. 2 after an eight-month suspension due to the spread of the novel coronavirus, Kyodo News reported.

Eighteen visitors selected by lottery in advance gathered at the market in the early morning and watched from a viewing deck as dealers wearing masks took part in the bidding.

The fish market, which opened in 2018 to replace the aging Tsukiji market, had suspended public viewings of the auctions on Feb. 29.

While the market had invited up to 120 spectators per day for the popular event before, capacity has now been cut to 27. Visitors are required to wear face masks, have their temperatures taken, and submit their contact information.

Norwegian salmon has strengthened its market position in Spain, despite an exacerbation of the pandemic there, according to the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC).

Salmon is the fastest-growing fish species in Spain, and the turnover value of salmon eaten out and in-home has increased by €112 million so far this year, said the NSC's envoy to Spain, Bjorn-Erik Stabell, citing Kantar data.

"The Spaniards have previously eaten most salmon in restaurants, and the good thing is that when society closed, they started making salmon at home," he noted.

In particular, sales of frozen salmon from Norway have increased under the coronavirus pandemic. From January to September, sales increased by 26% in volume and 18% in value. This is because several chains now sell frozen Norwegian salmon in the freezer counter, said NSC.

"Salmon is the fastest-growing fish species of all in Spain, despite the fact that they had a new closure of the community in September [a COVID-19-prompted lockdown]. The export value for fresh and frozen salmon has increased by a total of 2%, to NOK 359m in September compared with last year."

Spain is second only to France in Europe, in terms of Norwegian sales. It is also emerging as one of the largest consumer markets in Europe for Norwegian salmon, NSC added. "When the borders and restaurants reopen, and tourists return to Spain, Stabell believes that Norwegian salmon will get a further boost."

"Before the corona, about 50% of salmon in Spain were eaten at restaurants. We believe this out-of-home consumption will return to the same high level when society normalizes, in addition to the Spaniards continuing to eat salmon at home," he said.

The commercial halibut season in the Canadian province of British Columbia has been extended three weeks due to market disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Coast Mountain News reports.

The 2020 season was to end on Nov. 15, but the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has now extended it until Dec. 7.

All groundfish hook-and-line harvesters wanting to participate in the extended season need to have the conditions of their licenses amended prior to the original November closure date, according to the news service. Also, all harvests made after Nov. 15 will need to be landed at one of three designated port areas in Vancouver, Prince Rupert, or Port Hardy to be validated by a DFO-designated dockside observer by Dec. 14.

The landed prices of most Pacific fish harvests have fallen between 25% and 40%, reflecting a loss of exports to foodservice markets, the BC Seafood Alliance has reported. Meanwhile, the costs to harvest, process and ship products have escalated as the sector tries to meet COVID-19-related safety protocols.

Europeche — the organization representing Europe's fishermen — has warned the second wave of COVID-19 is having significant socio-economic consequences, especially in the Mediterranean.

"According to Europeche, the pandemic is putting to the test European economies that see once again in many countries the closure of horeca channels, lack of tourism, extremely low fish prices and health problems. This is causing a major impact in the income of fishermen and it does not seem likely to improve in the short or medium-term, particularly in the Mediterranean."

Under the "exceptional circumstances", Europeche called on the European Commission to be "sensitive and as flexible as possible" in the implementation of the newly adopted multiannual management plan (MAP), "in a way that does not aggravate the socio-economic consequences caused by this pandemic."

Adopted last year, the MAP for demersal fisheries in the Western Mediterranean began regulating fleets, mainly trawlers, from Italy, France and Spain.

At the time the fishing sector criticized the introduction of severe spatial-seasonal trawl closures and the reduction of the activity at sea from the first year of implementation. Still, it complied with the measures "even though [they] undermined the viability of the Mediterranean fleets," said Europeche.

"Fishermen, now facing the consequences of the COVID-19, fear further cuts which would lead to a considerable decline in the number of fishing vessels, jobs and fish supply."

The organization wants to see more research and assessment of the restrictions already put in place, before any further fishing effort cuts are introduced, it said.

The number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 at Deutsche See in Bremerhaven in Germany has increased from five to 23, reports Nord24.

It brings the total number of infections reported in Bremerhaven to 366.

On Tuesday, a spokesperson told Undercurrent News the situation was under control.

"Our factory hasn't been closed and will not be closed. Only a very short area of our delicatessen-manufacture is paused for two days due to testing precautions," said the spokesperson.

"We assume our colleagues got infected from the outside," the spokesperson added.

A new wave of COVID-19 cases across the US state of Illinois will lead to new restrictions on bars and restaurants, including a ban on indoor dining in the city of Chicago, ABC 7 reported.

The restrictions, which have led to a dispute between governor JB Pritzker and mayor Lori Lightfoot, will also include a requirement that outdoor dining end by 11 p.m.

"It hurts," said Jeff Lawler, owner of Geja's Cafe. "My first thought was, ‘here we go again.’ Will this be a two week shutdown? Will this be a two month shutdown what's it going to be? No one knows."

In a statement, Pritzker said the Chicago measures were prompted by a week of hospital admission increases and eight consecutive days of rising test positivity.

Fishers in the US state of Louisiana will now have until Nov. 23 to apply for a $14.6 million pot of relief money under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES) act after hurricane damage prompted officials to extend the deadline, the Associated Press reported.

Prior to the passage of two recent hurricanes, the deadline to apply for the CARES relief funds was set to end Oct. 26.

"After a closer look at the damage left by hurricanes Laura and Delta to the fishing community, the department wants to ensure that everyone impacted by those hurricanes has ample opportunity to apply," Louisiana Department of Fish and Wildlife secretary Jack Montoucet said.

Applications must be submitted online and the Gulf States Marine Fisheries Commission will be sending out payments to qualified applicants.

In a move aimed at taking advantage of increased stay-at-home dining amid the COVID-19 pandemic, US salmon importer BluGlacier has launched a direct-to-consumer delivery brand for fresh and frozen Chilean salmon.

The company, which is owned by farmers Blumar and Ventisqueros, plans to launch its Oshen brand on Nov. 1. It bills the service as delivering salmon to "customers’ front doors nationwide in completely biodegradable and recyclable packaging playfully designed with witty banter".

The company's offerings include a "One Night Stand" box with four eight-ounce fresh portions for $45 delivered to Miami, Florida, where BluGlacier is located or $75 nationally; an "OSHEN's Twelve" box with 12 six-ounce frozen portions for $75 to Miami or $108 nationally; and an "Entertainer Box" with two 2.5-pound fresh fillets for $87 in Miami or $125 nationally.

"With the need for easy, at-home solutions at an all-time high due to the pandemic, we are thrilled to deliver best-in-class salmon offerings straight from Chile to your kitchen," said Sebastian Goycoolea, BluGlacier's CEO said. "In a continued commitment to the environment, we are proud to say that all OSHEN products will be sustainably raised and mindfully packaged using eco-friendly materials."

Norway's Aqua Nor event, one of the largest aquaculture trade shows in the world, has been given the green light to go ahead as scheduled in August 2021, the organizing company Nor-Fishing has confirmed.

"Regardless of the unexpected pandemic, it would be a combination of physical and digital fair in 2021 — that has been our plan since the previous Aqua Nor," wrote Kristian Digre, general manager of the Nor-Fishing Foundation. "Next year's fair will have an additional digital platform."

This digital platform was already introduced at this year's Nor-Fishing event, which runs on a bi-annual basis to alternate with Aqua Nor at the Trondheim Spektrum venue.

"Adding a digital platform to the fair will add value for exhibitors who will have more opportunities to profile themselves," said Digre. "It will also make it easier for visitors, who for various reasons cannot physically participate, to see what is happening in Trondheim."

"At the same time, it is important for us to preserve the physical part of the fair as much as practically possible and infection control considerations allow."

Should the COVID-19 situation worsen towards August next year, Aqua Nor 2021 will be fully digital.

Meanwhile, with nearly a year still to go, two thirds of the venue have already been booked by exhibitors, demonstrating "a lot of committment for next year's exhibition."

"The user interface on the digital platform will be further developed and improved compared to Nor-Fishing Digital, and we will add more on-demand functions," said exhibition manager Karl Steinsbo. "In addition, we offer, among other things, video production from the stand, so that it becomes easier to show your own solutions to digital visitors"

A pivot to direct sales and the use of at-home deliveries for locally landed seafood has enabled a British Columbia, Canada, seafood processor to keep its doors open during the pandemic.

According to the Toronto Star, Walcan Seafood based on the province's Quadra Island was faced with a CAD 2 million ($1.52m) inventory of packaged smoked seafood products that it normally would have sold to tourists and the company was heavily involved in the province's "spot prawn" season.

"In March, we quickly realized, ‘Holy crow! This is serious,’" president Cammeron Pirie said. "‘By April, we were looking at laying off senior managers, and I was feeling really worried."

Walcan pivoted by launching a "Tide to Table" initiative that made local deliveries of fresh and frozen seafood possible. In the first week, the service had 100 orders and then began expanding throughout the area.

Part of the company's reason for success, he said, is that it handles all aspects of production and sale.

"Often 65% of the retail sales price will go back to large stores and the distributor," Pirie said. "For us to offer something for the same price delivered to someone's door only costs us 15% to 20%."

Five employees at German seafood firm Deutsche See have tested positive for COVID-19, according to the Bremerhaven municipal authorities, reports Nord24.

The employees who tested positive work in different departments of Deutsche See, the company confirmed to Undercurrent News.

There were positives tests in its administrative office and factory, it said. "We assume our colleagues got infected from the outside," a spokesperson said.

"We have the situation under control. Our factory hasn't been closed and will not be closed. Only a very short area of our delicatessen-manufacture is paused for two days due to testing precautions," said the spokesperson.

More of the 440 Russians and Ukrainians brought to New Zealand to help crew commercial fishing vessels have tested positive for COVID-19 at an airport hotel where they are being held in quarantine, Radio New Zealand (RNZ) reports.

New Zealand's Ministry of Health on Tuesday announced that it had confirmed 18 of the migrant laborers as positive. This follows earlier reports that 11 had tested positive and 14 other cases were under investigation.

The nation's health agency said it was investigating after the cases were detected during routine day-three testing, noting that none involved persons in the community.

As many as 270 of the migrant workers are expected to go out on three boats operated by Christchurch-based Independent Fisheries in November.

The New Zealand fishing sector late last month argued successfully to allow the foreign laborers to enter the country and crew vessels harvesting hoki and southern blue whiting. The scale of the problem was significant, Seafood New Zealand had argued. It would cost some NZD 725 million ($474.2m) annually to not have the workers.

Kris Faafoi, the country's immigration minister, announced on Sept. 22 that deep-sea crews would have class exceptions for border entry, as reported by Undercurrent News.

New Zealand air commodore Darryn Webb told Chris Lynch on Newstalk ZB that the number of positive cases was "logical to expect" as "places like Russia are high risk," the news service reported.

Russia, where most of the crew members are from, has recorded more than 1.3 million cases of COVID-19 — fourth highest among any country.

Webb also acknowledged that the travel to New Zealand, where the workers landed at Sudima Christchurch Airport and are now staying at a nearby hotel, was "an exposure risk factor". There was a 24-hour delay as the aircraft worked through its process in Moscow and the fishermen were assembled there for 48 hours and then en route for 18 hours, he said.

But he said it wasn't an "uncontained outbreak" and something that happens in our facilities, asserting that the steps taken to prevent further spread were robust. He said the quarantine procedures are "absolutely" working.

"We have an exclusive use facility for these fishermen," he reportedly said. "Part of the process early on is that we do know they are coming from a high-risk area, so let's provide them a single location."

Scotland should receive at least £62 million annually in replacement of the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF) according to fisheries secretary Fergus Ewing.

Ewing raised the issue at an EU "exit operations" meeting last week and has now written to the secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs, George Eustice, seeking "much-needed clarity" on UK government funding for the sector from Jan. 1, 2021.

"In addition to Brexit, Scotland's seafood sector has been hard hit by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic with the loss of export and foodservice markets. The new funding is also key to supporting recovery for coastal communities and protecting jobs."

"Scotland would anticipate any domestic replacement funding to reflect this importance and we had identified that we are seeking an allocation to replace the EMFF of £62m per annum," his letter states.

Attendees of this year's China International Import Expo (CIIE) will miss out on free fresh food samples following a ban by organizers due to the coronavirus, reports CCTV News.

Tastings of fresh salmon and tuna will be off the menu removing one of the payoffs of a day spent trudging around exhibition halls. According to the report, all free samples of food must be cooked first.

The measure follows concerns the virus can be transmitted along the cold chain. All imported cold chain food, food itself, packaging, and equipment will also be swabbed for tests for the virus for the event, organizers said.

This year's CIIE, the third installment, is being held in Shanghai from Nov. 5 to Nov. 10.

Despite "massive supply chain upheaval" from the COVID-19 pandemic, the markets for frozen North American lobster meet and tails are back on the rise, J.J. McDonnell, a seafood wholesaler based in the US city of Elkridge, Maryland, reported.

In its "Fish and Tips" newsletter, the company said that foodservice demand for frozen lobster tails hit "rock bottom" during the pandemic with tablecloth restaurants hit particularly hard and sellers employing "massive discounting" to move product. Canadian processors faced labor shortages and uncertainty as to whether the summer lobster fishing season would even occur.

"Fortunately, lobster dealers also found success selling frozen and live lobster directly to consumers through online platforms. The reopening of the US economies in major markets buoyed lobster demand enough to support sales," the company said.

The frozen lobster meat market suffered similar challenges but "avoided catastrophe" and is now on the rise.

During the summer, consumers in the Northeast US kept demand alive, suppliers bypassed usual channels with direct sales and Canadian processors were able to keep supplies moving, J.J McDonnell said.

"These factors combined to see the lobster meat market rally over the summer. Looking ahead, the lobster industry typically eyes selling live lobsters to China in Q4 and Q1 for the Chinese New Year," it said. "Maine lobster landings vary week to week and have generally trended about even to lower from 2019 figures. Lobster meat demand tends to see a ‘holiday bump’ which will continue to support a firm market".

The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the rate of exploitative practices on vulnerable fishing crew members around the world many of whom have been left stranded or stuck at sea due to restrictions to fight the coronavirus.

According to the South China Morning Post, the United Nations estimates that some 300,000 seagoing workers have been affected by the pandemic either because they can't return home or other restrictions.

"Some seafarers have been at the sea well beyond their contracts, and others are stuck on the land without a job," Darian McBain, head of sustainability at Thai Union Group was quoted as saying.

And the pandemic has made ensuring compliance with labor standards more difficult.

"Most audits have had to become virtual audits, because you cannot have people going onto vessels while the borders are closed," she added

The National Aquaculture Association's (NAA) annual Aquaculture America conference previously scheduled to take place in February 2021 has been pushed back until August, organizers said.

The four-day conference will still be held at San Antonio, Texas’ Marriott Rivercenter Hotel but will now take place beginning on Aug. 11.

"After considerable discussion whether to continue as planned or postpone the event, we did not feel that by February 2021 individuals, institutions and organizations would be able to approve travel or feel comfortable sending attendees to an in-person event," the NAA said in a press release.

It believes that by August, "an in-person event is much more likely to be successful for our attendees and exhibitors".

The Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte has announced a new partial lockdown amid rising coronavirus cases in the country.

According to Willem van der Pijl, a Dutch seafood market analyst and founder of consultancy Shrimp Insights, a new wave of positive cases has caused this measure to be taken.

"Today [Oct. 13] we had almost 7,500 new COVID-19 positive cases, and the government says that, without intervention, the virus will be out of control," he posted on his LinkedIn account.

Besides, the Netherlands decided to close cafes, bars, and restaurants from Oct. 14 on for at least four weeks, he added, which will have "a major impact on the foodservice segment."

"With current COVID-19 cases rising in most other EU countries, many other member states and also the UK will likely follow with similar measures soon," he added.

"With most importers already having placed their orders for the Christmas season, it is likely that stocks will last longer into 2021 than anticipated."

This adds to Willem's prediction of a slow winter this year in terms of shrimp sales in foodservice, after the summer broke shrimp sales records for several wholesalers in northwestern Europe despite the pandemic.

"The question is what's going to happen in the coming months; yes, there will be new orders and yes, there will be containers coming in, but the sales are expected to go down," van der Pijl previously told Undercurrent News.

"Some of the foodservice companies, they say they are expecting an index compared to last year of about 70%, meaning that they expect to sell about 30% less shrimp compared to the same months last year."

The outlook for the EU shrimp market is that "a real, full swing in demand" might not appear again before March 2021, he also explained to Undercurrent.

Researchers in the US city of Seattle, Washington are conducting a screening program of 10,000 Alaska fishing and processing workers that seeks early detection and control of COVID-19 infections.

According to Geek Wire, the effort is being led by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), a research center at the University of Washington.

"It's very important for us because we want to save lives and save livelihoods," said project lead Ali Mokdad, an IHME professor and Chief Strategy Officer for Population Health at the UW.

The IHME effort will rely on anonymized data of the workers’ tests while in quarantine to develop models that will be used to better respond to COVID-19 outbreaks.

Young's Seafood, one of the UK's largest seafood processing companies, has confirmed seven positive cases of coronavirus at its factories in Grimsby, The Grimsby Telegraph reports.

An undisclosed number of staff members who were in close contact with the positive cases have also reportedly been sent home to self-isolate.

Young's employs 2,000 people across its eight factories, yet positive cases identified so far are believed to have come from family or community contact.

The news comes after a further 50 cases of coronavirus were linked to an outbreak at Karro Food Group's factory in nearby Scunthorpe, The Grimsby Telegraph reported. Young's was added to Karro Food Group last year by private equity house CapVest Partners, which owns both.

Karro has set up a mobile testing unit for its 450 staff members; meanwhile, the site continues to operate.

The group Stronger America Through Seafood (SATS) has written to US senators asking for their support for legislation that would make it easier to permit offshore aquaculture operations in US federal waters.

The Oct. 13 letter, signed by 80 individuals including many with ties to major suppliers such as Pacific Seafood Group, High Liner Foods and Cargill Aqua Nutrition, asks senators to support the Advancing the Quality and Understanding of American Aquaculture (AQUAA) Act, arguing that it will help "revitalize" the seafood industry after the coronavirus outbreak.

"As America begins to rebuild from the devastation of the COIVID-19 pandemic, creating a new American seafood supply will have rippling effects throughout many areas of the country. Increased aquaculture production will lead to increased demand for American-grown crops, which can be used in plant-based fish feed, such as soybeans, corn and peas, will open up new markets to heartland farmers and lessen dependence on the uncertainty of foreign trade relationships," it states.

The bill would streamline the federal permitting process for offshore aquaculture, enshrining several of the measures outlined in a May executive order from President Donald Trump into law.

The Australian and Singaporean backers of a project to commercially farm sea grapes for human consumption believe that the effort is particularly important to ensure "food security" given the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to a press release from Singapore's Blue Aqua International and Australian Stock Exchange-listed Stemcell United Limited, the SCU Green Aqua Farm is moving ahead at the Marine Aquaculture Centre on St. John Island, Singapore.

The plans to raise sea grapes (Caulerpa Lentillifera) rely on "plant stem cell technology" and the aim of the project is to create an "integrated aquaculture farming system", the companies said.

"Since 2009, Blue Aqua has been supporting the aquaculture industry with sustainable and environmentally friendly technologies, and is seeking to ensure sustainable food resources are available for future generations," Philip Gu, SCU's CEO said in the release.

Danish fishing company Polar Seafood has turned down a government support package saying other fishermen "need it more", reports Sermitsiaq.

The firm, which operates in Greenlandic fisheries, said the company's capital base and solvency are strong enough to come through the current coronavirus crisis without aid.

Denmark's financial package helps fishermen in the inland fishery for shrimp, crab and cod cover the drop in prices since the coronavirus pandemic.

The government covers 10% of the drop in prices after the first 15% drop, with buyers applying for a refund from the government.

"It is not with complacency, but with gratitude that we at Polar Seafood Greenland say no thanks to procurement subsidies, which other parts of the fisheries and society need more," said shareholder and CEO, Jens Salling.

"Even though we do not need subsidies in our company, we largely recognize the need in other parts of the fishery," he said.

Oyster growers in the Cape Cod region of the US state of Massachusetts are trying to move forward after months of restaurant closure badly hurt their industry. But recovery will be a difficult process, the Cape Cod Times reported.

According to the newspaper, the cape region is home to 265 of the state's 391 licensed oyster farmers and over 70% of the industry's revenue comes from foodservice.

"Restaurants are our customers. When they closed in March, our business revenues went to zero," Zach Dixon, who co-owns the Holbrook Oyster company with Justin and Jacob Dalby, said.

He said his business was cut in half by the pandemic and although it received relief from the federal Paycheck Protection Program, those monies have since lapsed.

The CBC reports that tuna harvesters working out of North Lake, in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island, are seeing prices down as much as 50% due to the coronavirus pandemic.

It quotes Jason Tompkins, a tuna buyer and processor in Atlantic Canada, as saying the season got off to a "good and early start this year", noting that July 2020 saw more fish caught than the same month over the past 20 years.

"A lot of guys did see the writing on the wall," he said. "They took our advice as buyers and went early, and the prices we saw in July and August were some of the highest we’ve seen in years." But the prices plummeted as COVID-19 cases rose and restaurants began reducing their orders, he said.

"If you look at Toronto, for example, normally we’d have customers, you know, ‘Send us two fish on Monday, two fish on Wednesday and maybe one for the weekend.’ They’re now saying call us every day and we’ll let you know."

COVID-19 and the consequent lockdowns have severely affected the livelihoods of hundreds of farmers in the East and West Godavari districts of Andhra Pradesh, India, The Siasat Daily reports.

Supply chains came to a halt and logistical arrangements stalled, which meant there were no buyers for the already harvested vannamei shrimp in those areas.

"When shrimp was ready for harvest and sale, the COVID-19 pandemic struck an irreparable blow. There was nobody to buy it," a shrimp farmer from West Godavari said.

"I could not even harvest them. Within five days of the lockdown, factories shut down. By then, a virus started killing my shrimp," he added.

In addition, some local shrimp packers and exporters presumably formed a cartel to exploit farmers, "which have outsourced shrimp buying from farmers to some brokers who are manipulating the price of shrimp during the pandemic and even otherwise," a local said.

Kroger is working with the Indianapolis, Indiana-based firm ClusterTruck to install delivery-only kitchens at two of the US grocer's stores in Fishers, Indiana, and Columbus Ohio, Inside Indiana Business reported.

The grocer previously tested the so-called "ghost kitchens" at stores in the cities of Carmel and Indianapolis.

ClusterTruck's software allows it to deliver food within seven minutes of it being ordered, the company said.

Ghost kitchens have been a major development to come out of the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to keep traffic out of restaurants.

That's caught the notice of Kroger, Dan De La Rosa, group vice president of fresh merchandising for the grocer said.

"The new on-premise kitchen, in partnership with ClusterTruck, is an innovation that streamlines ordering, preparation and delivery, supporting Kroger as we meet the sustained customer demand for quick, fresh restaurant-quality meals, especially as we navigate an unprecedented health crisis that has affected every aspect of our lives, including mealtime," he said.

Vietnam's pangasius market has turned to boosting domestic consumption as it looks to shift the surplus product that hasn't found overseas buyers, reports Nhan Dan.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the export revenues generated by Vietnam's pangasius have dropped significantly, reaching $667.5 million over the first six months of the year — down by 30.6% year-on-year.

According to the Vietnam Pangasius Association, the total harvested area in the Mekong delta is down by 21% this year compared to last, while total harvest volumes have dropped by approximately 17%.

However, even with reduced volumes, there is still too much pangasius fish on the market for current demand, and so some firms have begun selling more to their domestic partners. The increased domestic consumption of pangasius fish has thus far reduced export pressure for enterprises by some 20-30%, according to Nhan Dan.

Moreover, fish processing companies in the south of the country are diversifying their range of products in order to make them more suitable to tastes in northern Vietnam, especially in the capital, Hanoi, with a market of nearly nine million people.

The US state of Alaska will disburse $50 million in federal COVID-19 relief aid to its fishing industry but there's some disagreement about how the money should be used.

Federal guidelines call for over half the aid to benefit processors, a third to help the commercial fleet and the remainder, about 5%, to go sportfishing guides and lodges, Alaska Public Media reported.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), meanwhile, wants a more even split among charter guides, the commercial fleet and seafood processors with small amounts to benefit subsistence fishers and aquaculturists, two groups ignored by the federal proposal.

ADF&G is seeking comments on its plan until Oct. 9.

The North Atlantic Seafood Forum (NASF) has said it will run a digital edition of its annual conference for 2021.

In a press release announcing the appointment of former Baader Norway general manager Andre Akse as its new chief, NASF said that "due to the uncertainty linked to the ongoing pandemic, the new managing director will run a digital edition of the 16th North Atlantic Seafood Forum".

The event will run on March 9-11, 2021.

The organizer confirmed to Undercurrent News: "We are planning for a digital NASF 2021, and if the situation changes and society gets back to normal [by] March, we will also have an option to bring delegates to a smaller conference."

Chinese restrictions on Russian fishing companies over coronavirus findings are more of a trade barrier than a safety concern, said a top industry executive from the latter, according to a Moscow Times report.

China, the destination for 60% of Russia's seafood exports, has so far placed restrictions on four Russian companies after traces of coronavirus was found on the outer packaging, German Zverev, president of the Russian fisheries industry association, told Vedomosti.

Russian fish exporters view China's actions as part of an "undeclared trade war" rather than a safety precaution, Zverev said.

They come amid increasing attempts by Chinese traders to lower the price they pay for Russian seafood, he claimed.

Russian transport vessels used to bring pollock and other seafood to China have been blocked from Qingdao, a major seafood hub, as previously reported by Undercurrent News. This came after stevedores in the port tested positive for COVID-19 after unloading Russian pollock.

Over two-thirds of the crew of a Russian trawler has tested positive for COVID-19 while in port in Tromso, Norway, reports NRK.

According to NRK, 24 of the 34 crew of Obeliai have tested positive for the coronavirus. The trawler, which is owned by Murmansk-based Nord Pilgrim, arrived in Tromso on Monday night.

On Tuesday, the crew of 34 people were tested for COVID-19, and late the same evening, 20 people were confirmed infected.

By Tuesday morning, the number of infected had increased to 24. The crew who tested positive are now in an isolation ward in a former nursing home.

Seafood Industry Australia (SIA) has welcomed the 2020-21 Federal Budget, calling it a great win for Australian businesses.

"The Federal Government has moved decisively in this budget and helped carve out a path to recovery for the many industries, including the Australian seafood industry, impacted by the COVID-19 economic crisis," said SIA CEO Veronica Papacosta.

"The 2020-21 budget recognizes the fundamental role agriculture and primary production is poised to play in Australia's COVID-19 recovery and reaffirms the government's support of the Australian seafood industry."

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has outlined a pragmatic spending agenda that should accelerate agriculture's growth and the contribution Australia's seafood industry makes to the nation's bottom line, SIA said.

"SIA welcomes the combination of big-ticket, future-focused spends including funding for the Australian seafood industry's first-ever consumption marketing campaign, the extension of the International Freight Assistance Mechanism (IFAM), instant asset write-offs, regional tourism, measures to address labor shortages, and support for upskilling."

The extension of the IFAM until June 30, 2021, will allow Australia's wild-catch fishers and aquaculturists to deliver produce to key international markets including China, Japan, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates, as key calendar dates including Chinese New Year approach.

"This extension provides market certainty to our exporters who rely on air freight, and will help protect jobs in the wild-caught and aquaculture sectors, and countless more positions downstream in postharvest, freighting and beyond. Keeping our industry connected to international markets not only secures the future of businesses and jobs, but cements our reputation as a reliable trading partner post-COVID-19."

The Federal Government's AUD 4 million investment in SIA's "Eat Seafood, Australia!" consumption marketing campaign is of "unparalleled importance" to the industry, Papacosta added.

Norway-based salmon Mowi farmer and processor is still operating its plant in the UK after six employees tested positive for COVID-19.

The company's factory in Rosyth, Scotland, which is supplying packaged salmon to J. Sainsbury and other retailers, remains open "due to the low number of cases, and the plant's ability to quickly identify and isolate all affected personnel and eliminate internal spread", a company spokesman told Undercurrent News.

The factory, part of Mowi's Consumer Products downstream division, employs over 800 people.

On Oct. 5, the Fife arm of NHS Scotland confirmed six people with links to a seafood company in Rosyth have tested positive for COVID-19, but did not name the company. The Dunfermline Press first reported the company was Mowi.

"Six employees from our fish processing facility at Rosyth have tested positive for COVID-19 and are at home self-isolating. These cases form two separate ‘clusters’, which originated outside of the workplace and are not linked. We carried out immediate contact tracing internally, with a number of other employees now also self-isolating at home as a precaution; and all potential areas of transmission received additional deep-cleaning immediately," the spokesperson told Undercurrent.

"We have been proactive in working with the relevant public health bodies and continue to ensure they are fully informed as the test and protect tracers continue their work and we believe we have taken all appropriate measures to minimize further risk," he said.

"The facility in Rosyth has robust precautionary measures in place that protect staff within the facility from the spread of COVID-19, and NHS Scotland has written to our employees over the weekend to confirm their assessment that the risk to them is considered ‘low’."

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken its toll on the Canadian/US Pacific halibut fishery, which has harvested just over 19 million pounds in 2020 and is not looking like it will match 2019 landings, the British Columbia, Canada-based wholesaler Tradex reports in its latest 3-Minute Market Insight.

Harvesters are running about 425,000 lbs behind last year's pace and, with most of the fishery ending Nov. 15, harvesters would need to catch about 1.2m lbs per week to have a typical year.

The International Pacific Halibut Commission extended the Canadian fishery season until Dec. 7 to allow extra fishing and market opportunities.

Halibut pricing for much of 2020 also has been lower, as halibut is traditionally consumed at white tablecloth restaurants. Alaskan longline halibut fletches have been garnering between $10.25 and $12.75/lb compared to $13.25 to $14.50/lb in 2019, Tradex reports.

Meanwhile, twice frozen Russian longline Pacific halibut fletches produced in China have been priced slightly higher on average most of this year, hovering between $9.25 and $10.75/lb compared to $8.50 to $10.50/lb in 2019.

On the commodity side, new season headed and gutted Alaskan longline halibut saw pricing between $6.35 and $6.65/lb this year compared to $6.50 to $7.90/lb in 2019.

On the bright side, there's been a slight uptick in retail sales and, instead of going straight to freezers, fresh sales have been moving and most of the industry has seen hand to mouth production and sales, according to Tradex.

The wholesaler recommends its buyers get their halibut programs "in order as an upward price trend is anticipated due to more demand from the economical revival of foodservice in the US and the potential for a shortage of Russian halibut raw materials".

The tagging of more than 6,000 tuna in the central Pacific over the past seven weeks is being held up as critical in light of the difficulty doing stock assessments during the coronavirus pandemic, Radio New Zealand reports.

"The western and central Pacific is the only area in the world where tunas are sustainably harvested," Simon Nicol, principle fisheries scientist for the Pacific Community's (SPC), is quoted as saying.

"Without the information from tagging, we wouldn't be in a position to be confident that bigeye tuna is being sustainably harvested.Tagging data is fundamental in assessing the skipjack population. Without it, the assessment would be highly uncertain."

Nicol oversees stock assessments in the region.The western and central Pacific tuna fishery — which lands skipjack, bigeye, yellowfin and albacore — is reportedly worth $6 billion annually.

SPC has sponsored a tuna tagging program for two decades, with an estimated 450,000 tuna tagged and over 81,000 of those tags returned to the SPC, which is based in New Caledonia, for evaluation.

The current effort started in August and was scheduled to finish this weekend. SPC pays a reward of $250 for the return of electronic tags and $10 for plastic tags, many of which are brought in by cannery workers, stevedores handling tuna transshipment in island ports, and artisanal fishers.

A new category has been created and awards handed out at the Seafood New Zealand "Seafood Stars Awards", honoring those who demonstrated "outstanding leadership, collaboration and initiatives observed during the pandemic".

New Zealand King Salmon (NZKS)'s health and safety initiatives and commitment to their employees during the pandemic collectively earned them the title, with special mention to Grant Rosewarne's senior leadership team (Andrew Clark, Jemma McCowan, Graeme Tregidga, Alan Cook and Shaun Young), engineering project supervisor Joe de Roo and project manager Cameron Johnston.

Sealord's community outreach in the form of donated product and initiatives such as drive-through temperature checks also earned them the COVID-19 award; while Jason and Dave Baker from Saavid Fishing were recognized for social distancing protocols during lockdown – in the water, on the boat and on land.

The final winner of the award, Seafood Standards manager Cathy Webb, was a worthy recipient.

"Webb was integral in developing operating guidelines for the seafood sector as alert levels shifted and was pivotal in informing operators of the latest requirements, working tirelessly to ensure communications were received as they happened," said Seafood New Zealand chief executive Jeremy Helson.

Meanwhile, NZKS's Adrian King was the sole winner of the 2020 "future development innovation award", having established a sustainable solution for feeding multiple salmon farms from a single location using a communications network.

Three "young achiever" awards were presented:

Completing the lineup were three "longstanding service" award winners:

UK retailer Wm Morrison Supermarkets has committed to continue making immediate payments to its smaller suppliers until the end of January in an effort to help them through the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, it has said.

Morrisons has been making these immediate payments to help small foodmakers and farmers with their cashflow since March.

A 5% discount that Morrisons’ farmers receive on their grocery shop is also being extended to "thank them as they continue to help feed the nation".

A US congressional representative who represents northwestern Oregon is calling for a public meeting to learn the factors behind a recent large-scale COVID-19 outbreak at a Pacific Seafood Group plant in the city of Warrenton and to assuage community concerns, The Astorian reported.

Democrat Suzanne Bonamici, who represents the state's 1st Congressional District, recently wrote to the processor and the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) stating that she was "deeply concerned" about an outbreak, the plant's second in recent months, that has seen 93 workers test positive.

Bonamici asked the OHA to convene a "virtual public meeting" on the issue.

"In the outreach my office has done with local leaders, we have learned that the community lacks information about this outbreak and urgently needs answers that will expedite containment of the spread in this small, rural community," she wrote in the letter.

Tuna traders and producers from General Santos City in the Philippines are gradually getting more orders from abroad, mainly from the US, after six months of lockdown due to COVID-19, The Inquirer reports.

"I’m back in business even if the tuna market in the US is still on its knees with many restaurants forced to close for bankruptcy due to the pandemic," said John Heitz, an American expatriate who is engaged in international tuna trading in the area.

This decision comes as commercial flights to Manila and to international destinations resumed, he also explained.

In terms of tuna prices, they were as low as PHP 100 ($2.06) per kilogram in June. However, according to Heitz, the fresh tuna business is getting back on its feet, with prices now between PHP 200/kg and PHP 300/kg for first-class stocks.

Also, Raul Gonzales, spokesperson for the Alliance of Tuna Handliners, believes "the main driver of the price of tuna is the class A catches, or those for foreign markets".

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the work of onboard officials who deter illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, while the distant-water fleets of China and other major fishing nations remain unaffected, China Dialogue Ocean reports.

"In most of the South Pacific, fishery inspectors cannot come on board the vessel to do inspections before authorizing the transfer of catch [transshipment]," New Zealand-based fisheries adviser Francisco Blaha said.

"The absence of observers will bring a level of uncertainly on reporting catch," he added. "The biggest issue we have in the South Pacific is misreporting and underreporting by the licensed fleet."

Also, due to the new restrictions, all those purse seiners in the South Pacific — which must arrive at ports to unload their catches and go through inspections — are now transshipping their cargo elsewhere.

"Many of them have moved to Kiribati, where they’re allowed to transship in the outside lagoon without formal controls," Blaha also said.

A facility owned by US processor Pacific Seafood Group in the city of Warrenton, Oregon, is experiencing a new outbreak of COVID-19 cases with over 80 workers diagnosed in recent days, The Daily News reported.

The Longview, Washington-based newspaper cited reports from the Clatsop County Public Health Department in Oregon that stated that 77 of the Warrenton's 159 night-shift crew members and six of 106 day-shift crew members had tested positive over the past six days.

Another newspaper, The Astorian, quoted Pacific's Warrenton general manager, John King, as stating that the outbreak was traced to a Labor Day barbecue attended by workers.

The Warrenton plant also experienced a smaller outbreak earlier this year.

Around 30% of dining establishments in the US state of Georgia that responded to a recent survey fear that they may be forced to close permanently without a bailout, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

The newspaper cited a recent survey of 3,800 restaurants from the National Restaurant Association (NRA) that 87% reported lower sales volume in August by an average of 30% lower sales.

Independent restaurants and the NRA have asked Congress to pass the Restaurants Act of 2020 to establish a $120 billion fund that would shore up the sector.

New Zealand's fishing industry has breathed a collective sigh of relief after a government decision to issue foreign fishing workers exemptions to enter the country will prevent the sector from being forced to tie up vessels.

According to Stuff, the country's deep-sea trawler fleet has received up to 570 exemptions to the country's border control restrictions, which were tightened due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In exchange, the industry has agreed to reduce barriers to employing New Zealand nationals and invest in training and education.

Read the full story here.

Chinese authorities have said they will stop accepting import declarations from a pair of Russian vessels for the space of four weeks, after coronavirus was allegedly detected on the outer packaging of Russian seafood products, reports The Star.

The positive cases were reportedly detected in the eastern province of Shandong on Sept. 26, and came from the fishing vessel Vladimir Starzhinsky and transport vessel Crystal Africa.

Over the past week, China has suspended imports from individual Brazilian and Indonesian seafood producers after announcing similar positive cases. Both companies have had their imports suspended for one week.

Authorities in China's Jilin province also claim to have detected coronavirus on the outer packaging of imported Russian squid in the same week.

Bluefin tuna, a prized fish for high-end sushi establishments, is cheaper than usual this year in Japan, with strong catches combining with the impact of the coronavirus crisis, reports Japan Times.

Fishers in Aomori Prefecture, known for its "Oma bluefin", are seeing good hauls, but prices at markets in Tokyo have plummeted due to a decline in demand from restaurants hit hard by the coronavirus fallout.

Fall and winter are the best fishing season for Oma and other bluefin caught in the Tsugaru Strait between Aomori and Hokkaido. This month, shipments of domestic bluefin to the Toyosu wholesale food market in Tokyo, most from Aomori, have been on par with those from a year ago, which was larger than in ordinary years.

Despite the high volume and improving quality, wholesale prices of domestic bluefin tuna at Toyosu in September are 20-30% lower than those in the same month last year. An intermediate wholesaler at the market said that "eateries are refraining from stocking up" due to falling demand for eating out because of the prolonged coronavirus crisis.

Well-known Seattle, Washington-based seafood restaurant chain Ivar's will close its two sit-down restaurants until the spring, citing greatly reduced customer traffic due to the pandemic, KING5 news reported.

The chain will put its Acres of Clams on Pier 54 and the Salmon House on Lake Union" in the US city on "hibernation" for the winter, CEO Bob Donegan said.

"Without cruise passengers, conventions, tourists, banquets, Sounders, Seahawks, and Mariner fans, and workers in the downtown offices, there are few people eating in our full-service restaurants. We fear when the weather changes and the rains return, we lose outside dining and we won't have any customers," he said.

The company's "fish bars" throughout the region will remain open.

US processing giant Pacific Seafood Group is dealing with a major outbreak of COVID-19 at a plant in Warrenton, Oregon.

Testing of the plant's 159-member night shift conducted earlier this week by a private laboratory revealed that 77 of the workers tested positive for the illness, according to a press release from the Clatsop County Public Health Department.

The Oregon Health Authority is taking the lead in arranging for quarantine of the affected individuals, and conducting tracing of family and other contacts of those workers. The agency is also arranging to test the members of the plant's day shift Thursday and Friday.

None of the individuals who tested positive have been hospitalized.

Pacific experienced a smaller outbreak earlier this year, when 11 employees of its Warrenton facility and four individuals who were contacts of those workers tested positive.

Mike Dawson, a New Harbor, Maine, lobster fisherman has pressed on despite the fall in demand caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, slower catches in August and a scarcity of "pogies" or menhaden sold as bait.

Dawson told the publication Barron's that while he's hopeful he can receive some of the trade relief and pandemic aid being offered by the US federal government, his survival plan, for now, is to press on.

"It really doesn't affect my strategy. I just keep going to haul. When the catch or the price is weak, you just don't go as hard or as much," Dawson said. "Your drive's not going to be there."

In addition to fishing, Dawson has also taken on surveys of lobster biomass for the state, which has helped. Despite the tougher economy he still struggles with finding a good "sternman", an assistant who helps bring in the catch, he added.

Hofseth BioCare has announced the first part of its accelerated phase 2 trial of "Cardio" soft gels for the treatment of patients with COVID-19 respiratory symptoms has been launched as a "virtual trial" in major cities across Ontario, Canada.

"This allows the broadening of the trial to include patients who are currently self-isolating with COVID-19. These patients will participate in the 28-day study via a virtual platform," it explained.

The trial will be conducted by clinical research organization, KGK. The platform allows KGK to interact one-on-one with each participant from their homes while adhering to public health guidelines.

The clinical trial will examine the benefit of Cardio soft gels/ the OmeGo product, "in combination with the best standard of care" in former smokers and/or steroid-resistant asthmatics with COVID-19.

"This group of patients are at a higher risk of progression to severe acute respiratory distress syndrome with COVID-19 infection."

Some of the planned study outcomes include improvements in daily oxygenation requirements, alleviation of COVID-19 related symptoms, and time to clinical recovery. Clinical status will be assessed by a World Health Organization clinical improvement scale.

The second part of the study will then recruit patients hospitalized with COVID-19. However, this part of the trial will now be conducted in Brazil and Mexico where hospitalization rates remain high, which will enable a timely recruitment schedule.

The in-hospital arm is scheduled to begin by late November, pending regional regulatory approvals.

Commercial fishers in the US Great Lakes, who mostly catch freshwater whitefish, were left out of a $300 million coronavirus relief program run by the US National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration because they fish in state, not federal waters, Michigan Radio reported.

The fishery, which begins in late winter when the ice begins to melt, was one of the first affected by the lockdowns required by the pandemic.

"The entire commercial fishery had started to collapse," Whitney Gravelle, a tribal attorney for the Bay Mills Indian Community said. "Without a market to sell their product to, they were basically stranded."

As most harvesters didn't qualify for several other federal aid programs, many were left without access to assistance, the media outlet reported. Some members of the region's congressional delegation are working to include Great Lakes harvesters in the next federal coronavirus relief bill.

"We want to make sure that they get the same attention as the other coasts," Representative Marcy Kaptur, (D-Ohio), the co-chair of the Great Lakes Task Force, said.

Just a few months after the COVID-19 pandemic began to shutter restaurants across the US, Positively Groundfish, a trade group that aims to promote the US West Coast groundfish sector, polled its members about their confidence in the sector's outlook into 2021. The results were not so positive.

A majority of the survey's 47 respondents from the states of California, Oregon and Washington — who included 27 fishermen, 15 representatives of processors, four from community-supported fisheries and an employee of a consumer packaged goods manufacturer — had a pessimistic outlook about the "US seafood industry as a whole, as well as the West Coast groundfish industry and their organizations in particular", the group said.

The study, which the group carried out in August and intends to carry out at marked intervals over time, said that the pessimism members expressed about the next 12 months stands in contrast to the "cautious optimism" that many had expressed a year ago, pre-pandemic.

"In regards to the US seafood and West Coast groundfish markets, fishermen expect conditions to be much worse in the coming year," the survey found. "About 70% of fishermen forecast both markets will decline. They are slightly more negative about the West Coast groundfish industry, with over a third expecting that conditions will be significantly worse. Processors are more positive than negative about the US seafood industry, but only slightly."

Unsurprisingly, the pandemic was faulted as the cause of some, but not all of the pessimism.

"Although much has changed since the previous economic outlook study, similar systemic inefficiencies and growth bottlenecks continue to affect the West Coast groundfish industry. Persistent low demand contributes to underutilization of West Coast groundfish quota and production capacity," the survey concluded.

The Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation (AFDF) — organizer of the Alaska Symphony of Seafood since 1994 — has postponed the November 2020 event due to the ongoing health and safety issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rescheduling for the event is planned for the spring of 2021, with a "call for product" to be reissued in early 2021.

"Despite some re-opening measures nationally and locally, there are still far too many uncertainties about the impact that COVID-19 will have on travel and mass gatherings this November in Seattle," said AFDF. "Accordingly, it is impossible to hold an in-person event that would provide an experience that the Alaska seafood industry finds so valuable within the Symphony."

It said, like many other organizers this year, it would explore opportunities to hold virtual events in 2020, "celebrating past Symphony winners along with new value-added products made from Alaska seafood".

Packaging containing frozen squid from Russia has become the latest Chinese seafood import to test positive for traces of COVID-19, months after similar traces were found on packages of shrimp imported from Ecuador.

According to the news agency Reuters, Chinese health officials in Fuyu in the northeast province of Jilin said that the squid had been purchased from the Sanjia Deda seafood wholesale shop between Aug. 24 and Aug. 31.

Customers are being asked to get tested for COVID-19. The squid was reportedly imported from Russia into the city of Hunchun and transported to Changchun, the capital of Jilin.

Whilst being a blow to many seafood companies’ business, the market impact of the coronavirus has benefitted some processors over the recent months.

Some processors with high exposure to retail have had a "really great performance" in recent months, Rabobank's analyst Gorjan Nikolik observed, during a call with Undercurrent News.

Some salmon processors have had double-digit growth, and some companies solely focused on retail had their best quarters ever in the recent months, he said.

Nikolik stressed those companies with exposure to retail with or branded, frozen, or canned product have "done well".

"Processing is a curse but also a blessing", he said, pointing out those "able to move towards retail" have had good results.

Many processors have been able to shift their sales towards retail, benefitting the current situation.

On the other hand, companies with strong exports to countries heavily affected by the COVID-19 outbreak had done "poorly", like those selling high-end species consumed mainly in restaurants and hotels such as lobster or shellfish.

Also, those processing companies based in areas heavily affected by the coronavirus outbreak suffered, like Indian processors that had lost some of their dominance in the US market, before recovering more recently.

"India has been overtaken by Indonesia as the largest shrimp supplier to the US in the peak of the pandemic," Nikolik pointed out, adding that India could not process the product and Ecuador, although increasing its exports to the US in recent months, did not have enough processing capacity in place.

For some shrimp exporters, the coronavirus impact had also been disastrous, Nikolik said, pointing out that shrimp companies — especially in Ecuador — had been negatively hit by the impact of the virus and moved from double-digit growth to negative.

Both Ecuadorian and Indian shrimp processors have "suffered quite significantly in this pandemic period", while Norway's salmon processors have weathered tings better, according to Nikolik.

Australian rock lobster fishers still stung by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic earlier this year will be getting a boost from the state of Southern Australia: They’re being authorized to go fishing two weeks earlier than usual.

According to the Australia Broadcasting Corporation, the move is designed to help harvesters recoup losses that occurred when Chinese imports shut down but prices are so far lower than previous years at AUD 80 per kilogram ($58.50), Andre Ferguson, a Port MacDonnell lobster exporter said.

"It's good — the price is not as high as it has been in other years, but that's probably coming from a bit of other competition in the marketplace from elsewhere," Ferguson said.

Even though Chinese demand is beginning to rebound, harvesters remain concerned about the availability and reliability of flights to China and other export markets.

UK industry body Seafish has launched the first of what will be a regular series of assessments looking at how the global pandemic affects seafood businesses.

The first focuses on impacts from January to June 2020. It looks at how the pandemic affected seafood supply, production, distribution and markets.

Taking about the impact on retail Scott Johnston, technical and CSR director at Young's Seafood, said:

"At Young's, we saw an uplift across our retail business which began in the lead up to lockdown. This started with strong chilled sales and was followed by an uplift in frozen sales as shoppers switched to bigger, less frequent shops and filled up their freezers with 142 million fewer shopping trips taken in between March and April."

The review also features stories of businesses that adapted to COVID-19 impacts by moving into or expanding direct and online sales to consumers. John Watson, owner of traditional fishmongers CFayre in Largs, Scotland, said:

"We’re selling more fish now than before the pandemic. We’re not sure whether that's because customers have discovered us, moved away from supermarkets for their fish or are simply appreciating the quality of Scottish fish, but it's been very positive."

Key impacts highlighted in the review include:

Find the report in full here.

The government of the state of Western Australia (WA) has unveiled new rules that will allow harvesters to sell as many as 100 rock lobsters from each fishing trip direct to the public, WA Today reported.

The measure was taken following the sudden interruption of the lobster export trade to China earlier this year at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Boosting the local lobster supply not only helps to keep our commercial fishers on the water but is great for the WA community, with more of our stunning rock lobster available for local consumption," Peter Tinley, the state's fisheries minister, said. "The fleet's 230 boats in the fishery can land up to 100 lobster each fishing trip to sell from the back of boat, providing a significant increase in supply to the WA community."

Having opted to retain its minority stake in the business after a challenging year, Thai Union Group has already begun making plans for the future of US foodservice giant Red Lobster, reports Campaign.

As previously reported by Undercurrent News, Thai Union maintained its 25% stake in the business, which grew to 49% as US investment firm and majority shareholder Golden Gate Capital sold its equity stake last month. This followed a challenging pandemic-ridden second quarter for Red Lobster, described by Thai Union CFO Joerg Ayrle as the "worst quarter ever".

As a first move, Thai Union is looking to slash Red Lobster's marketing expenditure, which Ayrle told Campaign is about two-and-a-half times what its competition is spending.

Red Lobster is dependent upon six or seven annual events such as Lobsterfest and Endless Shrimp, the CFO said, and in turn spends significantly on mass promotion and national TV campaigns. Thai Union has decided to change this approach, instead choosing to focus on a constant social media presence, which Ayrle noted could save around $70 million annually.

This approach to digital advertising is more in line with the Asian market too, where Thai Union plans to take Red Lobster from its current handful of locations to more than 100 stores in the next four to five years.

Chinese customs have announced a three-strikes policy for foreign food companies that send shipments to China which test positive for the coronavirus.

Imports from a foreign company will be suspended for one week if outer packaging or the product itself tests positive for the virus. After three positive tests, imports will be suspended for four weeks, according to the announcement from the General Administration of Customs.

The food company will be permitted to resume exports to China following the four-week period.

The new rules follow a spate of suspensions of food imports by China on the grounds imports pose a risk. Earlier this week China banned all imports of pig meat from Germany.

However, it appears more lenient than China's initial policy of banning imports from companies outright. In mid-July, three Ecuadorian shrimp companies were banned from exporting to China after positive tests for the coronavirus.

In the case of Ecuadorian shrimp giant Industrial Pesquera Santa Priscila, the firm had its license revoked after a single positive test from a sample taken from the inside of a refrigerated shipping container with its products.

All three companies were permitted to resume exports to China just over a month later.

The US foodservice industry was still hurting mightily as a result of the coronavirus pandemic in August, with sales off as much as 34%, finds the latest survey conducted by the National Restaurant Association (NRA).

Six months following the first shutdown of restaurants, nearly one in six foodservice businesses — nearly 100,000 restaurants — have either closed permanently or for the longterm. The NRA reports that its industry lost $165 billion in sales between March and July, and is on track to lose a total of $240 billion in sales by the end of the year.

Other findings:

— 60% of operators said their restaurant's total operational costs (as a percent of sales) are higher than they were prior to the COVID-19 outbreak;

— On average, restaurant operators said their current staffing levels are only 71% of what they would typically be in the absence of COVID-19;

— Nearly 3 million of the industry's employees remain out of work;

— 40% of operators think it is unlikely their restaurant will still be in business six months from now if there are no additional relief packages from the federal government.

The NRA, on Monday, wrote Congress and the Trump administration to ask for bipartisan support for legislation to help small business programs.

"For an industry built on service and hospitality, the last six months have challenged the core understanding of our business," said Tom Bené, NRA's president and CEO, in a press release. "Our survival for this comes down to the creativity and entrepreneurship of owners, operators, and employees. Across the board, from independent owners to multi-unit franchise operators, restaurants are losing money every month, and they continue to struggle to serve their communities and support their employees."

A longstanding seafood-centric dining hall tradition at Boston University in the US state of Massachusetts will be a lot different this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, student newspaper The Daily Free Press reported.

A 35-year tradition at the university, "Lobster Night" typically sees students receiving their own lobsters to crack open but with seating limitations and restrictions imposed by social distancing, the university opted for lobster rolls instead this year.

"[Lobster Night] is the most famous in students’ favorite specialty night for dining during the year," Colin Riley, a BU spokesperson said. "So I think it was really important, and I know that [BU Dining] felt the same way, that it was critical and important to continue to offer it in whatever ways they could. They found nice workarounds there."

Following the trend towards digital ordering during the lockdown, the UK's Sykes Seafood has launched its first e-commerce website, it announced.

The site will offer UK customers more than 200 products, Sykes said, with a reduced minimum order value of £500 along with benefits such as free and selected date delivery.

Sykes’ site aims to generate additional interest with wholesale customers who can now take advantage of cost savings by purchasing direct.

‌"We’re‌ ‌thrilled‌ ‌to‌ ‌launch‌ ‌Sykes‌ ‌Seafood‌ ‌online‌ ‌shopping," said Alan Dale, managing director at Sykes.‌ "‌It‌ ‌marks‌ ‌a‌ ‌significant‌ ‌stepping stone‌ ‌in‌ ‌taking‌ ‌our‌ ‌customer‌ ‌service‌ ‌to‌ ‌the‌ ‌next‌ ‌level.‌ ‌Customers‌ ‌have‌ ‌access‌ ‌to‌ ‌order‌ ‌our‌ ‌products‌ ‌anytime,‌ ‌anywhere,‌ ‌across‌ ‌the‌ ‌UK."

The website also comes with a quick re-ordering function, which Dale said he hoped would save wholesale customers considerable time.

In August, Dale told Undercurrent that Liverpool-based Sykes was in talks to acquire a pair of London-centric foodservice distributors, but uncertainty around what shape Brexit will take means Sykes’ plant investment focus is in continental Europe, not the UK.

Sykes’ new website launched on Sept. 9, and is viewable here.

Denmark-based whitefish processor A. Espersen has closed its plant on the island of Bornholm after one employee tested positive for COVID-19.

Bornholms Tidende reported the news, citing a company press release. So, all 35 employees in the plant have been sent home. Each must show negative results on two tests before they can return to work, the company said. The factory is also being deep cleaned.

The two-day closure has no consequence for the sale of Filet-O-Fish to McDonald's restaurants in Europe, as Espersen has a security stock of four-to-six weeks, the company said.

Espersen closed the plant as the pandemic hit and McDonald's closed outlets in Europe. The plant then reopened on June 9.

New seafood harvesters in Canada have hit an unexpected wall in their efforts to obtain the same COVID-related relief offerings as others, but at least one province's trade group — the Prince Edward Island Fishermen's Association (PEIFA) — is coming to their aid, the CBC reports.

The new harvesters have struggled to qualify for the Fish Harvester Benefit and Grant program, the Canada Emergency Business Account and the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy because they need to supply information about their previous work in the industry, explained Ian MacPherson, PEIFA's executive director.

"There are several of the programs that require one or two years of previous financial information, which of course a new entrant would not possess," MacPherson said. "They’re good benefits, we just need to get them expanded to a little wider circle."

MacPherson, who believes the barrier was unintentional, reportedly told the news service that he has raised the issue with federal fisheries minister Bernadette Jordan, meeting with the deputy minister and staff a few weeks ago. He believes adjustments will be made soon, as application deadlines are approaching.The problem is not unique to the fishing industry, the CBC reports.

Like the Marine Stewardship Council and Global Aquaculture Alliance, aquafeed certifier MarinTrust has extended its remote audits in an effort to help its customers.

MarinTrust's process on handling remote factory and chain of custody audits came into effect in April 2020 following the COVID-19 outbreak.

The temporary requirements have been reviewed and amended and have been extended by an additional six months, remaining valid until March 31, 2021 or until further notice, it said.

As a third-party certification program, MarinTrust — which was formerly IFFO RS — does not carry out the factory audits or make decisions based on them, and the remote audit policy, therefore, outlines the temporary requirements that will be followed by MarinTrust's approved certification bodies.

More particularly, the new risk assessment approach developed by MarinTrust will enable those bodies to assign a level of risk (low, medium or high) in order to determine if the facility may undergo a remote audit.

UK fisheries are joining a nationwide campaign organized by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) to celebrate sustainable seafood, and to urge consumers to choose products with the MSC blue fish ecolabel. 

It's part of an initiative by the MSC to try and better inform seafood consumers how their buying choices can help to protect oceans, it said.

"As part of this drive, the MSC is celebrating the hard work of the UK fishing industry in bringing sustainable certified seafood to our plates, following a difficult seven months for the sector. The impact of the coronavirus pandemic saw global supply chains disrupted, fresh fish counters closed, and restaurants unable to open for several months. "

According to Globescan research, seven in 10 UK consumers believe we need to consume fish and seafood from sustainable sources in order to help protect oceans. Yet the majority (nine in 10) say they need better information so they can avoid buying unsustainable products.  

In response, the MSC is launching its first Sustainable Seafood Week in the UK from Sept. 10-17, during which it will be working with major retailers, brands, restaurants and fish and chip shops to encourage consumers to look out for seafood products carrying the MSC blue fish tick ecolabel.

Gus Caslake,  Seafish southwest manager and Cornish Sardine Management Association chairman, said: "It's great to be part of this celebration of sustainable UK seafood. Cornish Sardines are in season right now, so it's a fantastic time to try this sustainably caught seafood."

"Fishing, alongside many other industries, has faced challenges over the last few months due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The arrival of sardines along the Cornish coast is supporting the seafood industry get back on track with this tasty, healthy and sustainable option."

Mike Park, from the Scottish Fisheries Sustainable Accreditation Group, said Sustainable Seafood Week and the MSC campaign were both welcome and timely given the economic and operational pressures the fishing industry has faced in recent times.

"Our campaign follows an extremely tough seven months for the fishing industry due to the impact of coronavirus on supply chains and the food sector," said Erin Priddle, MSC UK and Ireland program director.

"With this campaign, we also wish to celebrate the important work of the fisheries in getting sustainable seafood to our plates, whatever the weather or conditions at sea. Their commitment to sustainable practices is vital if we are to ensure oceans teaming with life for many years to come. "

Crab shells could be used to protect UK healthworkers from coronavirus by killing germs on medical equipment, reports the BBC, citing Welsh scientists.

It is hoped a coating which has long-lasting "virus destroying" properties could be made from chitosan, a chemical naturally found in the shells.

It is being developed in north Wales by the firm Pennotec and chemists at Bangor University. They hope it can used on protective equipment to halt virus spread.

The partnership has modified chitosan found in lobster and crab shells to make the anti-virus product. They now hope to create a coating which can be applied to medical equipment, and masks and gowns worn by National Health Service staff, which will kill any virus coming into contact with it.

A handful of restaurants in Montauk, New York, including at least three specializing in seafood, were closed recently after employees tested positive for COVID-19, The East Hampton Star reports.

West Lake Fish House, Inlet Seafood Restaurant, 668 the Gig Shack, and the Dock, all in the fishing village located in the part of the state known as Long Island, announced their closings on social media in late August, telling followers they would be closed indefinitely while taking the appropriate measures to sanitize their businesses and test employees, according to the newspaper.

The New York State Department of Health requires restaurants to notify the state and their local health departments upon being informed of any positive test result by a worker at their location.

Gioia Knutson, a spokesperson for the Suffolk County Health Department, reportedly told the newspaper that she wasn't able to provide the total number of positive cases recorded or confirm how many restaurants had been impacted.

The Dock announced, on Aug. 25, that two members of its staff, "a mother and a son," had tested positive for the virus and were in quarantine. Both were asymptomatic, but learned their results from "a routine check".

On Aug. 28, West Lake Fish House announced that one of its staff members had tested positive and that "all our crew will be tested tomorrow." The next day "after a deep cleaning and our staff getting negative results on COVID," the restaurant announced that the dining room would be reopened for dinner.On Wednesday, New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced that nearby New York City's restaurants would be permitted to reopen their indoor dining rooms to 25% capacity starting on September 30, Eater Magazine reported. If positive rates don't significantly increase, indoor dining capacity will increase to 50%, as is the case elsewhere in New York state, by November 1.

Around 150 Maltese bluefin tuna fishermen will benefit from a €720,000 scheme which aims to help those fishermen who were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, reports the Independent.

The scheme was approved by the European Commission back in July, and is designed to compensate for the drop in prices of bluefin tuna on the market and to help those fishermen continue their activities after the outbreak.

Fishermen are eligible to receive €2 per kilogram of tuna quota they hold.

"Like every other sector, the fishermen sector too was affected by this pandemic, especially since restaurants were closed earlier in the year, so they were unable to sell as much produce as they usually do, but that did not stop them from producing fresh products for the public," said agriculture and fisheries minister Anton Refalo.

The National Fisheries Institute, the US’ biggest seafood trade association, on Tuesday used a blog entry posted on its "About Seafood" site to chastise various national media outlets for "poor reporting and worse headlines" in relation to their coverage of studies that show how SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, can survive on surfaces, including food.

"This is not new information – like most viruses, the novel coronavirus can survive on different surfaces at different temperatures for a certain period of time," the organization wrote.

The reaction was to a non-peer reviewed study first highlighted by the South China Morning Post and noted here in an earlier blog post by Undercurrent News.

The study, which was later covered by The Hill and Bloomberg, involved cutting meat into small cubes and then treating it with a solution containing viral particles before storing the cubes at different temperatures. It reportedly found that SARS-CoV-2 could survive and remain infectious for more than a week (eight days) on the surface of chilled fresh salmon and for two days at room temperature.

NFI has been one of the loudest voices questioning suggestions by Chinese media and authorities that imported salmon or other seafood products are helping to spread the virus. The group's blog suggests the news services shouldn't have covered the study because it was not yet peer-reviewed.

"The fact that SARS-CoV-2 survived on chilled salmon does not indicate that salmon is a carrier of the coronavirus," the NFI blog stated. "The study could have looked at the virus surviving on a plastic bag, a grain of rice, or a shoe.

"Again, it's not a new discovery that the virus can survive on surfaces in the right environment. However, there continues to be no evidence that the survivability of the virus on food surfaces, like salmon in this particular case, can transmit the coronavirus to someone who eats or handles that product. Yet, headlines like today's in Bloomberg ("Salmon May Harbor Infectious Coronavirus For a Week, Study Shows") suggest to readers, especially those who don't read the full article, that salmon is in some way uniquely positioned to possibly transmit the coronavirus, which is inaccurate."

NFI pointed again to comments by the Food and Drug Administration, which recently offered: "Unlike foodborne gastrointestinal (GI) viruses like norovirus and hepatitis A that often make people ill through contaminated food, SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19, is a virus that causes respiratory illness and not gastrointestinal illness, and foodborne exposure to this virus is not known to be a route of transmission."

It suggested that reporters can reference a "myriad" of "platinum-level food safety organizations that explain how food and package surfaces can be hospitable to a virus but not perpetuate infection".

Stirling-based fish vaccination business, Aqualife Services, has become the first to take up a new reduced-rate hire scheme initiative brought in by "advanced compressor manufacturer" Vert Technologies, the latter has said.

Aqualife — the world's largest fish vaccine delivery company — has made the move to "help it with new product development without the need to invest in new equipment at an uncertain time".

Its teams have vaccinated more than 800 million fish to date, that is, over £10 billion of fish kept healthy and disease free. It offers, too, a range of training courses and a variety of fish care and handling services.

"Vert's loan offer has allowed us to continue to focus on new product development which otherwise may have slowed as we come out of lockdown, so we are grateful for its commercial support through these tricky times," said Kristian Clezy, Aqualife's head of engineering.

A team of researchers in China says it has established that COVID-19 can survive and remain infectious for more than a week on the surface of chilled fresh salmon, the South China Morning Post reports.

The results raise implications that imported salmon could be a source of international transmission, a suggestion that many in the seafood industry have resisted.

The study, which was reportedly supervised by Fudan University virologist Jiang Shibo, an editorial consultant for The Lancet, a science journal, involved buying fish from a shop in Guangzhou, cutting the meat into small cubes, and then treating it with a solution containing viral particles before storing the cubes at different temperatures, according to the news service. Each day a sample was taken out for a test to see if the virus could infect normal cells.

The scientists reportedly discovered that the virus remained infectious for eight days after being kept at a temperature of 4 degrees Celsius (39 degrees Fahrenheit). Salmon is typically kept at 4 degrees in markets, restaurants and during transport, the news service noted.

The experiment also reportedly found that the virus remained infectious on the salmon for two days at 25 degrees Celsius (77 degrees Fahrenheit), which the researchers called "regular room temperature".

"Under such condition, (coronavirus) contaminated fish from one country can be easily transported to another country within one week, thus serving as one of the sources for international transmission," said the Chinese scientists led by Dai Manman in a non-peer-reviewed paper published in biorxiv.org on Monday, according to the news service.

"This calls for strict inspection or detection of (the coronavirus) as a critical new protocol in fish importation and exportation before allowing sales", they said.

Seafood industry representatives have argued that the travel time and conditions involved with sending salmon to China would preclude any chance of it being responsible for a spread of the virus. However, the article notes that high-quality salmon can be moved across the world in a matter of days. Chile's fishing authority, for example, said last year that salmon could reach Shanghai in 2.5 days.

Two of China's coronavirus outbreaks – the initial outbreak in Wuhan and a later spread in Beijing in June – have both been blamed by Chinese authorities on wet markets that sold seafood. The country temporarily halted salmon imports in mid-June after the virus was reportedly discovered on salmon chopping boards at Xinfadi market, the center of the Beijing outbreak, though authorities later ruled out salmon as the source of transmission.

Professor Liao Ming, director of the laboratory of prevention and control of animal diseases at the Ministry of Agriculture, was also a co-author of the study.

A lawmaker in the US state of Massachusetts has voiced his opposition to a proposal from the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) that could impose a 100% at-sea monitor requirement or a mix of at-sea monitors and electronic monitoring, South Coast Today reported.

The proposal, known as Amendment 23, is set to be discussed at the NEFMC's next meeting slated to be held from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1.

State senator Mark Montigny (D-New Bedford), New Bedford mayor Jon Mitchell and Gloucester mayor Sefatia Romeo Theken have co-signed a letter to the council opposing the amendment.

"We strongly urge the council to take a more mindful and realistic approach when considering monitoring requirements in the groundfish sector fishery," the letter states. "Such approaches should consider cost effective monitoring programs that offer true benefits to those businesses required to cover the expenses. These approaches should be based on sound – quantitative analyses."

The Global Aquaculture Alliance (GAA) has announced that its third-party Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) certification program has successfully completed the pilot phase for remote auditing of farms, hatcheries and feed mills (including cluster and group remote auditing).

"After continuous requests from facilities, suppliers and endorsers to continue delivering the full range of assurances through the BAP program despite the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, GAA reports that 239 remote audits, including 66 pilots, were successfully conducted between April 3 and Aug. 21."

The value that remote auditing offers has been clearly understood and appreciated as a proactive solution for our eligible facilities, suppliers and endorsers, said Wally Stevens, CEO.

"We are also thankful for the support that our seven certification bodies have given to this new remote auditing methodology. This solution offers needed mitigation for the severe disruption and widespread travel restrictions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic."

The BAP program has now turned its focus to developing a remote audit solution for its processing standard 5.0, which applies to both wild-caught and aquaculture seafood processing facilities. Two pilot projects have been completed so far with a total of 22 scheduled.

Pacific cod and pollock processor UniSea in the US city of Unalaska, Alaska, has seen its third case COVID-19 from a quarantined worker who arrived on the island Aug. 23.

According to the Bristol Bay Times, the employee had received a negative COVID-19 test result prior to traveling to Unalaska and received a positive test result for the illness halfway through the quarantine. The employee has since been isolated and is being treated.

The plant is connected to two other COVID-19 cases: an employee who arrived to the plant on Aug. 17 and was diagnosed on Aug. 24 and a family member of a UniSea employee who arrived on Aug. 21 and was diagnosed five days later.

The City of Unalaska has seen 101 people test positive for COVID-19 since the pandemic's start and four cases remain active. Of the 101 cases, 85 were attributed to an outbreak aboard an American Seafoods vessel.

A meeting of the US New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) that will, among other items, discuss Amendment 23, a much-debated measure that will recommend the level of at-sea monitoring requirements for the region's groundfish fishery, will be held remotely, not in Gloucester, Massachusetts as originally planned.

According to the Gloucester Daily Times, the decision to move the meeting to a remote session was made after COVID-19 restrictions would have limited an in-person meeting to under 25, which would have been largely taken up by the 18-member council and staff.

"It was a hard, hard decision," Janice Plante, the NEFMC's spokeswoman said. "As chairman John Quinn told the members, this is for the safety of everyone involved."

New Zealand's Sanford has said it has made some swift changes to its sales team in a bid to mitigate the impact of foodservice closures in several key markets.

"In many of our major markets, seafood is typically consumed out-of-home and the lockdowns unavoidably impact on restaurants, hotels and any eating occasions where there is a need for social distancing," said CEO Volker Kuntzsch.

"Until recently Sanford did not have a directly employed representative in some of its larger markets, but we are addressing this by making rapid adjustments to our sales team and appointing partners who are more focused on retail. And despite the challenging environment, we are confident that our focus on innovation, branding, getting closer to the consumer via sales channel and market diversification and new product formats will deliver the results we want and a valuable and sustainable world-class seafood business for the medium and long term."

Sanford has been most impacted in its fisheries portfolio, where commodities like squid have suffered from price and volume reductions and hoki production had to return to a fillet block focus for retail, reversing the previously undertaken shift to higher-value fillet production for foodservice, it said. The aquaculture business is faring better, outperforming prior years.

Sales revenue for product harvested by the company was down 15% for the third quarter of FY20 versus the previous year, and the same is anticipated for Q4.

The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is continuing to permit remote assessments and audits where COVID-19 restrictions prevent on-site audits, it said in a Sept. 2 update.

"The decision is based on the MSC's close monitoring of the effect of previous derogations for fisheries and chain of custody holders and is effective from Sept. 28, 2020 to March 27, 2021.

An unprecedented initial six-month automatic extension to the usual timelines for MSC assessments and certifications came into effect on March 27, 2020 and will end on Sept. 27.

"MSC certificate holders may continue to use remote assessments and audits in place of the usual site visits for another six months where national or local COVID-19 restrictions apply or the independent assessor considers a health risk is involved. Initial assessments of fisheries and supply-chains for businesses that do not yet have a certificate will require additional risk assessments and reviews. Remote assessments have proven effective since their implementation in March."

Chain of custody certificate holders who are required to undergo independent labor audits still have until March 28, 2021, or the second audit in the revised standard (whichever is later), to complete these.

"Many fisheries and supply chains continue to be affected by the impacts of the pandemic. Certificate holders must continue to meet the requirements of the MSC standards. We recognize this may require alternative measures to ensure sustainability and traceability of seafood," said MSC's chief science and standards officer, Rohan Currey.

"We want to reassure those engaged in our program that we recognize the local constraints on many partners, and we will do what we can to support our partners through these unprecedented times. However, we must maintain the integrity of our global certification programs for the long-term benefit of all partners."

The seafood industry in the US state of Maine could get a $20 million boost by the end of October through funds made available under the federal "CARES Act", reports Bangor Daily News.

Individual fishing license holders and shellfish growers who qualify will get the same lump-sum payment, no matter how large or small the operation.

State commissioner of marine resources, Patrick Keliher, said that after some frustrating delays, state and federal officials are nearing final agreement on exactly how to allocate the funds. And he said that despite rumors circulating on social media that the funds are being diverted, the money will indeed go straight to individual seafood businesses in Maine.

The funds will go to seafood-sector businesses that have lost at least 35% of their revenues compared with the same period in previous years due to the closure of restaurants, casinos and cruise ships that were the backbone of lobster and other seafood sales.

The National Restaurant Association (NRA) is taking a stab at reigniting demand for dining with a new promotional campaign named "Restaurant Revival", Nation's Restaurant News reported.

The campaign has launched its first video ad, "Sounds we crave", featuring 30 seconds of images and sounds of food being prepared and served. The ad also showcases restaurants’ "ServSafe" commitment to protect diners amid the pandemic.

"This campaign is about reigniting the memories we cherish about dining out," Tom Bene, the NRA's president and CEO said in a statement. "While diners have been able to enjoy some restaurant meals through take-out and delivery, we all have missed hearing the words, ‘Your table is ready,’ and the unique experiences that dining out provides."

South Korea's Dongwon F&B — part of Dongwon Industries — has seen sales of its canned tuna soar over the past six months, reports Korea Times.

"In Korea, canned tuna products have been included as an essential item on the disaster relief food list for people affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The tuna product also has been supplied to medical personnel, who have been fighting the spread of the coronavirus, and the underprivileged," the company said.

According to Nielsen Korea's research data, sales of canned tuna products from March to June increased by 18.2% compared with the same period in 2019. Sales of light standard canned tuna products increased by 17.9%, while chili canned tuna posted 15.7% growth.

Demand has risen too outside of Korea, with Dongwon a major supplier to the US via subsidiary StarKist Co.

"According to a news report, US retail operator Costco put a limit on the number of canned tuna items that each customer could buy. As the COVID-19 pandemic has been extended, canned tuna sales have been increasing consistently since May," said Dongwon.

Early in August Undercurrent News reported on booming canned tuna imports in both the US and EU.

The town of Petersburg in the US state of Alaska is operating a COVID-19 testing program to identify and isolate cases away from its seafood plants, KTOO reported.

Officials were concerned that the town's processing plants — operated by OBI Seafoods and Trident Seafoods — would bring out-of-town workers in Petersburg that could have infected local residents who also work at the plant. But as the plants carried out extensive testing and quarantines of their workers, concern arose that local workers might inadvertently spread the virus into the plants.

So the Petersburg Borough Assembly used $177,000 in federal funding to operate an extensive bi-weekly testing program at the plants.

"Friday morning we head down with our supplies and PPE [personal protective equipment]," Liz Bacom, manager of infection prevention at the Petersburg Medical Center said. "We have two people checking people through and getting their consent, and then they come over to the little swab station, which is a little protected area with plexiglass, and they test themselves."

Vietnam's shrimp exports enjoyed robust growth in the past seven months and are projected to rise over the coming months, despite shrinking markets due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a Customs News report on a statement from the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).

In the first seven months of the year, the county netted $1.9bn from shrimp exports, up 7.7% year-on-year, according to VASEP. The US kept its position as the leading consumer of Vietnamese shrimp, accounting for approximately 22.8% of the overall market share.

July alone witnessed shrimp exports to the US enjoy an increase of 45.3% compared to the same period last year. Exports to the market over the seven-month period increased by 33% y-o-y to $435.2 million.

Japan became the second-largest export market for local shrimp, with exports over the course of the reviewed period witnessing an annual increase of 0.2% to $329.7m.

Following a period of decline, the EU market experienced an uptrend trend in July, while the entry into force of the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement is anticipated to increase exports to the EU over the course the remaining months of the year thanks to good sources of raw materials coupled with tax incentives.

In addition, shrimp exports to China grew in July, while exports to the Republic of Korea, the UK, Canada, and Australia enjoyed a double-digit increase.

Biologists would love to know the factors that caused the deaths of an adult fin whale and a juvenile humpback that recently washed ashore in Unalaska, a remote community in the US state. However, due to restrictions on large groups aim at preventing the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, it's likely that the necropsies needed to determine the whales’ causes of death won't occur, Alaska Public Media reported.

Necropsies take a large team to carry out properly, according to Melissa Good, a marine advisory agent with Alaska Sea Grant.

"Human safety is always the number one priority," Good said. "Other places have difficulties with doing necropsies, whether the animal floats into a remote area or there's bears in the area — you’re always putting human safety first and then going, ‘okay, can we get a sample after that?’ Right now, it happens to be that COVID-19 is at the forefront of all of our minds. And it's something that we all need to be cognizant about, and continue to protect ourselves and the community. So we just can't take those risks."

The summer salmon season in the US state of Alaska is largely over but before participants move on to their winter activities, they should pat themselves on the back.

At least that's the message delivered by representatives of the Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association (BBRSDA) during an Aug. 26 webinar to the fleet.

Actions from participants across the sector prevented "what many feared could have been a major health disaster in the watershed", Fritz Johnson, the BBRSDA's board chairman, said.

"Other food-related industries haven't fared it's well so it's to your credit that however challenging, the 2020 season took place with minimal problems. This was a huge accomplishment," he said.

He recognized the work of state officials, processors, local businesses and the fleet in avoiding hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19.

The Russian food and drink exhibition WorldFood Moscow will be going ahead as planned on Sept. 22-25 at the IEC ‘Crocus Expo’, event organizers confirmed with Undercurrent News.

"WorldFood Moscow 2020 will become the industry's first offline event after the lockdown," an event spokesperson said.

"Its business program, among other events, will feature top managers of Russia's major retail chains, horeca [hotels, restaurants and catering] sessions, and WorldFood Organic, a competition for the organic market leaders, which will take place at WorldFood Moscow for the first time ever."

Further information will be released closer to the event, organizers said.

Mowi plans to wait until a coronavirus vaccine is widely available, and stability resumes in the marketplace, before resuming its branding activities at pace, CEO Ivan Vindheim has said.

"We had big plans in both France and the US this year, and retail is key," he said during the firm's second-quarter earnings call. "The environment hasn't been ready for [launches], so we have put them off."

There have been some e-commerce launches, he said, but "we need a disease-free world, I think, before we are ready to speed up branding again".

Internal calculations at salmon farming giant Mowi have determined that overall, salmon demand has dropped 10% in the first half of 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We have calculated a ‘net effect’ number internally, which we believe in, and I guess we can share it," said CEO Ivan Vindheim during the company's second-quarter earnings call.

Foodservice, of course, is down significantly, but retail is up, compensating in part. "We believe the net effect is 10% demand reduction, all-in-all," said CFO Kristian Ellingsen.

Mowi saw booming retail demand bring its "consumer products" division strong profit margins in Q2.

"The future is always hard to predict, but I would expect Consumer Products to go on leveraging the greater demand at retail as long as the pandemic persists. Certainly in Q3 and Q4, I think."

Namibia's Hangana Seafood is in good shape after some of its employees were caught up in a recent Walvis Bay-centered COVID-19 outbreak, reports the Economist.

The firm's makeshift hospital is empty after the last of 14 crewmembers who tested positive was discharged last week.

"With Walvis Bay becoming the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic a couple of weeks back, we quickly realized that extraordinary circumstances called for extraordinary measures. Like many other employers in the Namibian fishing industry, we needed to find ways to protect our employees," said Hangana managing director, Herman Theron.

The Namibian fishing industry's ability to operate has been impacted heavily by the lockdown, from catching and processing to a significant decrease in consumer demand, the news site said.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, several fishing businesses owned by women in the US state of New Hampshire are seeing success in a field traditionally dominated by men, in part through tapping into new distribution channels.

The article from Scripps Media, republished nationwide on the broadcaster's affiliates such as KXLF, highlighted three small businesses that are making strides in the sector.

These include groundfish harvester Heidi Marquis who sells directly to consumers through her firm The Daily Haul.

"We were pulling in fish every day and it wasn't going to local consumers, so we had to create that market," she said.

She's linked up with Fox Point Oysters, owned by Laura Brown who has expanded to farmers’ markets in the state.

The two women have also supported the efforts of Ella Byrne, a 15-year-old lobster fisher who sells her catch from her garage.

"It's a very male-heavy industry; I’m the only girl who fishes," Byrne said.

The Indian state of Odisha has launched a new scheme promoting intensive aquaculture through biofloc technology to provide employment during the pandemic period, reports PTI.

Fisheries and Animal Resources minister Arun Kumar Sahoo said the scheme will provide livelihood support to entrepreneurs, unemployed youth, and interested progressive fish farmers, and will also increase fish and shrimp production in the state. He said this scheme is most suitable for youths who face unemployment during the pandemic.

Biofloc systems require less space, and uses significantly less natural resources, than traditional aquaculture. 150-200 square meters of land, and municipal piped water supply, is enough to warrant a small investment and starting to farm, the scheme says.

Tilapia, pangasius, carp and other fish can be grown, as per local market requirements.

An 18-year-old, highly regarded seafood restaurant in the Tinley Park suburb of the US city of Chicago has shut its doors, citing the difficulties of survival amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Chicago Tribune reported that Tin Fish, a seafood restaurant and oyster bar, was unable to keep its doors open despite months of trying.

Curtis Wierbicki, a partner in the restaurant said that part of the issue was that Tin Fish lacked a patio for outdoor dining.

"We tried carryout, but seafood doesn't travel well, not compared to Italian," he said.

Then, Tin Fish faced a staff shortage in its kitchen as several of its workers had elderly family at home and worried about possibly transmitting COVID-19.

Additionally, two restaurant patients became sick with the illness in July.

"We gathered everybody together," Wierbicki said. "It was July 2, and we were going to be closed for the Fourth of July weekend anyway. And we closed down. That was it after 18 years."

Estonian salmonid farmer PRFoods reported cause for optimism in its annual report despite seeing what had been a profitable year turn into a loss-making one as a result of the coronavirus.

The low prices that have hit the salmonid market this year are set to continue well into 2021, PRFoods believes, which prevent it from making a decent profit in absolute terms, but have "significantly" increased its export volumes.

The company anticipates salmon demand and prices to recover by roughly 9% in 2021, noting that the average futures price of salmon for August 2021 is €5.55/kg.

"We assume that the direct damage caused by the coronavirus has passed. At the same time, the long-term effects of the accompanying economic crisis on consumer behavior as well as on competition are unpredictable."

"In countries where the coronavirus has been successfully combated so far, including Estonia, rapid recovery of Horeca [hotels, restaurants and catering] can be seen," PRFoods added, though it noted that the situation was highly volatile and still difficult to read going forward.

Over the past quarter, the group saw coronavirus eat into its turnover, bringing total sales down by 8.7% year-on-year to €78.3 million.

"Taking into account the average gross margin for the first nine months of the year (13.9%), we estimate the direct negative impact of COVID-19 on EBITDA of €0.6m. The group's results were negatively affected primarily by the Finnish unit, while the British unit's result remained at the same level as last year, despite the situation caused by the coronavirus."

SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, can survive on frozen meat and fish for periods up to three weeks, reports Forbes, citing a study published in bioRxiv.

Researchers continue to explore the possibility that contaminated food could be the source of new outbreaks in countries that had previously controlled the virus, such as New Zealand and Vietnam.

The study noted the presence of infectious (live) virus, not just genetic material, on meat which was previously refrigerated and frozen for up to three weeks, and later thawed.

Finding genetic material on the surface of food is not the same as finding live replicating virus. "This distinction is important because viruses are quite different than bacteria — they cannot survive on their own without a live host. Besides, having even enough virus is even more crucial to risk of infection. As a result, the potential for infectivity — possessing a high enough viral load which is then capable of transmission to a person — after eating the particular food is quite remote," said Forbes’ writer.

Yo! Sushi has announced it will close 19 restaurants and cut 250 staff as part of a company-wide restructure, reports BBC.

The company — which is supplied by New England Seafood International (NESI) subsidiary Joii Sushi — is launching a company voluntary arrangement, allowing it to shut loss-making sites.

It said the current climate and "changes in consumer behavior" meant that rents at some restaurants were unsustainable.

Yo!'s boss Richard Hodgson said that while the chain had already taken measures to reduce costs, rents remain an issue.

Yo! Sushi currently has 59 restaurants and 10 concessions in the UK.

"Like the rest of the sector, we need to take decisive action to adapt to the lasting changes that the COVID pandemic has brought about," said Hodgson.

NESI CEO Dan Aherne recently told Undercurrent News, "like most foodservice suppliers, our Joii sashimi fish supply business has taken a hit".

NESI is also supplying into Sushi Daily concessions in Waitrose and Partners stores, most of which "traded through the lockdown and are therefore emerging strongly. However, the "YO! To Go" kiosks from YO! Sushi in Tesco stores were paused, he said.

The World Aquaculture Society has canceled its four-day World Aquaculture 2020 meeting in Singapore, which had previously been rearranged for December.

"Despite the improvements to the COVID-19 situation in Singapore some uncertainty still remains in the near term, where large events are concerned," it said.

World Aquaculture (WA)2020 is now slated for June 14-18, 2021 in Singapore.

The venue will remain the same; the Singapore EXPO Convention and Exhibition Centre.

A free webinar for WA2020 participants will now take place from Dec. 14-16, coveringaquaculture topics.

Its current calendar looks like this:

Three fishermen who were spared coronavirus during an outbreak that affected 85% of the people on an American Seafoods vessel earlier this year may provide the first direct evidence that antibodies can provide immunity from the contagion, reports the New York Post.

Blood samples collected before the factory trawler FV American Dynasty set sail in May indicated that three of the 122 people on board had high levels of neutralizing antibodies — which block the virus from entering human cells — indicating that they were once infected and recovered.

None of the crew members tested positive for the virus — and while six tested positive for antibodies that bind to the novel coronavirus, only those three had neutralizing antibodies.

Eighteen days into its voyage, the ship returned to shore after one crew member fell ill and required hospitalization. As the other crew members were monitored for the next 50 days, 104 people were confirmed to be infected.

US Foods Holding Corp, the US’ second-largest broadline distributor, has launched a "ghost kitchens" program that aims to make it easier for restaurants to support delivery or carry-out only operations.

The distributor said in a press release that the program will give its clients "access to exclusive resources developed to streamline the process of starting a ghost kitchen, including proprietary technology to help identify menu opportunities, a detailed playbook to guide decision making, dedicated marketing support, webinars and one-on-one consultations with US Foods specialists".

Across the US, many restaurants have switched to "ghost kitchen" operations due to pandemic-related restrictions on dining room capacity.

"The Ghost Kitchens program was developed in response to growing interest among our customers, but we’ve also been tracking the trend, and ghost kitchens are projected to reach a $1 trillion global market by 2030, making them an attractive concept for operators even after dine-in restrictions are lifted," Jim Osborne, senior vice president of customer strategy and innovation at US Foods, said. "We also know ghost kitchens are a departure from the traditional brick and mortar format, so some independent operators need help to jumpstart a new venture, which is why our program takes out all the guesswork."

The US Seafood Nutrition Partnership's Eat Seafood America! promotional campaign, launched in the weeks after the COVID-19 pandemic took hold across the country, is bearing fruit, the group said.

The SNP summarized a consumer survey it conducted to gauge the campaign's effectiveness, stating that consumers who reported seeing the messaging were "three times more likely to have increased their seafood consumption in the last two months".

The campaign, an effort of the SNP and a group of 44 organizations known as the Seafood4Health Action Coalition, is working to change US consumer eating habits when it comes to seafood.

The campaign has garnered nearly 300 million potential impressions through a mix of news articles, videos and social media, SNP said.

The Namibian ministry of finance has opened a bidding process for catch quotas of hake, horse mackerel and monkfish to raise money for the nation's coronavirus response efforts, reports The Namibian.

In total, 72,000 metric tons of horse mackerel and 11,000t of hake are being offered on the auction, of which 40% is reserved exclusively for Namibian companies.

Of the 28,000t of horse mackerel reserved for the local market, 8,640t of wet fish is reserved at a price of NAD 2,500/t ($167), while 20,160t of frozen fish is reserved at a price of NAD 3,000/t.

For the 60% of quota in open bidding, the price for both wet and frozen fish is set at NAD 3,500/t.

As per the terms of the auction, the quota can only be caught by vessels registered and licensed in Namibia, while successful bidders must cooperate with the ministry of fisheries on conditions applying during the catching period.

The second quarter's "second wave" of COVID-19 in China impacted seafood prices after being linked to fish markets, according to Xinrong Zhuo, chairman and CEO of Chinese firm Pingtan Marine Enterprise.

"Although the COVID-19 pandemic appears to be under control in China, the situation is still severe in many countries and regions of the world, and the pandemic has adversely affected the global market and economy. In the second quarter of 2020, a second wave of regional spreading of the coronavirus occurred in some cities in China, including Beijing, and some cases were related to seafood markets, which had an impact on the prices of marine catches."

With the regional spreading of the coronavirus generally contained, the Chinese market is gradually recovering, and the catering and entertainment industry is resuming normal operations, he said. "Although we are not able to estimate the future impact of the COVID-19 pandemic at this time, we believe that the Chinese consumers’ demand for seafood will return and grow during the second half of 2020."

China's strict emergency quarantine measures and travel restrictions to contain the pandemic had a big impact on the country's economy in the first half of 2020, the company noted. Although it was generally believed the pandemic was under control in the second quarter, the government continued to take precautionary quarantine measures to avoid additional outbreaks of the pandemic, which had an adverse impact on economic activities in China.

"The continued precautionary quarantine measures by the [Chinese] government and travel restrictions implemented by some countries have had a significant impact on many sectors across China, which has also adversely affected the company's operations in China, despite the PRC government's efforts to revive the economy," the firm said.

Pingtan has implemented shifts in work system, paid leave, and reduced the number of foreign crews on its vessels, it said.

"Some of Pingtan's customers are fish processing plants that export processed fish products to foreign countries. These customers tended to reduce or postpone their purchases from the company in the initial stage of the pandemic and have now started adjusting their business strategies in relation to exportation or domestic sale."

"These customers and other customers of the company may further reduce or postpone their purchases in the future due to the pandemic, which may lead to an increase in inventory. The company may take necessary de-stocking measures, such as lowering the selling prices of catches and extending the term of payment for certain accounts receivable, which may adversely affect the financial conditions and working capital of the company."Pingtan expects its results to go on being impacted by the pandemic and surrounding measures for the rest of 2020.

After a sharp drop in sales of fresh products and the closure of the HORECA channel due to COVID-19, many Chilean fishermen and small-scale farmers has to reinvent themselves and partner to sell ready-to-go, canned or pre-packaged foods instead, according to the Chilean foundation Fundacion Cocinamar.

The foundation, which seeks to give visibility to these sorts of stories, developed a new program to support entrepreneurship and regional innovation in the Coquicombo region in collaboration with the Chilean economic development Agency, Corfo, the regional government and WWF Chile.

"We are integrating Chilean fishermen's organizations into our network of entrepreneurs through different activities and providing them with tools to generate sales and adapt to the current context," project manager Griselda Illabel explained.

"We are promoting new initiatives to boost the economy through the digitization and the e-commerce, but also by sharing other fishermen's experiences who have been able to reinvent themselves," Corfo's regional director Gregorio Rodriguez said.

"The artisanal industry is going through very tough times and that is why it is very necessary to provide tools for the development of new products that allow these people to have a greater differentiated offer to open to new markets in the long term."

The foundation is also hosting a series of webinars between Aug. 24 and Sep. 14, which will be focused on improving artisanal fishing ventures and the use of digital tools, mainly.

Pangasius is one of the Vietnamese seafood products most heavily impacted by the pandemic, with exports down more than 31% in the first half of 2020, reports Customs News.

A reduction in new orders, high inventories and low export prices have made profits for the sector plummet, the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) said.

The results of Vinh Hoan Corporation took a hammering, with profits halving in the second quarter to VND 218 billion ($9.2 million), compared to the first half of 2019. The six-month profit also halved to nearly VND 368bn, only 35% of its annual target.

Click here to read the full story.

Guangzhou, China, won't be seeing many imports of frozen meat and seafood any time soon.

According to Bloomberg, the southern coastal city's Cold Chain Association of China has ordered its member companies to suspend the import of all such products coming from COVID-19-hit areas, based on a statement made by the city's internet information office on Weibo, a microblogging site.

The statement, issued Sunday, did not specify which areas or countries would be effected.

The association also has ordered all workers who come into contact with frozen meat and seafood to be tested once a week for the coronavirus.

The action follows the local government, in the nearby city of Shenzhen, reporting that it found the virus on a surface sample of chicken wings imported from Brazil. The article noted how evidence of the virus was found earlier on seafood in other Chinese cities.

"I don't think there is any major problem if you clean the food thoroughly and cook it well before eating," infectious disease expert Zhong Nanshan said in an interview with a TV news outlet Sunday. "There is maybe a chance the virus can be transmitted from food to humans, but that isn't the primary means."

The World Health Organization has said there are no examples proving that the coronavirus can be transmitted in food, Bloomberg reports.And Chen Wei, executive vice president of the China Meat Association, reportedly recommended against suspending meat imports nationwide in an interview with the Beijing News. Current outbreaks are isolated, he said.

"If there is a complete ban, it will affect the availability of abundant supply and stable prices, and be a huge detriment to consumers," Chen said.

The US Department of Agriculture's (USDA) recent decision to include aquaculture businesses in the Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP) will be good news for crawfish farmers in the state of Louisiana who have struggled with the loss of foodservice demand, a US congressman said.

Representative Garret Graves, a Republican, said in a statement that he had been pushing for the measure.

"Louisiana crawfishers are feeling the heat as the pandemic has crushed demand, and CFAP is definitely not a substitute for getting our economy – or the ultimate catalyst needed to boost customer demand – back up and running. But this is a major win for our local businesses as crawfish are the integral part of a bowl of etouffee proving yet again Louisiana feeds America. It is going to help some of our guys out of a pinch as we all hold out hope that the tail-end of this thing is close," he said.

Under CFAP, farmers will qualify for direct USDA assistance. The application deadline is Sept. 11.

UK processor Young's Seafood has echoed comments made by retailer Iceland and rival brand Birds Eye that shoppers dipping into the frozen aisle in supermarkets more often looks to be here for the long-run.

In an article on the sustained boost to frozen seafood sales, the Grocer quoted Young's marketing director Jason Manley as saying the coronavirus pandemic has brought "a whole new range of consumers into the frozen aisle".

"The fastest-growing shopper demographic is more upscale, younger, pre-families. This new behavior isn't going away, [and it] has the potential to change the demographic of the frozen category."

Data from the UK's lockdown period showed volume sales of frozen seafood overtook chilled for the first time since 2005 at the peak of the panic-buying phase during the week ending Mar. 21, said the Grocer, citing Nielsen.

And even as lockdown measures eased, demand remained high, with frozen sales up 23.9% on last year.

A group of commercial fishermen in San Diego in the US state of California have launched a program to provide locally caught seafood for meals for the food insecure.

The Fish to Families project, which is grant-funded by The San Diego Foundation, is an initiative of the San Diego Fishermen's Working Group. The pilot project uses local chefs to produce meals for the food insecure, the elderly and the homeless, according to a release from the group.

Diversified Communications, organizer of the annual Seafood Expo Asia, has announced the cancellation of the event in November 2020 due to ongoing health and safety issues caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The event was scheduled to take place on Nov. 18-20, 2020 in Singapore, having already moved it from traditional home Hong Kong.

"Despite some re-opening measures internationally and locally, there are still far too many uncertainties about the impact COVID-19 will have on travel and mass gatherings this November. Consequently, it is impossible to hold an event that would provide an experience the seafood community would find valuable," it said.

Back in July Diversified was pressing ahead with the Asian expo.

So far this year Diversified has had to cancel or postpone the Boston and Brussels seafood shows, as well as what would have been the first Aquaculture UK event in Aviemore, Scotland, since it acquired the rights to that show.

The US Department of Agriculture plans to buy $30 million worth of US wild-caught shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico in an attempt to stabilize a sector hurt badly by the COVID-19 pandemic, Louisiana television station 4WWL reported.

Louisiana and Mississippi officials had urged the agency to step in after slow foodservice demand caused shrimp prices to plummet, according to the Associated Press.

"This is a step in the right direction for helping the seafood industry and Louisiana shrimpers in particular," Louisiana Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser said. "This will help keep our shrimpers in their boats and in business. However, we still have work to do to get our entire seafood industry the assistance it deserves."

Some fishermen on the US East Coast are angered by a National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) decision to cancel four research and biomass surveys due to COVID-19 safety concerns soon after stating that at-sea observers would be redeployed on groundfish vessels.

The Gloucester Daily Times reported that some in the sector are upset by the two actions.

"NOAA doesn't have anybody working in its offices and has canceled much of its on-the-water field work out of safety concerns for its staff," Jackie Odell, executive director of the Gloucester-based Northeast Seafood Coalition said. "Data is very important. Monitoring is very important. But at some point, NOAA has to understand that the lives of fishermen and their families don't come second. That has to be a top priority"

The four surveys include a summer ecosystem monitoring survey, a northern shrimp survey, an autumn bottom-trawl survey and a summer/fall plankton survey.

The Namibian government is to auction fishing quotas for 72,000 metric tons of horse mackerel and 11,000t of hake to provide emergency funds to fight the coronavirus, reports Eagle FM.

Namibian fisheries minister Albert Kawana said funds would be used to buy medical equipment on international markets.

"We do not produce medicines in Namibia, nor do we manufacture medical equipment. In order to obtain these items, we have to buy them with foreign currency," Kawana said.

Fourty per cent of the quotas will also be reserved for Namibian companies.

The article in Eagle FM did not include a date for the auction.

Indonesian shrimp packer PT Panca Mitra Multiperdana (PMMP) has welcomed 35 employees back to its East Java plant after they were declared free of coronavirus, reports Reportase.

The company announced a significant reopening event, as — including those employees who had tested positive for the virus — it saw a total of 150 return to work after "vacation" handed out after a speight of COVID testing.

As reported earlier in this blog, a task force had written to the local governor asking whether PMMP needed to close entirely.

The company told local media it had followed government guidelines on what to do in the event of virus cases being discovered, and that the measures had been successful.

American Seafoods Group, the US’ largest harvester and processor of pollock, is the subject of a lengthy investigative article from a food-focused news site that asks why its vessels have been especially hit hard by COVID-19 outbreaks at sea.

In June, over 80 crew members aboard the American Triumph were sickened with the virus and two other company vessels were forced to halt fishing after separate outbreaks.

The Counter quotes sources who suggest that the Seattle, Washington-based company's use of a five-day quarantine period, rather than 14 days, was one such cause. Additionally, it cites a letter sent in June from Dr. Marisa D’Angeli, a medical epidemiologist with the Washington State Department of Health's Office of Communicable Disease Epidemiology to American Seafoods that suggested "that crew from one of the ASF ships were not consistently wearing masks".

In July, the Triumph was hit with a second outbreak even after new stricter quarantine protocols were put in place and the vessel was reportedly cleaned thoroughly, The Counter said. It quoted D’Angeli, who raised additional concerns.

"I’d like to know about compliance with the quarantine," D’Angeli said in an email. "Were some people quarantined at home, potentially having exposures to roommates, family members or others in the community[?] If quarantined in the hotel, were they all in private rooms, did they come out of rooms to socialize, have a smoke, etc."

American Seafoods noted its COVID-19 precautions and the three at-sea outbreaks in a July 22 press release that quoted CEO Mikel Durham.

"These have occurred despite our efforts to screen and test crews, place them in quarantine, and sanitize vessels and belongings before going to sea—all in coordination with public health professionals. Still, the virus reached us, just as it has so many others," she said.

Shrimp production in the Vietnamese region of Ca Mau is up year-on-year, but thanks to the COVID-19-prompted shutdown of foodservice markets globally, inventories are piling up, reports SSGP News.

The processed shrimp output in the first seven months of this year reached 65,458 metric tons, an increase of 8% over the same period last year. However, Ca Mau's exports are down 12% in value, at $446 million.

Major importers such as China and the US have suspended or cut orders, and as a result, Ca Mau has some 20,000t of shrimp in inventories now.

This means decreased purchasing power for Vietnamese processors, in turn leading to lower raw material prices paid. The price of raw black tiger shrimp has decreased by about 30%, and vannamei prices are down 15%.

A bill recently reintroduced in the US Senate would help alleviate some of the strain that the COVID-19 pandemic has placed on the country's food banks, non-profits, restaurants and processors through a combination of grants, loan guarantees and reimbursements.

The Food Supply Protection Act of 2020, first introduced in May by senators Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican, and Michigan Democrat Debbie Stabenow, will "help fill the gaps in the broken food supply chain, reduce food waste, and help farmers, workers, processors, food banks, and families in need", Murkowski said in a press release.

The bill features "infrastructure grants" for food banks and non-profits, grants and reimbursements for projects to cut down on food waste as well as funding for "farmers and small and medium-sized food processors" to help them protect their workers, the press release said.

The new version of the bill includes greater support for the seafood industry.

"The changes will allow states to purchase seafood and shellfish to distribute to food banks and clarifies that fishermen and seafood processors are eligible for grants and loans to retool their operations and protect their workers," the press release said.

A task force responsible for handling COVID-19 outbreaks in Situbondo, East Java, Indonesia, has warned of a further 14 new cases at a shrimp processing plant there, reports Antara News.

The new cases were all employees at PT Panca Mitra Multiperdana (PMMP). This brings the total number of the shrimp plant's employees who have the virus to 93; 37 from Situbondo, and 56 from nearby Bondowoso.

On Aug. 4 the task force asked the local governor if the plant ought to be closed down. It has thousands of employees in all.

Health officials in Kodiak Island in the US state of Alaska have confirmed seven new COVID-19 cases there as of Saturday, Aug. 1, bringing the total number of cases on the island to 32 with 16 active cases, the Kodiak Daily Mirror reported.

The newspaper said that all seven new cases were non-resident workers from the seafood industry/ The risk of community transmission from the seafood workers is low, according to Kodiak Public Health nurse Elsa DeHart, because the workers are isolated.

"They are remote and will stay remote throughout their time period," DeHart said.

Health officials on Kodiak have conducted over 5,600 COVID-19 tests, over one-third of the island's population.

The New Zealand fishing megafirm Sanford announced today that it will be closing its fish processing plant at Tauranga, on the country's North Island.

The decision was reportedly motivated by two factors: the sharp drop in processing volumes as a result of a reduced supply from other companies, combined with the building's failure to meet new seismic strength requirements.

The company explained that even if processing volumes were to eventually return to pre-COVID levels, the engineering issues mean the building would still be unviable for use.

"We had installed a second processing line at the end of last year, but in 2020 our fish processing arrangements were not only hit by the impact of COVID-19 but we received the results of engineering reports showing that the site was not viable in the long term," said chief operating officer Clement Chia.

"We would have needed to rebuild or move out within three years. The pandemic has unfortunately moved up that timeline."

Sanford said the decision to close could result in the loss of 65 jobs, although it is trying to minimize the number impacted. In particular, the firm said it intended to continue unloading seafood at the Tauranga site, and would retain some staff for that purpose.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced on Tuesday that it has approved the Coronavirus Aid Relief Economic Security (CARES) Act-related spending plans for California, Massachusetts, Oregon and South Carolina.

The decision gives these states permission to go ahead and begin the process of accepting applications from fishery-related participants in relation to a combined $300 million in relief funds.

The CARES Act, passed by Congress and signed by the president in March, grants — under sect. 12005 of the bill — $18.4m to California, $28.0m to Massachusetts, $16.0m to Oregon and $1.5m to South Carolina, as reported by Undercurrent News.

Other big state winners, which have yet to have their plans accepted by NOAA, include Alaska and Washington, which were rewarded $50.0m each in relief funds, and Florida ($23.6m) and Maine ($20.3m).

"We expect several more state spend plans to be submitted and approved in the coming weeks," NOAA said in a question and answer section, adding: "We appreciate the work each state, territory, tribe,and interstate marine fisheries commission is devoting to the development of these comprehensive plans that will get these much-needed funds into the hands of eligible applicants."

As noted earlier, beneficiaries’ losses must be "greater than 35% as compared to the prior five-year average revenue, or any negative impacts to subsistence, cultural or ceremonial fisheries", according to a summary of the measure. Fishery participants are defined to include tribes, persons, fishing communities, aquaculture businesses not otherwise eligible under other provisions or other fishery-related businesses.

In case you were wondering how online grocery sales are progressing during the pandemic, check out the second quarter performance of online retail giant Amazon.

It saw net income of $5.2 billion on sales of $88.9bn during the three month period ended June 30, Supermarket News reports. That's an increase of 100% in net income and an improvement of 40% on sales from the second quarter of 2019.

Amazon, which now owns more than 500 stores in the organic supermarket chain Whole Foods, said it increased grocery delivery capacity by more than 160% and tripled grocery pickup locations during the second quarter.Meanwhile, physical store sales dropped 13% to $3.8 billion during the second quarter.

Those sales come mainly from Whole Foods, however, and exclude online orders made through Amazon's brick-and-mortar brands, such as Prime Now delivery and pickup via Whole Foods stores, the news service explained.

"Amazon's second quarter was another highly unusual quarter," Brian Olsavsky, Amazon's chief financial officer and senior vice president, said during a late Thursday earnings call with analysts. "As I mentioned on our last earnings call, we began to see a significant increase in customer demand beginning in early March, and demand remained elevated throughout Q2. Strong early demand in groceries and consumable products continued into Q2, while demand increased during the quarter in our other major product categories like hardlines and softlines.

Olsavsky said Amazon has been "super encouraged" the increasing popularity of grocery delivery.

With the higher sales due to the pandemic also came higher operating expenses for Amazon, however. The company reportedly spent more than $4bn on incremental COVID-19-related costs in the quarter to help keep employees safe and deliver products to customers in this time of high demand — purchasing personal protective equipment, increasing cleaning of our facilities, following new safety process paths, adding new backup family care benefit, and paying a special thank you bonus of over $500 million to front-line employees and delivery partners. The company has created more than 175,000 new jobs since March and is in the process of bringing 125,000 of the employees into regular, full-time positions.

The US state of Alaska has put the latest (as of Aug. 2) numbers of seafood sector COVID-19 cases at 248, according to Anchorage Daily News.

The largest outbreaks in the state have involved workers in the seafood industry.

In total, there are 248 people in either quarantine or isolation staying in Anchorage after recent industry outbreaks, according to the Anchorage Health Department.

The season for spiny lobster fishing in the Caribbean nation of The Bahamas is approaching and harvesters have been given governmental go-ahead to begin on Aug. 1. Still, with the COVID-19 pandemic still weighing on foodservice demand, the sector is worried about the possible impact on prices.

Adrian LaRoda, the president of the Bahamas Commercial Fishers Alliance (BCFA) told the country's Eyewitness News that with exports low and the species perceived as a "luxury food", prices were likely to drop.

"Everything is a go for the season and fishermen have been preparing to go out. Some guys are already out and they are going to take advantage of the August 1 start. I’m fairly optimistic about the season," the BCFA president said. "We are concerned however about what the pricing would be. Exports are nowhere near what they should be because of COVID-19. We don't know what the price will look like until the third week or the end of August."

A new study commissioned by UK frozen food giants Nomad Foods and Iceland has indicated the acceleration of frozen food's revival during the UK lockdown is set to continue, and create long-term changes in shopping habits, they said.

With more shoppers than ever being drawn to the category since mid-March, the results of the study highlight value for money and reduction of food waste as two of the main reasons that the popularity will remain, according to the retailer and the owner of the Birds Eye brand.The pair said the freezer had become more popular with younger shoppers. 26% of 18-24-year-olds are buying more frozen equivalents of their regular fresh items and 31% are trying new frozen foods such as meat substitutes.

"Generation Z has been paving the way during lockdown and is making frozen fashionable again, with 40% of 18-24-year-olds stocking up on more healthy frozen options like frozen vegetables, fruit, meat and fish."

As attitudes towards food continue to develop, with people spending more time in the kitchen and cooking from scratch, 33% of all UK shoppers are using their freezer more efficiently with a further one in five including more frozen foods in their cooking. The stats indicate this could be a long-term trend, as 24% say they plan to continue buying more frozen food after lockdown.

The cost-saving potential has been highlighted as one of the key benefits that frozen food has over fresh alternatives, with 21% highlighting how frozen items can be better value for money than fresh, and 17% agree they can get far more for their money from shopping frozen.

Further research commissioned by Birds Eye and Iceland before lockdown took a deep dive into consumer shopping habits and found that over £188 million worth of food was wasted nationwide each week. For every £1 spent at the till more than £0.15 was money down the drain due to the amount of fresh food thrown away. 8% of consumers expressed a desire to reduce their household food waste, but a quarter of those admitted to not knowing where to start.

But it seems that lockdown has given shoppers the time to reflect, with 47% of those polled expressing they are far more conscious of the food that their household is wasting since March, with the figure rising to 54% of 18-24-year-olds.

The ongoing postponement of seafood-related events is now leaking into 2021.

The National Fisheries Institute (NFI), the US seafood industry's largest trade association, on Thursday announced that it was rescheduling its 2021 Global Seafood Market Conference (GSMC) from its usual late January timeframe to late May to improve attendance.

The event now will be held May 23–28 at the same venue as previously scheduled, the Loews Coronado Bay Resort in Coronado, California. The group said more details would be provided in the coming months.

Though NFI doesn't directly blame COVID-19 in its explanation, it remains unclear how soon the US, or world, may completely emerge from the recent pandemic that has caused so many live events to be postponed or canceled.

The trade group said it moved the dates of its meeting, which regularly draws hundreds of attendees, "as part of an effort to ensure attendees are able to join this important annual event".

"Throughout the ongoing pandemic NFI has produced webinars on everything from COVID-19 market impacts to regulatory changes and value chain alterations," the group said in a press release issued Thursday morning.

"The success of these presentations and the significant attendance illustrate that members of the seafood community are hungry for detailed trend and data analysis, the hallmarks of the annual GSMC."

While the digital space is an important platform, hour-long virtual meetings provide a limited experience compared to a full program, it said.

"Moving the conference allows NFI to continue to offer this event and provide much needed critical information during a time when there has been so much disruption in the market."

Indonesian shrimp farmer and processor PT Panca Mitra Multiperdana (PMMP) has reported 15 positive COVID-19 cases at its packing plant in East Java, reports Antara News.

The company said the plant was still operating as normal, though reduced to one shift per day — in part because raw material supply was low anyway.

Around 130 factory employees have been tested following the positive cases. Health procedures are in place at the plant, it said.

A little further afield, in the nearby settlement of Bondowoso, 274 individuals have been tested, as 14 of the positive cases at PMMP live there, reports Klik Jatim. In all, 1,705 residents of the town work at PMMP.

Four workers out of at the Da Yang Seafoods crab, shrimp and tuna processing plant in the US city of Astoria, Oregon, have tested positive for COVID-19, results show.

According to The Astorian, although all of the plant's workers have been tested, Clatsop County officials are still waiting on some of the results. The plant has closed its Pier 2 operations, the newspaper said.

It added that Clatsop County has recorded 71 COVID cases since March 23 and seen 55 recoveries to date.

Mowi's Polish processing division has confirmed 29 cases of COVID-19 at its plant in Duninowo, it confirmed to Undercurrent News.

The source of infection was "outside the company", via social activities, it said.

"From the day we diagnosed the first case, July 17 this year, we have conducted 823 tests. Such a small percentage of cases (29 confirmed cases in a 4,000-person factory) proves that the restrictive internal procedures introduced already in March this year, related to the protection of employees and the company against the spread of coronavirus, appeared to be successful."

The test results confirm that Mowi's division of the plant into zones has prevented internal spread, with individuals testing positive and working within one part of the factory posing no threat to those in others, the company said.

"This situation does not require the entire factory to be closed and does not affect the safety of our products. There's only a marginal decrease of production due to the testing and isolating employees awaiting the test result, but it's not a major disruption."

Those who tested positive feel well at this time, it added.

The local crisis management team and provincial sanitary and epidemiological station have taken all necessary measures to eliminate the risk of spreading the infection, while Mowi "relaunched the information campaign dedicated to employees", it said.

Some 150 workers will share in a settlement of nearly $500,000 from Marubeni's North Pacific Seafoods after they were reportedly forced to quarantine in a Los Angeles, California hotel without pay.

According to Alaska's KTOO, the firm that had sued the processor in June on the workers’ behalf, Arns Law Firm, called the settlement "fair". The workers will receive up to $2,685 each for their 12-day quarantine.

"We think that it is a fair and just compensation for the workers that were held for 12 days at a hotel without being paid," Jonathan Davis, a managing partner of San Francisco-based Arns, said.

According to the suit, the workers, who hailed from the US and Mexico, arrived in Los Angeles and planned to work at North Pacific's Red Salmon Cannery in Naknek for the summer. But while in Los Angeles, three workers tested positive for COVID-19 and the rest of the workers were told to wait at the Crowne Plaza Los Angeles Airport Hotel without pay for the duration of the quarantine. Otherwise, they would be fired, the suit claimed.

Jim Erickson, vice president and co-owner of Alaska Glacier Seafoods, a crab, fish and shrimp processor now confronting at least 40 COVID-19 cases among its mostly non-resident 150 employees at a plant in Juneau, didn't expect the source of his company's COVID-19 outbreak to come from the community.

But that's the working theory, based on a report by the Alaska radio station KTOO.

"If you would have asked me, ‘Hey, if you get COVID-19, where are you going to get it from?’ I would have said, ‘Well, from somebody we brought in from out of state, most likely.’ But that wasn't the case," he reportedly said last week. "We weren't expecting it from community spread, to be quite honest. "…We’re not sure where he contracted it initially, because he's probably not sure," Erickson said. "I mean, let's face it, you could pick it up anywhere."The owners at Alaska Glacier thought they did everything right to keep their business safely running during the pandemic, KTOO reported. But even with mandatory COVID-19 screening and two week quarantine for out-of-state staff, the virus still found its way into the facility.

On July 4, a Juneau resident who works at the plant started showing COVID-19 symptoms and was quarantined at home immediately. Within a week, the employee had tested positive and several coworkers on the same work crew had started to experience fevers and body aches.

Per an agreement reached before the season, Alaska Glacier, which processes more than 10 million pounds of crab, fish and prawns in a normal year, is counting on other processors to pick up its slack. It's buying from fishing tenders, then delivering the products to other processors instead of processing it at the Juneau plant.

The biggest frustration, according to Erickson, is waiting for test results. Employees have to quarantine for up to a week while they’re waiting for results, which are backlogged at state labs in Anchorage and Fairbanks. The average turnaround time has been five to seven days, effectively shutting down the plant.

The city and borough of Juneau have discussed buying equipment to process tests locally, according to the article. But because of high demand around the country, the waitlist is several months long.

New Zealand's ministry for primary industries has attempted to bring a focus on jobs in its sector in a post-COVID-19 world.

The country's seafood sector has welcomed the launch of a new jobs website, "Opportunities Grow Here", which aims to encourage New Zealanders into jobs in the primary sector.

It has been traditionally difficult to fill jobs in the industry, particularly seagoing positions, and this should be a great resource for employers, according to Seafood New Zealand chief executive Jeremy Helson.

"Fishers, farmers and growers will be essential to spearhead the export-led growth that will be needed to cushion the economic effects on New Zealand post-COVID-19," said the body.

"There are great jobs in the seafood industry both land-based and at sea and there are plenty of opportunities to advance into high-paying careers," Helson added.

"We would love to have more Kiwis in our industry, particularly in on-the-water jobs which are highly skilled and highly paid. While those on deepwater vessels could spend weeks at sea, the conditions and remuneration are very attractive."

The processing sector, and science and research labs, or also in need of local talent, he added.

The American Triumph, an American Seafoods Group (ASG) catcher processing vessel that had 85 of its 119 crew members test positive for COVID-19 on July 16, docked in Seward, Alaska, on Wednesday and had its positive crew members taken by bus to Anchorage to be isolated, the Alaska radio station KTUU reported.

The state's Department of Health and Social Services explained that the vessel docked in Seward due to challenges associated with docking in Anchorage. It was previously in Unalaska's Dutch Harbor port, where crew members who tested negative were flown out on Sunday.

ASG CEO Mikel Durham was unavailable for an interview, according to KTUU, but published a statement online.

"We all want the Triumph to get back to fishing," she wrote. "Our crew wants to return to the work they love and join other American Seafoods vessels at sea. At the same time, we want to ensure we are doing everything we can to protect all our crew members and communities."

Vietnam's shrimp exports increased by 5.7% year-on-year in the first half of 2020 to $1.5 billion, despite the impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak, reports VN Express.

Shipments to the US, one of its major markets, grew by 29% to $323.3 million, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers.

Vietnamese shrimp has enjoyed a competitive advantage there since India and Ecuador have suffered from supply chain disruptions due to lockdown, it said.

Japan, Vietnam's second-largest shrimp market, accounted for 18.3% of all shipments with $278.2m worth of imports, up 1.9% from the same period last year.

However, exports to the EU fell 7%, to $200m.

Another seafood processing plant in the US state of Oregon is having all of its employees tested Thursday for COVID-19 after one worker was found to have the virus, the Cannon Beach Gazzette reports.

The Clatsop County Public Health Department (CCPHD) and the Oregon Public Health Laboratory are working with Da Yang Seafood to test all 160 of its employees at an Astoria plant after a male worker in his 30s was found to be infected, according to the newspaper.

The worker, who was not identified, is recovering at home.

The man was reportedly identified as a potential positive case through daily health screenings performed by Da Yang on all of its employees, and the company notified the CCPHD on Sunday (July 19). Results were received two days later.

Da Yang closed its two Astoria processing facilities Wednesday (July 22) for deep cleaning and said it would keep them closed until test results are received, according to the newspaper. That's expected to happen by Friday or Saturday.

CCPHD reportedly praised Da Yang for being expedient about notifying the agency, which it said allowed for a quicker response and better chance of containing any potential outbreak.

Clatsop County has recorded a total of 68 COVID-19 cases since March 23.

Undercurrent News reported in May and early June about a coronavirus outbreak at Pacific Seafood's facility in Newport, Oregon, a town in Lincoln County. As many as 124 employees and contractors — roughly a third of the workforce — had tested positive.

UK aquaculture genetics and health firm Benchmark Holdings has entered into an agreement to sell its vaccine manufacturing facility to a center being funded by the UK government.

Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult (CGT Catapult) will pay Benchmark £16 million in cash on completion of the deal, subject to conditions.

"The government's strategy to build infrastructure in the UK to scale the manufacture of vaccines and therapeutics in support of the response to COVID-19 created a perfect solution to ensure that our vaccine manufacturing facility is put to best use and to secure employment for its workforce," said Benchmark.

The facility, which was completed in 2017, employs 75 highly qualified staff who will transfer to CGT Catapult on completion of the sale.

Read the full story here.

Seafood Scotland has launched a campaign to help Scottish seafood businesses attract more customers through the use of free marketing directories to reach a greater consumer audience.

With huge swathes of the seafood export market closed off due to the COVID-19 crisis, the seafood industry has been quick to innovate, establishing markets closer to home that maximizes the appetite for local produce, the marketing body said.

"From developing a consumer offering for the first time, developing home delivery options and click and collect services, to the growth of quayside selling, businesses often find it challenging to let consumers know they are there."

The Net Income campaign will target fishing and seafood processing businesses via direct email and social marketing throughout July and August to encourage them to add details of their retail offer to a number of direct selling directories which provide consumers with information about where they can buy food online, locally and at the quayside.

To help businesses streamline the process, Seafood Scotland has worked with the sites to create a one-step application process which will result in listings across the Scotland Food and Drink ‘Support Local’ hub, Seafish's ‘Fish is the Dish’ and ‘Fish on Friday’ sites.

The current lockdown in The Indian state of Kerala has taken its toll on seafood shipments and exporters say that "movement has virtually come to a standstill" following the suspension of operations in processing units, reports the Hindu BusinessLine.

"We have no clue on how to cope with the situation as we are totally stuck," said Alex K Ninan, president of Kerala's branch of the Seafood Exporters Association of India. The situation has become more significant with rising demand from overseas markets expected through July and August, he said.

US demand is strong and Japan's is picking up, but the shortage of raw materials is posing hurdles. The closure of shrimp peeling sheds in the state's coastal belt has badly affected the sector, he said.

Even through COVID-19 related shutdowns, prices on Russia-sourced king crab have held steady at listed levels, and relief is on the way in the form of an expected higher Alaska quota, reported J.J. McDonnell, an Elkridge, Maryland-based seafood wholesaler, in its latest newsletter to customers.

There is no need to take an active position on king crab unless you have to secure a large quantity of one size and are not open to substituting sizes if shortages occur, the company advised on Wednesday.

"While held inventories in the US are reportedly thin, the Alaskan season is right around the corner and it appears quotas may be higher for the 2020 fishing season," the company said. "Additionally, new Russian auction prices will be announced in the fall."

Historically, Alaskan king crab has been the primary source for king crab and availability depended much on the October fishing season, forcing buyers to take a position and develop a strategy to last through to the next fishing season. Putting further strain on the situation was the sharp reduction of quotas blamed on warming waters that hurt the biomass.

It caused king crab prices to soar to record levelsand forced buyers to turn to Russian king crab as a replacement. Russian origin king crab is now more readily available to the US market than Alaskan product, the wholesaler noted.

Sales and prices are changing quickly and in a positive direction for prime-sized lobster tails as the US and global economies reopen from COVID-19-related shutdowns, the Elkridge, Maryland-based seafood wholesaler J.J. McDonnell reported in its latest newsletter to customers.

Lobster tails and lobster meat are hugely popular items in the US during the summertime, but the industry has faced a torrent of challenges recently, the company noted.

"Even before COVID-19, the implementation of tariffs on US live lobster exports to Chinese and EU markets had started to change market dynamics," it recounted. "US lobster exports to Canada increased with nowhere else to go. In turn, Canadian live lobster exports to China and EU increased, as did Canadian processing and exports of tails and meat products to the US. During this shift, market pricing for tails and meat climbed to near record high prices. But COVID19 has impacted each of these supply chains and markets uniquely."

For starters, the pandemic "crippled Chinese New Year demand and left live supplies in Maine and Canada with no home," J.J. McDonnell advised. Then Canadian processing facilities were unable to run at full capacity due to worker shortages.

Meanwhile, as foodservice market demand for lobster tails and meat products dried up, Canadian lobster harvesters resumed fishing in May, putting more live product on the market.

"The result was a blistering, downward market correction for lobster tails and meat," the wholesaler recounted. "Weekly prices fell at a record pace in Q1 and Q2 as traders attempted to clear high priced inventories in unprecedented market conditions." But change is happening, J.J. McDonnell advised, as Canadian fishing is about concluded for the season and Maine harvesting is just getting warmed up.

"The expectation is for foodservice demand to ‘save’ the frozen lobster market [from] what some observers feared to be a complete collapse," the company said. "Inventories are now moving through the pipeline as restaurants — particularly in the Northeast — reopen throughout the summer."

The wholesaler's predictions of higher prices were not yet reflected at the Maine dock during the first few days of July, Undercurrent News reported earlier, however. Despite workable weather conditions on the water, fishermen said they haven't seen big landings and their peers have yet to show up in large numbers, too, as the prices were not too compelling. They feared what would happen to dock prices after more harvesters showed up in the next few weeks.

Waitrose has become the first major UK supermarket chain to sell Marine Stewardship Council-certified sustainable British clams.

The clams are now on sale at fish counters across 150 of its UK stores.

The clams and cockles are sourced from the Poole Harbour clam and cockle fishery, on the UK's southwest. They are supplied by the Dorset Shellfish Company, a key supplier to some of the UK's top restaurants.

The Dorset Shellfish Company has never supplied produce directly to supermarkets before "due to the usually high demand from the restaurant trade", said Waitrose.

The supply arrangement has "provided a much-needed lifeline to Dorset fishermen whose livelihoods have been at stake during this uncertain and challenging period," it added.

"The quality is so high that we typically supply the restaurant trade but with the food service industry closed down until now, Waitrose has shown their support and it's become an important lifeline during these difficult times," said Tommy Russell, fisherman and chairman of the Poole and District Fisherman's Association.

The clams are priced at £12 per kg, with a promotion of 20% off.

Alaska Glacier Seafoods, a Juneau, Alaska-based seafood processor, now has dealt with 38 COVID-19 cases, KINY 800/94.9, a Juneau radio station, reports.

Mila Cosgrove, the City and Bureau of Juneau incident commander, reportedly told KINY that one resident of the community, who tested positive, is believed to have spread it to other workers at the seafood facility in early July.

As many as 17 contacts were then tested, nine of whom were found to be positive. Four of those who tested positive were Juneau residents, she said.

Cosgrove reportedly expressed hope that there was little other community spread from the cases, many of which were asymptomatic.

The company has tested 113 of its employees.

Alaska Glacier's struggles with the coronavirus account for a large percentage of the overall 64 COVID-19 cases in Juneau, though 54 are recovered, the radio station reported.

Scottish seafood's markets have shifted over the last four months, according to trade organization Seafood Scotland.

Current business patterns point to a market dominated by long-haul and domestic markets, as Europe becomes more challenging thanks to Brexit, and successful "buy local" campaigns in European markets during COVID-19 restrictions.

With the virtual standstill around export opportunities from the UK, many companies turned to the domestic market, which usually accounts for just 20% of trade. Even that sgement was significantly impacted by the closure of foodservice businesses across the country.

However, many businesses successfully executed rapid change programs and built on the domestic consumer side of their businesses — not enough to replace lost income, but enough to keep their operations open alongside support received from Government packages.

"The market profile has changed considerably," said Natalie Bell, head of trade marketing for Europe, Middle East and Asia at Seafood Scotland.

"UK consumers are demanding more of their own seafood, as opposed to the 60% that is normally imported from places like Norway. Buying decisions are being driven by purpose, and ‘buy local’ is top of both consumer and foodservice consciousness, so the demand for more is likely to continue."

Her organization is receiving greater numbers of inquiries from Scottish companies looking to widen their export base, she said.

"Those that traditionally stuck to the key European markets are now extremely interested in sending their produce further afield to places such as Singapore, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia. Scottish seafood and its quality is widely recognized in many markets, and when passenger air routes settle into a consistent pattern, we will see higher volumes of Scottish seafood traveling beyond Europe."

The New England Wind Development Area (WDA), a group that has been going toe to toe with commercial harvesters in the US state of Massachusetts over plans to place wind turbines in fishing vessel channels, is funding the distribution of quick-turnaround coronavirus testing kits, the television station WPRI 12 reports.

WDA's members, including Vineyard Wind, Eversource/Orsted, Mayflower Wind, and Equinor, have pooled more than $40,000 to pay for mobile units in the Port of New Bedford, which will be able to test hundreds of fishermen over the next few weeks.

The port is the US’ biggest for landing Atlantic scallops.

The mobile units, which are being managed by Southcoast Health, are being made available every Thursday at one of the piers. The testing kits will take one to two days to deliver results, according to the article.

The collaboration between the two industries will bring them closer together once the wind industry takes off in Southeastern Massachusetts. Vineyard Wind CEO Lars Pedersen reportedly said.

"Vineyard Wind and the commercial fishing industry based in New Bedford will soon become neighbors in and around the port and out at sea," he said. "Part of being neighbors means coming together as a community during these challenging times."

Boats can't leave the port without proper COVID-19 clearance, so their crews don't have time to wait for results, Ed Anthes-Washburn, the port's director, is quoted as saying.

"We hope this fast and convenient testing program will allow more fishermen to stay safe and healthy as they get back to work," he continued.

The discovery of traces of COVID-19 on the outer packaging of Ecuadorian shrimp cartons last week has thrown another issue into the already uncertain seafood trade between India and China, reports the Times of India.

As reported in the Indian media last week, shrimp exports from India to China were already facing delays of more than 10 days in customs approval, although it was unclear whether these delays were directly linked to the border skirmishes taking place between the two nations.

With the discoveries of COVID-19 on packages of shrimp from Ecuador, Chinese customs now ostensibly have an extra reason to delay the clearance of goods to allow for further checks.

"While there has been no policy announcement officially by China, we have to be doubly careful and see that our consignments are devoid of COVID," Ravi Yellanki, former secretary of the All India Shrimp Hatcheries Association is reported to have said.

India's shrimp trade with China has been something of a lifeline for the sector since the pandemic struck its more traditional markets in the US, slashing demand in May.

The initial panic buying of canned foods related to the coronavirus may have subsided a bit in the US, but canned tuna producers say their sales continue to remain higher than a year ago at this time, the Wall Street Journal reports.

While wholesale prices have declined for other seafood, the average wholesale price for tuna was up 41% in May when compared to a year earlier, according to data from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. This after reaching decade lows late last year.

But it depends on where the tuna is being sold. Skipjack tuna purchased in Bangkok, Thailand, for example, was going for $1,200 for a metric ton in June, up 14% from December 2019 but down from the peak of $1,500 paid in March, according to data from Thai Union Group.

Companies have been able to keep retail prices steady for tuna so far. Americans are still paying as little as $1 for a five-ounce can. But analysts warn that wholesale prices could remain elevated or trend higher in coming months, as efforts struggle to meet the surge in demand.

The tuna industry has a very long supply chain, the article notes. More than 40% of the world's commercially caught tuna comes from the western and central Pacific Ocean, often landed in tiny nations. The fish are shipped to processing plants on islands in the Pacific, in Asia or South America. Tuna is often canned in a third country before landing on supermarket shelves.

Luis Gallegos, Ecuador's foreign minister, said the issue with China over the suspension of three shrimp companies is set to be resolved.

"The problem of shrimp exports with China has been overcome in a sign of friendship and the close relationship that we will continue cultivating with China," he said in a press conference.

His statement comes a few days after the Latin American country's president, Lenin Moreno, requested Chinese premier Xi Jinping to take action in the COVID-19 shrimp dispute.

"The immediate response to the letter from President Lenin Moreno and the holdings of two bilateral meetings, one technical yesterday and the other by Minister Iván Ontaneda this morning with his Chinese counterpart, makes it possible to ensure that this impasse has been overcome," Gallegos explained.

Gallegos — who gathered with the Chinese ambassador at the United Nations on July 10 to raise the problem of the suspension of the export licenses of three Ecuadorian shrimp companies — also said that the ministry worked throughout the whole weekend to solve this problem. China claims to have found traces of coronavirus on shrimp packaging and in a container.

"China has been given guarantees that Ecuador will apply all the necessary protocols to guarantee the safety of products entering the global market," he added.

"I am a diplomat, and I know that impasses occur. In these commercial issues, there have been and will be impasses. Still, diplomacy is at the service of the country to seek pragmatic solutions to everything that may affect the well-being and employment of Ecuadorians."

He recalled that Ecuador isn't the only country that has had suspensions within the Chinese market but that more than 23 countries have suffered these measures, saying that the same thing happened with Chilean salmon exports and meat from Argentina and Brazil.

Intensive testing of seafood, meat, and other products for the coronavirus has tripled customs clearance times at some major Chinese ports, raising concerns the delays could ensnare global trade flows, Bloomberg reports.

It normally takes about three days to clear the product but is now taking as long as 10, according to an official with Bojun Supply Chain Co., which provides buyers with customs clearance services on foods including frozen products.

China began testing food shipments for the virus last month in a move it said is aimed at protecting the public's health, after imported salmon was singled out as a possible culprit for Beijing's fresh COVID-19 outbreak in June. Salmon sales to China have started slowly rising again after this incident.

Three Ecuadorian shrimp firms have also just been blocked by China after officials claimed coronavirus was found on the outside of packaging and inside a shipping container. The market is currently assessing the impact.

The 11th edition of the Holland Fisheries Event will be going ahead in spite of the coronavirus on Oct. 2-3 in Urk, Netherlands, event organizers confirmed.

The fisheries and maritime fair offers more than 100 exhibitors from both the Netherlands and beyond the chance to showcase their products and developments to a broader public audience, according to the event website.

The fair is aimed at a professional audience from the fishing and maritime industry, with an international outlook. It will be held once again at the De Koningshof Party & Events venue in Urkerbos park for the fifth occasion.

European exports of farmed salmon to China are gradually restarting after a temporary halt due to a coronavirus scare, two exporters and the Norwegian Seafood Council told Reuters on Monday.

Salmon was pulled from retail shelves last month after coronavirus was found on a chopping board used to cut salmon at a large food market in Beijing. However, officials in China and Norway later concluded that imported salmon wasn't the source.

"Salmon exports to China are resuming, but Beijing is still under lockdown," Regin Jacobsen, CEO of Faroe Islands-based Bakkafrost, told Reuters.

NSC said Norway exported 119 metric tons of fresh salmon to China in the first week of July, down 76% from the same week a year ago, but up from 58t the previous week.

Ecuadorian shrimp producers have expressed their frustration over the suspension of three of the county's shrimp packers.

"As a result of this craziness, purchase prices to producers will fall again," a Facebook commenter on an Ecuadorian shrimp farmers’ forum said.

"We [producers] are always the most severely affected. It seems like China wants to take us off the market in any way or that they no longer want to do business with Ecuador. It is clearly a commercial strategy."

"We need to find out why," a second Facebook commenter said.

As of June 30, head-on, shell-on (HOSO) shrimp prices were, on average, $3.80/kg for 20/30 count shrimp; $3.60/kg for 30/40 count; $2.80/kg for 40/50; $2.60 for 50/60; $2.30 for 60/70; and $2.20 for 70/80 count.

"This clearly shows their intentions," an Ecuadorian small shrimp producer, who also spoke in condition of anonymity, told Undercurrent News. "By making these statements, China will drive prices down even more and benefit greatly from discrediting us [producers]."

"We mustn't allow that," he added. "The quality of our products must always prevail."

"The government should do something to help us," a third Facebook commenter said. "They are doing nothing at all while we [producers] suffer. Prices will continue dropping and we will end up giving away our products. This situation is unsustainable."

A top executive at China's largest shrimp company said the country's control measures for Ecuadorian shrimp are "normal" as they constitute the government's responsibility to protect consumers.

"The Ecuadorian white shrimp event is a result of the strengthened inspection and quarantine regime implemented after the discovery of the new coronavirus at Xinfadi market in Beijing," Chen Han, managing director of Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products, told Undercurrent News.

"It is based on a responsibility to consumers. As long as customs clearances are accelerated, it is normal behavior."

In the long run, keeping China free from COVID-19 will provide a net benefit for consumer demand, he said.

Assessing the short-term market impact of suspensions to the three Ecuadorian firms, Chen reckons domestic Chinese prices will increase slightly.

"But due to the previous domestic stocks and the further recovery of domestic shrimp production this year, prices have not changed much and the market supply is sufficient," he said.

The Boston, Massachusetts-based seafood restaurant chain Legal Seafoods has begun to reopen some of its 30 locations to various degrees. Unlike other restaurants, the company had previously declined to offer takeout or delivery during the pandemic.

On June 18, Legal Harborside, in Boston's Seaport, re-opened with take-out service only. A week later, the Chesnut Hill location did the same thing, the Framingham Source reports. On June 20, the Boston location began outdoor dining seating on its patio.

On July 21, three more locations will open, including the one in Framingham. Legal Sea Foods on Route 9 will be open daily from noon to 8 p.m. for restaurant dining and takeout, according to the news service.

The "main priority remains the health and wellbeing of our employees, guests and the communities in which we operate," the restaurant said in a statement. "We are strictly following all mandatory guidelines required by the [US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] and local officials and implementing even more robust COVID-19 prevention and mitigation policies and procedures."

Those procedures include, according to the restaurant: "Using a disinfecting and misting unit at the close of each day, in addition to our strict cleaning and disinfecting regime; "Assigning a "sanitation and safety steward" to each shift to ensure enhanced oversight of all safety, hygiene and sanitation requirements; "Disinfecting all high touch and high traffic area surfaces every hour, and disinfecting all guest seating area surfaces after each use; "Setting up "sanitation stations" with hand sanitizer, disinfectant wipes, disposable masks and other health safety needs for guest and employee use;

"Requiring all team members to complete an internal training certification program, including COVID-19 prevention as well as food safety, sanitation and hygiene policies; "Conducting daily wellness checks and temperature checks of all employees prior to each shift; and "Implementing increased frequency of staff handwashing to every 30 minutes (in addition to when it is necessary) and the additional step of using hand sanitizer after handwashing."

Following the suspension of three Ecuadorian seafood processors after coronavirus was detected on the outer packaging of exported shrimp, Ecuador's national chamber of aquaculture (CNA) confirmed that the Chinese government will not change procedures for the rest of the country's producers.

According to a report on the incident, positive samples for COVID-19 were detected on the internal walls of a shrimp container and on the outer surface of five boxes of the product.

The three Ecuadorian companies which returned positive results are to shut down their processing plants immediately for cleaning and disinfection, while personnel are tested for the virus, the CNA added.

Meanwhile, during the July 9 press conference, Ke Xing Bi, director of the food security office of China's General Administration of Customs unit, said the positive result "does not mean contagion".

Li Ning, deputy director of China's food safety risk analysis center, added that "the possibility of contagion through food intake is minimal".

"Up to now, there is no scientific evidence to corroborate the spread of the disease through food," the deputy director told the media on July 10. "Among the 10 million cases diagnosed worldwide and in the more than 80,000 cases reported in China, there is not one case reported for food intake."

A UK seafood wholesaler, Cupid Trading, has secured a six-figure funding package from HSBC Bank to ensure it can manage stock and improve cashflow after being heavily impacted by the lockdown, reports Insider Media.

Cupid Trading imports frozen goods from India, Vietnam, Indonesia and Bangladesh, and sells to customers in the hospitality sector in the UK, Poland, Belgium, Denmark and the Netherlands.

It also provides seafood buying consultancy and sourcing services through its offices in the Far East.

The company began to experience disruption due to the pandemic in February and was forced to cease trading in line with lockdown restrictions temporarily.

However, after securing the funding, it has been able to strengthen its financial position and is now beginning to resume some critical operations as the hospitality sector re-opens.

Director Ahmad Ahsan said: "Prior to the lockdown, the company was in a strong position. The funding from HSBC UK has ensured that we can continue essential operations and will protect the long-term stability. We can now plan ahead and play our part in restarting the exporting to EU, hotel and restaurant industry."

Darren Martin, relationship manager for Greater Manchester, HSBC UK, added: "With over 25 years of experience in seafood, Cupid Trading has been able to establish itself as one of the most respected names in its industry. We look forward to seeing the business recover from this difficult period and continue to grow."

Singapore is getting ready for a small invasion of crustaceans from the US state of Maine, and even the low amount of traffic for restaurants due to the coronavirus won't stop them from reaching their destination, the Straits Times reports.

Maine-style lobster rolls from New York's Luke's Lobster and dainty cakes from Danish pastry shop Leckerbaer are soon to be introduced to the densely populated Asian island nation as a food delivery option ahead of in-dining locations by Singapore-based "lifestyle company" Caerus Holding, according to the news service.

"Previously, when you start a business, plans for delivery come after it opens. Now, that's the first to be ready; even the store takes a back seat," Vijay Pillai, Caerus's CEO, is quoted as saying. "Getting products to customers in their homes is No. 1 on our list."

The two brands are to be launched next month next to each other at Shaw House, a major shopping area, after more than a year in the making. Eventually, each outlet will seat about 30 diners, though numbers will initially be reduced to 15 to 20 seats because of safe distancing measures.

Caerus is best known for the debut of its New York's famous cake boutique, Lady M, in 2013, the Singapore news service noted. It describes Luke's Lobster's Japanese branches as a must-go for visitors to that country.

The delivery of two new vessels to Icelandic companies Samherji and Sildarvinnslan (SVN) has been delayed by the coronavirus pandemic, according to the latter of the pair.

New pelagic vessel Borkur was originally scheduled to be completed by Karstensens Skibsvaerft and delivered to SVN by the end of 2020. First, it must complete a sister ship which will be delivered to SVN's 40% owner, Samherji.

Now, this vessel is expected to be completed by the end of 2020, while SVN's should arrive late in the winter or in the spring of 2021, it said.

The new vessels will be 88 meters long and 16.6m wide, with a gross tonnage each of 4,100 metric tons. They will accommodate a crew of 16, and represent an investment of ISK 4.5 billion ($32.3 million) each.

When it commissioned the vessel, SVN managing director Gunnthor Ingvason told Undercurrent News it would serve to help the company in a volatile pelagic situation. He prophetically noted in 2018 "we don't know whether the coming capelin season could see us catching 7,000t or 70,000t". Iceland has not set a capelin quota since that year.

"The pursuit of blue whiting is a long task, and efforts have been made to fish from that stock in international waters. It is important to have large and powerful ships," he added.

Pent up demand from Chinese consumers for fresh New Zealand crayfish has sent export volumes soaring to levels not seen since 2015, reports Stuff.co.nz.

Auckland Airport air cargo data for May shows more than 300 metric tons of live crayfish were exported to China, up 53% on the same month last year.

The renewed appetite for crayfish comes after a tough couple of months for the NZD 320 million industry, which has been hit hard by the dive in demand due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Thailand-based food show Thaifex is scheduled to go ahead from Sept. 22-26, according to organizer Anuga Asia.

Meanwhile, Seafood Expo Asia, is also going ahead, with the event set to be held on Nov. 18-20 at the Singapore EXPO. On Tuesday organizers Diversified Communications made a call for proposals for conference speeches.

Anuga Asia said as Thailand further eases its COVID-19 restrictions in June, businesses and exhibition venues are gradually re-opening.

Thailand has now opened all domestic borders, and will be the first Asia-Pacific nation to re-open to travelers and businesses through the creation of "travel bubbles", which will allow foreign visitors from selected countries that have managed to contain the outbreak.

To ease any potential issues, Thaifex will operate an improved event website experience, enhanced pre-registration platform, and a new "Virtual Meet", it said.

Unlike past editions of the show when only a single day was open to the public, this time there will be two public days.

"Post-COVID-19, the [food and beverage] industry will be presented with new options for growth and success. We want to provide industry professionals with the right opportunities to lead this change and quickly build back their business," said Anuga Asia. "Thaifex aims to provide a safe venue for all our stakeholders, enabling them to fully engage with each other and connect with the right partners to kick-start these discussions."

The trade show this year will include both online and offline elements, with virtual options made available for "selected event highlights".

Activities such as the "Future Food Experience+" will be returning as a fully digital experience, where selected panel discussions will be conducted via live stream sessions or pre-recorded webinars.

Thaifex claimed the event will be "one of the first international trade exhibitions to take place physically in Q3/Q4 this year".

The Oregon Health Authority, the US state's main public health body, plans to conduct contact tracing to determine the origin of a COVID-19 case at Pacific Seafood Group's Warrenton plant.

The Daily Astorian reported that the agency will step in to perform the duties after a "mutual decision" by it, Pacific and Clatsom County officials. The plant had previously seen an outbreak of the virus but the new case is a Moldovan man in his 40s who recently arrived at the plant as part of the federal H-2B visa program.

The newspaper said that the county wanted to quarantine an individual who traveled by bus with the infected worker. The health authority and Pacific asserted that asymptomatic workers who test negative for the disease can continue to work, the county said, according to the newspaper.

Following the US National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) June 30 announcement that it would delay implementing a requirement for New England fishers to carry at-sea observers, an Oregon congressman wants similar consideration for their West Coast counterparts.

Peter DeFazio, a Democrat, wrote on June 30 to Chris Oliver, the assistant administrator for NOAA Fisheries, reminding him that he’d asked in April for NOAA to extend a waiver on observers for the shore-based individual fisheries quota program in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. He was not pleased when he learned that a similar waiver had been granted in New England.

"I find it appalling that NOAA Fisheries seems to believe that those in the Pacific Coast fishing industry deserve less protection from this deadly virus than their New England counterparts," DeFazio wrote.

He asked the agency to reconsider extending the waiver for the West Coast.

South Korea has remained the most stable market in Asia for Norwegian salmon during the first half of 2020, though this has been thanks to a significant shift in how people there buy their seafood, according to the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC).

Said market has actually grown in H1, by 11% to NOK 1.1 billion ($115.9 million).

"Norwegian salmon has a market share in South Korea of more than 80%, and most of this is eaten in restaurants," noted Gunvar Wie, NSC's envoy in Japan and South Korea.

"However, we now see a clear shift in the consumer market where more and more people order their food online and eat it at home for fear of Corona infection. Salmon sales to the hotel and restaurant industry are declining, while grocery retail sales are growing sharply."

Two seafood exporters operated by native tribes in the US state of Washington are worried about the loss of oyster sales to local restaurants even as their key geoduck exporting market in China begins to rebound, Eater Seattle reported.

The publication spoke with Jamestown Seafood, which is owned by the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe and Suquamish Seafoods, owned by the Suquamish Tribe.

"It went to zero," Tony Forsman of Suquamish Seafoods said of the company's geoduck business. "We just quit harvesting."

He expects the tribe's geoduck business to eventually rebound but is less sure about oyster sales to Washington restaurants.

"The real uncertainty is with our oysters. No way of telling how fast, or if that will even recover this year," he said.

The board of Spanish frozen seafood association Conxemar will make a decision next week on whether to hold its annual October show in Vigo, a spokesperson told Undercurrent News.

Conxemar's board will also make a call on a plan to hold a trade show in Brussels, Belgium, next April, the week before Diversified Communications’ Seafood Expo Global show makes its debut in Barcelona, Spain, she said.

Undercurrent reported the Brussels plan earlier this week.

Australia's federal government has announced it will extend the "international freight assistance mechanism" (IFAM) — which aids seafood companies export goods while consumer flights are interrupted — until December 2020.

Seafood Industry Australia (SIA) welcomed the news, with interim CEO Veronica Papacosta thanking the government.

"The AUD 240 million [$166.1m] extension will allow Australia's wild-catch fishers and aquaculturists to deliver an estimated AUD 3 billion worth of produce to key international markets including China, Japan, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates."

Since the IFAM was first announced in March, more than AUD 500m worth of seafood products have been exported. "Keeping industry connected to our international markets not only secures the future of businesses and jobs, but cements our reputation as a reliable trading partner," she said.

Some Clatsop County residents worried that workers at processing plants run by Pacific Seafood Group and Bornstein Seafoods in the US state of Oregon were at heightened risk of COVID-19 prior to outbreaks there. The residents wrote to county officials but the county was stymied from acting as the state, not local government had the needed authority to act, the Astorian newspaper reported.

Furthermore, the Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration said it could not force businesses to provide masks and hand sanitizer and that it couldn't determine which businesses stay open, which workers are essential, or force businesses to send workers home if they appear sick, the newspaper said.

Jenny Pool Radway, the executive director of the Lower Columbia Hispanic Council wrote to the county about the risk at Bornstein on April 14 alleging a lack of worker safety protections there.

Bornstein Seafoods in Astoria and Pacific Seafood in Warrenton in late April and early May were directly tied to 38 of Clatsop County's 49 COVID-19 cases, the newspaper said.

Mercator Media has confirmed that, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 13th edition of the Icelandic Fisheries Exhibition, known as Icefish, will now be held Sept. 15-17, 2021.

It had been slated for Sept. 23-25, 2020.

"Given the global restrictions on travel and the effects that social distancing requirements will have on the operation of the exhibition, the team at Mercator Media has been examining alternatives and seeking the opinion of exhibitors," said Marianne Rasmussen-Coulling, events director with Mercator.

"There is also the added uncertainty surrounding further possible government actions and restrictions, both in Iceland and abroad. We would all prefer that this was not the case, but in the circumstances, we believe rescheduling to 2021 is now the best option for exhibitors and visitors."

Unlike some other events which have backed an online edition for 2020, Mercator stressed the face-to-face nature of IceFish.

"Meeting up with client networks and making new ones is a key reason to attend. For the rest of 2020, it is evident that exhibitors and visitors may be less willing to attend, currently have serious concerns about travel, and may feel that their safety could be compromised."

Norwegian firm Hofseth BioCare (HBC), which is trialing its Cardio product as a possible COVID-19 treatment alongside Canada's KGK Science, has seen the treatment move into a second phase of testing.

According to a stock exchange filing, HBC said that the Cardio soft gel treatment is aimed at patients with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, an ailment caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus linked to COVID-19.

Regulators with Health Canada have approved a second trial with 100 former smokers and steroid-resistant asthma patients at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, Canada "who exhibit early non-acute lung injury caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus".

An interim analysis will be performed after the first 30 patients complete treatment, the company said.

Cardio contains the "full spectrum" of omega-three fatty acids, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), and docosapentaenoic acid (DPA), according to the firm. Sold under Hofseth's OmeGo range of fresh salmon oil-based products, it is normally used for its benefits for cholesterol levels.

If phase two trials prove successful the firm will move into phase three trials involving 600 patients.

Chilean aquaculture fair AquaSur has been pushed back to March 2021, it has said.

Originally scheduled for October 2020, the show — which is usually held every two years — is now slated for six months later.

"Our current plan is to hold AquaSur 2020 in Puerto Montt and we are working with our event partners to identify and secure the necessary exhibition facilities, logistics, and hotel accommodations for a successful [event]."

Once the logistical arrangements have been confirmed the new dates will be announced; within the next 15 days, it guided.

Vietnam's seafood show Vietfish is the latest casualty of COVID-19, with organizers announcing the cancellation on June 30.

"Despite some re-opening measures nationally and locally, there are still far too many uncertainties about the impact COVID-19 will have on travel and mass gatherings this August," they said.

Next year's event will be held from Aug. 25-27, once again at the Saigon Exhibition and Convention Center in Ho Chi Minh City.

Photo: Minh Phu shrimp at Vietfish, credit: UCN

China's largest tuna company, Shanghai Kaichuang International, has been forced by the COVID-19 pandemic to delay the construction of its new processing plant.

The board decided on June 29 to issue shares in order to raise funds to delay the project — named Zhoushan Tuna Food Processing Base — to 2021.

It said that net funds raised from a share issue back in 2017 amounted to CNY 586.2 million ($82.8m). A large chunk of that went on the 2016 purchase of Spain's Conservas Albo, for €61m.

The company explained that the pandemic halted construction on its new tuna plant early in the year, and while works slowly began again from March onwards, various restrictions continued to delay them.

With base construction work 100% complete and the "secondary structure" at 85%, the company is now targeting Jan. 31, 2021, as the completion date.

Back in 2018 Shanghai Kaichuang postponed the construction of its tuna processing plant due to weak Chinese demand for canned tuna products.

The US’ 13 Alaska Native corporations count as "Indian tribes" eligible to share in an $8 billion pot of relief money set aside under the federal government's $2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, approved by Congress in March, a federal judge has ruled.

Several tribes had sued the government arguing that the corporations, which own millions of dollars in investments ranging from fishing and construction to natural resources, were distinct from tribes, the Anchorage Daily News reported. A Washington, District of Columbia-based federal judge sided with the US Treasury Department.

"The court now holds that ANCs are ‘Indian Tribes,’ and that their boards of directors are ‘Tribal governments,’ for purposes of the CARES Act," judge Amit Mehta wrote.

The corporations stand to receive some $162 million in CARES Act monies but some tribes have vowed to appeal.

The coronavirus outbreak will drive strong demand for "clean and green" produce in the future, according to Australian shrimp farming company Seafarms Group.

The firm, which is behind plans for a 150,000 metric ton land-based shrimp farm, believes "safe clean, food with impeccable provenance, reliably supplied, will not only continue to be in high demand but will attract a price premium".

It predicts a significant reduction in reliance on Asia's wet markets, and a rise in demand on aquaculture products in general.

"While we recognize that COVID-19 creates a severe shock to Australian and global commerce and creates immediate stresses on the planned PSD [Project Sea Dragon] construction schedule, there is flexibility there that can be used to our advantage."

"Based on currently available projection, we estimate that PSD will be coming into production just as the world economy rises from the pandemic."

The US Department of Labor's Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have jointly released interim guidance intended to better protect employees working in seafood processing facilities, including those maintained on vessels, in relation to the coronavirus pandemic.

The guidance, which was developed with the help of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), reiterates that seafood-processing workers are not exposed to the disease through the fish and seafood products they handle.

"It is imperative that workers in the seafood processing industry are protected from coronavirus exposure in their workplace," principal deputy assistant secretary of labor Loren Sweatt said in a press release."While the seafood products these workers handle do not expose them to the coronavirus, their work environments – processing stations and other areas in busy facilities where they have close contact with coworkers and supervisors – may contribute to their potential exposures," the guidance warns.

The National Fisheries Institute, the US seafood industry's largest trade association, brought attention to the issuance late Thursday, saying it "is pleased to see federal regulators working together to create important guidance to protect workers at seafood facilities and provide guidance for employers."

Among the suggestions included in the guidance:

Scotland's seafood processing sector is currently running at around 50% capacity, but as markets prepare to re-open and consumer demand increases, the sector must be ready to safely ramp-up.

This week Seafood Scotland and Seafish, as part of the Scottish Seafood Training Network (SSTN), brought the industry together for a webinar with Helen Muir, SSTN chair, to establish what change is required across the sector to make it safer for workers and consumers.

Muir — who is also head of HR for Dawnfresh Seafoods — shared many of the measures that firm has recently undertaken to make its operations safe in light of COVID-19, and to ensure that production can continue around social distancing and new hygiene guidelines in place, "as well as those that might come in the future as we deal with as yet indistinct crises".

Donna Fordyce, interim head of Seafood Scotland, said that while some larger operations like Dawnfresh have been quick to act, some of the smaller processors have found getting back to some level of operational capacity a real challenge.

"It is hard to know where to start, and production has completely stopped in some places. However, to get the entire seafood sector moving again, all parts of the supply chain need to be up and running."

The number of new COVID-19 cases in the major New England scallop landing and seafood processing city of New Bedford, Massachusetts, and its surrounding area has been declining in recent weeks, South Coast Today, the local newspaper, reports.Several seafood processing plants in New Bedford, including Blue Harvest Fisheries, were earlier forced to shutdown for several days as a result of detecting coronavirus cases, as reported by Undercurrent News.

However, since May 12, the number of new cases detected in New Bedford has gradually dropped from a moving average of 53 per day to just eight on June 16, based on a chart maintained by the city, according to the newspaper.

The city, on Tuesday, reported no new cases and on Wednesday it reported only one new case, for a total of 2,124 cases overall.New Bedford mayor Jon Mitchell, a few weeks ago, was reluctant to suggest major progress was being made, according to the newspaper. However, on Wednesday, he was more upbeat.

"Now they’re clearly going down, which is good," Mitchell said. "And that trend has allowed us to reopen a great many businesses and activities."He also noted that New Bedford has had fewer cases on a per capita basis than some other Northeast cities. He complimented residents for doing a "fabulous job " of understanding the requirement of social distancing and mask wearing.

But he added: "All that said, we’re not out of the woods yet; the virus is very much still around and, as we’ve seen in other states, very capable of spreading again at exponential rates so we have to be on guard for a while still."

According to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health's Weekly COVID-19 Public Health Report, published Wednesday, of the 13,668 New Bedford residents that have been tested for the disease, 15.33% have been found to be positive.

The confusion and fear around farmed salmon in China was reflected in Norway's exports last week, the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) has revealed.

Exports of fresh salmon to China fell by 97% in week 25 of 2020, to just 15 metric tons, compared to the same week last year. Compared to week 24 of this year, the decline was 94%.

"The sharp fall in weekly salmon exports to China must be seen in light of the recent development of COVID-19 in Beijing and the effects this has had on salmon trade and demand," said the NSC's envoy to China, Victoria Braathen.

"Last week, the Chinese authorities ruled that salmon is not the source of the outbreak, and we can say that the situation is clearer. At the same time, it is too early to say what effects the new outbreak of COVID-19 will have on the demand for fresh salmon going forward."

"As the situation gradually normalizes, we have great faith in the Chinese seafood market and further potential for Norwegian salmon," she added.

The World Aquaculture Society still intends to hold its four-day World Aquaculture 2020 meeting in Singapore beginning on Dec. 14, it said.

The meeting will take place at the Singapore EXPO Convention and Exhibition Centre & Max Atria and, if held, will be one of a small handful of seafood sector trade shows not to be canceled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

"The Steering Committee is working hard to keep track of the developing guidelines and regulations from the Singapore government, international health organizations and other authorities," the group said in a press release. As these develop, we will be incorporating them into WA2020 to make it the safest and most effective Conference and Exposition possible."

Organizers added that in light of current events, they have added a special discussion section: "Aquaculture and the COVID-19 pandemic and preparation for future crisis situations".

The UK will relax lockdown restrictions and allow restaurants and pubs to reopen in England from July 4, the BBC reports.

The prime minister, Boris Johnson, said the two-meter distancing rule is being reduced to 1m, and tourism should be boosted by the opening of attractions such as cinemas and museums.

A spokesman for the prime minister has also told political reporters that the government is planning a new law making it easier for pubs, restaurants, and cafes to serve people outside.

An order from officials in the US state of Alaska to delay trials until September has left the family of two crewmembers who sank aboard the F/V Scandies Rose on Dec. 31, 2019, in limbo, the Kodiak Daily Mirror reported.

The vessel's sinking, which killed five of seven crew, is under investigation from the US Coast Guard. The newspaper said that the hearing, which had been initially scheduled to be heard in June, is needed before the families can receive death certificates for their loved ones.

"Literally, we cannot do anything," Deanna said. "They are still considered missing, and until we have a death certificate we can't go on with the wills. We can't go on with anything."

The 42-year-old crab fishing vessel capsized and sank at about 10 p.m. on Dec. 31, according to a statement from the Coast Guard. A mayday call had been heard the same evening via high frequency radio. The vessel's last known position was five miles southeast of Sutwik Island and 170 miles southwest of the Coast Guard air station in Kodiak.

The Australian industry body Seafood Industry Australia (SIA) has received an AUD 4 million ($2.7m) to use in a national marketing campaign promoting domestic seafood within the country as well as to help support the industry's recovery post-COVID.

"This funding will allow the Australian seafood industry to deliver a 12-month national awareness program designed to provide a much-needed boost to the Australia seafood industry, and the supply chain that supports it including retailers and foodservice, as we recover from the impacts of COVID-19," wrote the SIA.

The governing body noted that the campaign would also represent a move to establish Australian Seafood as a brand in its own right, as the sector embarks on its first united national approach to marketing.

"Post-COVID-19 we’re noticing a change in Australian consumers and they’re prioritizing Australian produce. This provides us with a wonderful opportunity to position our clean and sustainable Australian seafood to domestic consumers, as they adjust their purchasing behaviors and prioritize the importance of Australian origin," the SIA added.

"This campaign will be focused on one clear, simple message to eat Australian seafood. So, let's throw another prawn on the barbie and Eat Seafood, Australia!"

The South African hake supplier Sea Harvest Group has reopened its Saldanha Bay plant operations originally shut on June 17 due to non-compliance with the country's COVID-19 mitigation regulations, reports Fin 24.

After being closed from midday on June 17, Sea Harvest was given clearance to reopen its Saldanha operations on June 19.

The company had allegedly failed to comply with regulations imposed to prevent the spread of the disease, while 80 of its employees had tested positive. This led to the closure of the production line and entry points at the plant, while sub-contractors were also unable to carry on with work.

Sea Harvest CEO Felix Ratheb said the company had now put in place screening and sanitizing transport for staff, manned an onsite clinic with six nurses and a doctor, as well as putting in place physical barriers to force social distancing.

Two longtime seafood restaurants in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada's capital city, have been forced to shutter their doors for good due to the prolonged closures imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the CBC, the closure of the Fish Market Restaurant, Coasters Seafood Grill and Vineyards Wine Bar Bistro will have a big impact on the city's ByWard Market.

Some of the restaurants that’ve closed in Ottawa had operated for four decades, said Sarah Chown, chair of the Ontario Restaurant Hotel & Motel Association.

"It's tragic, sadly not shocking for a lot of restaurants that are going through that but it's just terrible," she said.

Scottish Sea Farms (SSF) has announced it will repay all money received under the UK government's "coronavirus job retention scheme" as markets re-open and business performance begins to show signs of bouncing back.

The company will pay back in full the furlough scheme funding, which provided vital support at the start of the COVID-19 restrictions, and won't be making any further claims.

"Both the UK and Scottish governments were quick to identify food producers as being key to the nation's resilience during the COVID-19 crisis, so we have worked hard to put in place the protective measures necessary to enable us to operate safely and at near full capacity to help keep supplies of fresh farmed salmon flowing.," said SSF managing director Jim Gallagher.

Since March 2020, the company has furloughed 36 full-time and part-time staff – 8% of its 451-strong workforce – under the scheme, amounting to support in the region of £106,000 until end of June.

Although it's hard to predict when exactly it will be safe or practical for those furloughed to return to work as normal, SSF said it was opting to cover the full cost of salaries.

"Trading has been exceptionally tough these last few months. On the one hand, panic-buying led to an initial bounce in domestic sales. On the other, our export markets all but closed resulting in reduced sales, increased freight and operating costs, and significantly reduced profits.," said Gallagher.

"Now, we’re starting to see a nice bounce in several of these same markets: France, Italy, Spain, Germany and even the Far East are all open again. There's a long way to go but the business is in profit and as such we feel the money received via the job retention scheme would be better served invested in the country's essential services and recovery."

Seafood processors in Atlantic Canada will share CAD 38 million ($27.9m) of the federal government's CAD 62m Canadian Seafood Stabilization Fund to offset the cost of COVID-19 prevention measures and adding refrigeration, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

The program, to be administered by the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, will pay for expenses incurred after March 15 and review applications on a first-come, first-served basis. Applications can be submitted as of June 22, the broadcaster said.

The latest coronavirus updates from the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) show that salmon sales to China dropped in week 24 — the week in which salmon seemingly copped the blame for starting a new wave of COVID-19 cases in Beijing.

"Affected Norwegian seafood exporters have reported on logistics challenges to Beijing. Due to the new outbreak of infection, a number of flights to and from Beijing have also been canceled," said NSC.

That said, exports had been declining since week 20, and are now below the weekly levels seen at this time in 2019.

"After salmon prices to China have risen in recent weeks, we have seen a decline in total exports of fresh whole salmon. Last week, exports of fresh whole salmon to China fell by 34% to 240 [metric tons]. It is too early to say what consequences the new Beijing outbreak will have on salmon exports in the future," said Victoria Braathen, NSC envoy to China.

The average export price for fresh whole salmon was NOK 70/kg in week 24, on a par with 2019's week 24 level. "It is the highest export price measured since the start of the corona period in week nine, when the salmon price was NOK 72.85/kg," said Paul Aandahl, NSC analyst.

The Norwegian body also noted that Italy has begun to recover, with a gradual reopening of restaurants and sushi outlets early in June.

"The last three weeks, exports of fresh whole salmon to Italy increased by 60% and for the first time since the corona outbreak in the country started, exports of fresh whole salmon passed [2019 levels]."

The Chinese government has yet to uncover any evidence that salmon was the original source or an intermediate host of the most recent wave of COVID-19 that's hit Beijing, an official at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday, according to multiple media reports.

A new cluster of the coronavirus was found on salmon cutting boards at the Jingshen Seafood Market, Beijing's largest wholesale food market, on Friday, setting off a frenzy of seafood inspections and import refusals over the weekend.

However, there was no trace of it on the salmon before it reached the market, Shi Guoqing, deputy director of the CDC's emergency response center, said at a press conference, the Chinese business news service Yicai Global reports.

"At present, all the evidence points to Xinfadi, rather than to salmon," said Zhong Kai, director of the China Food Information Center, referring to the market in Beijing's southwestern district of Fengtai.No contamination has been found in restaurants selling salmon, and no infections have been found among people who ate the fish, Kai reportedly added. Also, there have been no COVID-19 outbreaks related to imported salmon in any other cities.

"The incubation period for the COVID-19 virus is at least three days, sometimes up to two weeks," an epidemiologist reportedly told Yicai Global. The earliest related case was announced on June 4, which means that the infection took place three to 14 days before that.

The possibility that salmon and other aquatic products have been contaminated has not been ruled out, he added, however.

The comments are not the first by a Chinese government official this week to essentially downplay salmon as the source of the recent outbreak.

Wu Zunyou, chief epidemiologist with the Chinese CDC, said in an interview Monday with state television that a positive result from a salmon chopping board "doesn't indicate much," as it could have been contaminated by workers or shoppers spraying droplets.

However, Wu urged that inspection and quarantine "must be strengthened", given that food products may become contaminated during production and transported along the cold chain, "if products come from countries with severe outbreaks", as reported by Undercurrent.

It's unclear if the virus can be transmitted through frozen food that's later thawed, Bloomberg News has reported. It quotes David Hamer, a professor at Boston University School of Public Health and a physician at Boston Medical Center, as saying that, although there is no evidence that COVID-19 can be transmitted through food, more research is needed.

"That raises a whole lot of concerning prospects around the global movement of the food supply," Hamer said. "This could set off a panic if people think their food could be a cause of infection."

Fishing subsidies have been the albatross around the World Trade Organisation's neck for the past two decades. Now experts fear the coronavirus will prevent it from meeting its deadline to end the practice, according to an article in China Dialogue.

The deadline for agreeing a deal to end such subsidies, in accordance with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), is this year.

Isabel Jarrett, manager of the Pew Charitable Trusts program to reduce harmful fishing subsidies, said members have faced delays drafting the text agreement. "As negotiations can't take place in person and virtual negotiations are difficult we don't have a clear sense of the timeline for the rest of the negotiations," she said.

Ambassador Santiago Wills of Colombia, who leads the fisheries subsidies talks at the WTO, said despite challenges he is still hopeful of a deal this year.

In a recent webinar hosted by NGO Chatham House, Wills said though coordination between delegates "has been difficult" due to the pandemic, he confirmed that the commitment of all delegations to reaching an agreement remains strong.

The NGO Human Rights at Sea has issued a scathing response to the plans by the International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) calling for a global strike in response to contract extensions during the pandemic.

In its release, the NGO says the strike alienates the unions at a time when global stability and unity is most needed.

"Human Rights at Sea strongly denounces what it considers are irresponsible and short-sighted actions by ITF and supporting industry bodies, which if allowed to be followed, could well have life-changing repercussions and long-term ripple effects for the most vulnerable in society," it went on.

The call to action, announced on June 15, would see seafarers supported in leaving their roles, ceasing work and thereby disrupting global supply chains, a move which Human Rights at Sea claimed would set a dangerous vigilante precedent in the global marine environment.

"Previous claims of a ‘humanitarian crisis’ due to lack of crew-change could now be eclipsed in terms of repercussions of this unnecessary call to action," the NGO added.

"The consequential deaths resulting from failures to deliver aid, urgently needed medicines, re-supplies for global frontline healthcare workers, including critical stocks of PPE and medical equipment to fight the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as essential raw materials, food and oil, must see those responsible held to account."

Shellfish farmers in the US state of Virginia who have been hard hit by the drop off in restaurant demand caused by COVID-19 hope that demand will begin to pick up for the summer around the Fourth of July. According to the Augusta Free Press, some 93% of US aquaculture operators in the south have been negatively affected by the pandemic, according to a recent university study.

"The pandemic has had a major impact on our sales," Heather Lusk, the vice president of shellfish company H.M. Terry Co and a member of the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation Aquaculture Advisory Committee said. "The summer months are generally big months for us, but our sales are about half of what we would normally expect this time of year."

The recent spate of new COVID-19 cases in Beijing, China needs further testing before any definite links to imported salmon are confirmed, the Global Salmon Initiative (GSI) has stressed.

In a statement distributed by farmer Bakkafrost, GSI quoted Mike Ryan — ahead of the World Health Organization's emergencies program — as stating the new virus outbreak in China needs further testing, after an initial "hypothesis" claimed it may have been caused by imported salmon or its packaging.

"I think we need to look at what has happened in this case. I don't believe it is the primary hypothesis. But it needs to be explored," Ryan reportedly said.

"His comments echoed those of experts earlier on Monday who said the fish itself was unlikely to carry the disease, and any link to salmon may have been the result of cross-contamination," added GSI.

GSI said:

Fishmeal and fish oil markets in China have been negatively impacted by restrictions due to COVID-19 and unpredictable weather conditions, Maggie Xu, China director for the IFFO, told participants to the trade association's recent meeting webinar.

Overall aquafeed output in China is expected to remain steady or slightly muted due to these conditions, she said.

Increased consumption of marine ingredients should come from the pig sector, which continues to recover after the African Swine Fever outbreaks decimated the Chinese hog stock in 2019.

In terms of domestic supply of marine ingredients, China's output from whole fish has decreased in recent years, whereas supply from by-products has remained stable, she said.

Enrico Bachis, IFFO's market research director, provided a global perspective during the meeting. Fishmeal and oil output decreased in 2019 at least partly as a result of poorer catches, especially in Peru, Iceland and Denmark, he said.

The prediction for this year is slightly better, however. Global marine ingredients supply should be just short of 5 million metric tons of fishmeal and about 1m metric tons of fish oil, he said.

The Chinese city of Beijing has recorded 36 new locally-transmitted coronavirus cases, amid fears of a second wave in the Chinese capital, reports BBC.

Another 36 cases were also recorded on Saturday. The city had previously seen no new cases in more than 50 days.

The country's vice premier Sun Chunlan called on officials to take "decisive measures", warning that the risk of further spread remained high.

The outbreak has been linked to the city's largest wholesale market, with local media reports focusing on the fact the virus was discovered on chopping boards used for imported salmon at the market, prompting major supermarkets in Beijing to pull the fish from their shelves.

The general manager of the market has been dismissed, along with other local officials.

Three other provinces – Liaoning, Hebei and Sichuan – have also reported confirmed or suspected cases connected to Beijing.

Undercurrent News has reported that more importers and the Norwegian Seafood Council have confirmed Chinese import authorities are holding imported fresh salmon upon arrival in the country for tests.

Suppliers of luxury food items like wagyu beef, bluefin tuna and caviar are suffering as prices of have cratered aid the pandemic, Reuters reported.

Widespread restaurant closures have been particularly difficult for luxury food suppliers as consumers don't typically want to prepare those foods at home or under strict social distancing.

"People will not want to taste a Chateau Petrus wine, a lobster or caviar under a bell jar," said Michel Berthommier, managing director of Caviar Perlita in southwestern France said, according to the news agency. "If you force people to eat in these conditions they will prefer going to fast foods."

The Russian Caviar House was forced to offer a 30% discount for Beluga hybrid caviar, it said.

"Spring and summer are always low seasons for the caviar market, but if we compare this period with previous years, the sales in Russia are down 50%," Alexander Novikov, its owner, said.

Alfred "Al" Sunseri, co-owner of the P&J Oyster Company, says his oyster processing and wholesale business has existed in the French Quarter of the US city New Orleans, Louisiana, since 1876, but it has never been through anything as rough as the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We had Hurricane Katrina and two years later we had Hurricane Gustav and then, you know, three years after that, we had the BP oil spill. And I’m going to tell you, after being in this business, as long as I have there is nothing —, out of even those catastrophic things that we’ve dealt with —, like COVID," Sunseri told CBS News for a recent article. "We had these terrible, devastating impacts on our business, but when they closed down restaurants to where you could not go inside. It's not really the most conducive thing for oysters."

P&J, which sells to restaurants and other vendors in the area, made about 50% of its normal sales in the month of March and the number dropped to about 2% of the norm in April, according to Sunseri.

The pain has been felt by the state's whole seafood industry, which includes more than 4,000 licensed commercial fisherman and more than 500 people working in processing and dealing, according to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. Commercial fishing carries an economic impact of $2.4 billion, with the oyster industry making up $317 million of that amount.

Louisiana's highly regarded restaurant industry, which accounted for $10.3 billion in sales in 2018, also has struggled, losing about 25% of its revenue, according to the Louisiana Restaurant Association.

The pandemic hit the New Orleans restaurant industry in the middle of its busiest nine months, between October and June, when many festivals and carnivals take place. Many restaurants will simply disappear, advised Stan Harris, LRA's president and CEO.

"Restaurants, as a rule, don't file bankruptcy. They just close. They don't have the money to file bankruptcy. They just walk away," he said.

A two-day recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) aquaculture conference originally set to begin on Nov. 16, 2020, has been postponed by a year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Annex Business Media, the organizer of the RAStech Conference and Trade show, said that its next event will be held Nov. 3 and Nov. 4 at the Westin Hilton Head Island Resort in the US state of South Carolina.

"The continued call by government and public health officials around the world to practice social distancing and avoid large gatherings to reduce health risks associated with COVID-19 has influenced our decision to postpone the RAStech conference," Todd Humber, group publisher at Annex said. "We look forward to safely welcoming professionals from across the world next year at this industry-leading event."

Attendees, sponsors and exhibitors who have registered for RAStech 2020 will automatically be rolled over to the 2021 event, Annex said in a press release.

The 2020 Groundfish Forum, a major event for the global whitefish sector, has been canceled due to the pandemic.

Seattle, in the US State of Washington, will now host the 29th event from Oct. 12–14 in 2021. The US Pacific Northwest city was set to host the event this October.

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has complicated efforts by ocean researchers in Canadian coastal communities to study the effects of climate change in Atlantic Canada, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported.

The news agency said that restrictions to prevent the spread of the virus have delayed or canceled scientists’ fieldwork, data collection efforts and the movement of equipment. Physical distancing requirements onboard vessels have shut out researchers as well, the agency reported.

"We simply cannot do certain types of research right now and field research is not happening," Anya Waite, scientific director of the Ocean Frontier Institute, said.

Farmgate prices are down about 25% for Vietnamese vannamei shrimp, reports the Siam Canadian Group, a company focused on Asian shrimp trade, in its latest newsletter.

Most Vietnamese farmers of vannamei shrimp are aiming to grow to size 30 pieces (head on shell on, cooked and peeled) per kilogram, the company said. Last year the price for such shrimp was about VND 165,000-170,000 ($7.12 to $7.33)/kg, but now they’re selling for VND 125,000 ($5.39)/kg.

For 60-count (about 31/40 headless shell on — or HLSO — and peeled tail on — or PTO), last year's price was about VND 140,000/kg, but now its only VND 115,000/kg.

The market demand for size 31/40-71/90 (HLSO/PTO) and smaller is strong, "although that is not an ideal size for farmers to harvest in terms of yields", Siam Canadian advised. "However to achieve these sizes with competitive costing, Vietnam will start to do heavier stocking density levels and partial harvests again. This will help seafood processors, suppliers and exporters grow their market shares."

The Vietnamese shrimp industry is heading into a bit of lull in production.

"Due to the change from industrial-scale intensive farming to extensive farming, now in July, [black tiger] shrimp farmers [have started] to take parent stock for the hatcheries and start seeding after hatching," the company explains. "The farming period is generally from August to December and harvest season is now December to May, then delivering to frozen seafood processors."

Normally in June, black tiger shrimp is farmed less and the farmers instead treat their ponds, as the habitat and soil are more alkaline at that time.

As for vannamei, some farms harvested early this year, in March and April, to get ahead of weak prices due to the coronavirus pandemic. They will reseed again in May and June, setting up harvests for August through October, Siam Canadian reported, adding: "Therefore June and July shrimp landings will be short and a second crop will be further delayed."

Macknade, a Kent, UK-based food hall specializing in Anglo-Italian cuisine, has launched a new "fish butchery", becoming the first retailer to team up with the Pesky Fish platform.

Pesky is an online fish marketplace which delivers fresh, traceable seafood from vessels around the UK coast.

Macknade looks to cut plastic waste, and encourages customers to bring their own Tupperware when visiting. The fish butchery will follow similar practices, "enabling shoppers to buy the tastiest catch of the day with a clear conscience".

Stefano Cuomo, managing director of Macknade, believes the new counter will make an excellent addition for numerous reasons.

"Each and every single fish will be traceable right down to the boat and fisherman who caught it. Our partners at Pesky Fish, we’re proud to say, use only non-destructive methods of fishing. The range on offer, meanwhile, will constantly be changing and developing depending on what it is in season."

"This will allow our most adventurous customers to branch out from the norm and try something different. Best of all, our butchers will always be able to advise on methods for preparing and cooking, as well as what to serve alongside each week's catch."

Ben King — a skipper signed up to the Pesky network — said he usually supplies foodservice only.

"This change has been brought about by current global events but it was important to us to find a retailer with the same values and understanding of the unpredictable nature of the sea and our catch."

"We are using an ever-growing supply of seasonal, geolocation and environmental data and with this we are able to help both fishermen and our buyers predict what's likely to be caught today and tomorrow as well as the days, weeks and months to come. "

Whittier Seafood, a processor in the small town in the US state of Alaska, has seen 11 of its workers test positive for COVID-19, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

The cases are the first confirmed in the city with a population of around 200 permanent residents, according to a 2018 census estimate.

The first case was detected on June 1 and further testing at the plant revealed 10 more, according to the newspaper.

Cathy McCord of Whittier Seafood said at a city council meeting that the processor has done its best to keep groups of workers separated, but that she "couldn't give you guarantees that they have not come in contact with other people, other local residents of Whittier."

Crawfish markets in the US state of Louisiana are beginning to bounce back as the COVID-19 pandemic wanes and prices are beginning to recover, according to 225 Magazine.

The state's shelter-in-place order coincided with the normal crawfish harvesting season and its typical peak around Easter.

"We’ve been doing this for 38 years, and this is the first time in 38 years that we lost our crawfish season. It's like losing your crop as a farmer," Michael Cashio, the owner of Heads & Tails Seafood restaurant and market told the newspaper. "We lost our crop."

Several farms were also hit with COVID-19 outbreaks with over 100 crawfish testing positive and white spot syndrome virus has reduced yields.

But now, crawfish prices appear poised to rebound, according to Kurt Guidry, a professor in the LSU AgCenter Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.

Derek Butler, executive director of the Association of Seafood Producers, a trade association that represents processors in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, responded Wednesday to a call by the local union for a retroactive CAD 3.00 ($2.22) per hour wage increase for plant workers during the coronavirus pandemic by calling it "irresponsible and poorly timed".

Earlier in the day, the Fish Food and Allied Workers Union (FFAW) issued a press release calling on the processors to "immediately, and retroactively to the start of the season" institute the pay hike.

"Processing companies are eligible for a 75% wage subsidy program through the federal government – combined with significantly reduced prices paid to harvesters and other federal funding means these companies are reaping the financial benefits of the COVID-19 pandemic while their essential service employees lose out," the FFAW argued.

Keith Sullivan, FFAW's president, noted that grocery stores have stepped up in such a way.

"Companies are paying 25 cents on the dollar to their essential worker employees who are assuming all of the risk with no reward," he said.

However, Butler insists that the federal and provincial initiatives are to help offset costs and ensure businesses can run in light of COVID-19.

"While it is an individual decision for each company, fish prices are down, sales are down, revenues are down, and costs related to making our plants safe are up," he said, adding that FFAW's allegations that companies are reaping the financial benefits of government handouts and low fish prices "are simply inaccurate, bordering in libelous."

The China Fisheries & Seafood Expo (CFSE) has announced it will take place as planned on Oct. 28-30, 2020, at Qingdao's new Hongdao International Convention and Exhibition Center (HICEC).

China's central government is currently relaxing many of the strict control measures which were enacted to bring outbreaks of COVID-19 under control. These measures include the resumption of large trade shows after July 1. Several large international shows are currently scheduled both before and just after CFSE, organizers noted.

When registering for attendance badges all overseas participants will be required to upload their passport information, including their passport photo. In order to enter the show, facial recognition software must match your passport photo, CFSE has warned.

"Currently China requires its citizens to use an instant digital tracking app which is installed on their smartphone via WeChat or AliPay. Chinese citizens must have a green indicator to enter the show. Foreigners can also download these tracking apps."

More information will be given in due course as to whether this will be mandatory. "In addition, overseas people must inform Chinese authorities in detail where they are staying during their visit."

Show participants will have their temperature taken several times before they can enter the show. In addition to the main entrance lobby, temperatures will be taken at the security gate entrances, it said.

All CFSE participants are encouraged to bring their own masks to the show. Complimentary masks and gloves will also be available. Use of facemasks is mandatory, while gloves are optional.

HICEC staff will be frequently sanitizing public gathering places such as restrooms, dining areas, and high-touch areas such as escalators. In addition, all exhibit halls will be sanitized after the close of the show each day.

Currently, it is suggested people in high-density events such as trade shows keep a one-meter social distance.

"We realize that are still challenges to holding a successful CFSE. Currently, overseas flights to China are very limited, for example. However, as the virus situation in China continues to improve and their economy resumes growing, we anticipate more international flights to China will return well before this October. Many international carriers are anticipating resuming flights to China in June."

Coronavirus cases in the US state of Alaska, the country's largest source of wild-caught seafood, spiked Tuesday, June 2, officials reported.

According to the Anchorage Daily News, the state saw 20 new cases Tuesday, seven on Monday and 27 on Sunday, May 31, its highest-ever total. The new cases bring the state total to 487, which includes 106 active cases. Those figures do not include 22 instances where non-resident Alaskans have tested positive in the state, a tally that includes several cases of out of state seafood workers who were quarantining before reporting to work for the coming salmon season.

According to the newspaper, a seafood industry worker who is not an Alaska resident tested positive for COVID-19 in the Valdez-Cordova Census Area, the state said.

After Bellingham Cold Storage in the US city of Bellingham, Washington, received a visit from American Seafoods’ vessel American Dynasty, which saw over 86 of its crew test positive for COVID-19, the cold storage stepped up measures to prevent the spread of the disease.

According to the Bellingham Herald, those measures included deploying a two-hour treatment with industrial levels of ozone and an extensive wipedown of the cold storage spaces that crew members came into contact with, Doug Thomas, Bellingham Cold Storage's president said. He added that the cold storage will perform temperature and wellness checks for employees as well as COVID-19 tests in the coming days.

The American Dynasty has since returned to the Port of Seattle and is under quarantine.

Recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) specialist AquaMaof has opened its "virtual booth", ready for the online events season, it said.

"With major trade events canceled or postponed, the company has built a virtual reality (VR) stand to safely meet with the seafood industry."

Participants at the "booth" will be able to watch live and pre-recorded expert presentations, as well as explore AquaMaof projects around the world in the interactive map and gallery. There is also a VR tour of AquaMaof's flagship land-based salmon R&D and training center in Poland.

"Now, more than ever, we see a growing interest in our RAS technology as an enabler of sustainable, clean, and local seafood production," said Shai Silberman, VP of marketing and sales at AquaMaof.

Participants can register to visit the booth here.

Papua New Guinea (PNG) has said it will not suspend or waive the onboard observer coverage on its tuna vessels during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission has suspended coverage on all purse seine vessels fishing and transhipping in the waters of the Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA).

However, PNG's government has approved PNG-flagged and locally-based foreign vessels to continue undertaking port calls for the landing of fish, as well as other foreign bilaterals to carry out transhipments in certain designated ports.

"All PNG…[Marine Stewardship Council] trips will apply compulsory PNG observer placement onboard all…vessels for its MSC authorized trips fishing within its archipelagic and [exclusive economic zone] waters," said PNG's Fishing Industry Association.

"PNG has no intention of compromising its MSC certification standards and will therefore not come up with any alternative traceability assurance system than those systems explicitly articulated in its public certification report."

Despite the havoc wreaked by the COVID-19 pandemic on his restaurants and oyster farm, Terry Sawyer, the co-founder of Hog Island Oyster Co, said he remains confident the industry will be able to recover.

The Marshall, California-based business leases 160 acres and has six restaurants. It had to furlough 90% of its 300 staff members as the pandemic hit, Reuters reported.

Sawyer said that the company kept a skeleton crew employed to tend to the farm's oysters.

"If we can't get out there to do this work, some of them will die because they’ve been too crowded. They’ll be misshapen," Sawyer said.

He hopes to bring back staff when restaurants can reopen.

"We enjoy preparing food. We enjoy producing food," he said. "… that passion is still there."

The shrimp harvesting season across the US state of South Carolina has kicked off but suppliers remain concerned that the restrictions on restaurants due to the COVID-19 pandemic mean that foodservice demand will fail to materialize.

According to the state's Island Packet newspaper, the state's waters opened to shrimping May 27 following the opening of more limited "provisional waters", which opened April 15.

"Overall it's been good in the provisional areas: decent catches and nice shrimp," Larry Toomer, the owner of Bluffton Oyster Co., was quoted as saying.

According to Craig Reaves of Sea Eagle Market despite the lack of foodservice sales, retail demand has held steady and more people are cooking shrimp at home.

"Thankfully we’ve been able to sell all the shrimp we’ve been able to catch since April 15," Reaves said. "We can sell them as fast as we can catch them. That was a concern for DNR [Department of Natural Resources]— would we be able to sell them if they allowed us to go to work. We confidently told them we could, and we have."

The Indonesian government has proposed an IDR 1.02 trillion ($69 million) stimulus package to aid small scale fishermen and aquaculture farmers affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, reports the Jakarta Post.

Edhy Prabowo, minister of the country's maritime affairs and fisheries ministry, said the stimulus would include social aid for fishermen, fish farmers and salt farmers and funds to strengthen surveillance efforts against poaching.

"We will optimize the budget to help enable fishermen to go on fishing while also providing the farmers with seeds, broodfish and infrastructure," the minister said in an online press conference after attending a limited cabinet meeting with Indonesian president Joko "Jokowi" Widodo on Thursday (May 28).

The stimulus package, which was proposed during the meeting, will provide IDR 413 billion in funds for fishermen and IDR 407bn to aid aquaculture farmers.

It also includes IDR 36.1bn for fish processors and marketeers, IDR 54.1bn for salt farmers, IDR 106bn to strengthen poaching surveillance and IDR 8bn for internal audits.

"We also would like to have more cold storage facilities to anticipate the possibility of slow demand as several regions are still implementing the large-scale social restrictions [PSBB]," the minister said.

Government data presented by President Jokowi on April 28 showed that over 20 provinces faced shortages of staple foods, such as garlic, sugar, chili and eggs.

Ports run by Pacific island nations are becoming worried that infected crew members on fishing boats could bring COVID-19 into their countries, New Zealand's TVNZ reported.

The news outlet cited two vessels believed to have confirmed COVID cases: An Ecuadorian vessel reportedly saw 29 out of 30 crewmembers sickened and a vessel operated by China's Dalian Ocean Fishing Company that suffered four deaths of crewmembers with COVID symptoms. However, it's unclear if Dalian Ocean's crewmembers had the disease as the four bodies were thrown overboard, the news outlet said.

"We condemn the inhumane treatment against our crew members working at the Chinese fishing company," Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi was quoted as saying.

The California, US-based seafood distributor Lusamerica Foods has seen 38 employees test positive for COVID-19 in the past few days, reports San Jose Inside.

A worker for Lusamerica Foods at its factory in Morgan Hill, Santa Clara County, was tested positive for the virus a fortnight ago, according to the Inside, after their spouse was hospitalized with COVID-19.

Further tests were held for the other workers at the plant after the incident, of which 38 have so far returned positive for the coronavirus.

All employees who have tested positive are now staying at home, although the majority are not displaying symptoms, Lusamerica said.

However, as a result of the outbreak, Lusamerica will expand its processing and distribution capacity at other factories in Fife, Washington and Vernon, California, it said.

The Chinese wet market where the novel coronavirus was first reported is more like a "victim" of the pathogen, said the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDCP), according to News Week.

Many of the first cases of COVID-19 were linked to the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China. However, subsequent research has cast doubt over whether this is where the novel coronavirus originally spilled over into humans.

"At first, we assumed the seafood market might have the virus, but now the market is more like a victim. The novel coronavirus had existed long before," CCDCP director Gao Fu said on Monday, as reported by the Chinese state-run newspaper Global Times.

In January, Gao said that the novel coronavirus—SARS-CoV-2—originated in the wildlife solid illegally in the Wuhan market. But now, the director has said samples collected in early January from animals at the market showed no traces of the virus, although the pathogen was detected in some environmental samples, including sewage.

A group of First Nations commercial fishers in the Canadian province of Manitoba are faced with a tough choice: Should they go out fishing now even as markets may not materialize or should they wait on a forthcoming government aid package with an uncertain arrival date?

According to the CBC, Sam Murdock, a member of the Fisher River Cree Nation and a director of Fisher River McBeth Fisheries, called the situation "desperate".

He has been fishing on Lake Winnipeg for four decades, he said and has yet to hear details about the government's CAD 469.4 million ($340m) aid package that was announced May 14.

"How do we access that money to support individuals that are deriving their income from just commercial fishing? A lot of these guys, that's all they know is commercial fishing," said Murdock.

The explosion in land-based aquaculture has not been exempt from COVID-19.

As companies scale back on non-operating expenditure, Cooke has postponed an order to build a major recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) in Chile. Also, financing was canceled for Nordic Aqua Partners (NAP)'s grow-out project in China, with the company later clarifying it expects the project to go ahead later this year.

Aquafeed producer Skretting, though, has told Undercurrent News it will continue its R&D efforts for RAS at "full speed".

"We have not seen anything stop, though we have seen some delays here and there," said CEO Therese Log Bergjord.

"Of course, we remain of a view that RAS will have a good potential and it will play an important role for the growth potential of the industry going forward."

While Akva told Undercurrent it still plans to invest in and supply NAP, Skretting owner Nutreco declined to comment back in April. Skretting itself had no further comment late in May.

The firm is more than simply a feed supplier, though, said Log Bergjord; it plays, and will continue to play, an important role for RAS customers, "because feed is such an important input factor to the production system".

"We will certainly make sure that we play our part in enabling their success. So, we are not slowing down at all long on the, R&D and the feed development for these systems."

Its recent sustainability report shows Skretting is in the process of developing a new feed concept, specially designed for RAS concepts, named RCX.

It will be designed to increase stability and reduce risk in these systems, it said. "It is our intention to rollout RCX globally, starting with North America."

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted but not deterred investment in Russia's fishing sector and harvesting continues with landings above 2019 levels, the organizer of the country's major seafood shows said.

Expo Solutions Group, which puts on Global Fishery Forum & Seafood Expo Russia, said in a press release that several of the country's large fishing companies have continued with their planned fleet renewal and while the sector saw "complication" in flying in foreign experts who were upgrading Russian processing plants, this has been resolved.

Russian landings for the first four months of the year, Russian seafood catches are up 6% compared to 2019, Expo Solutions said.

"The fishery is continuing, implement the processing of products, and supplying in retail. Each of the segments of the fishery industry is functioning, adapting under the prevailing situation," it said.

Additionally, preparations continue for the three-day Global Fishery Forum, which is set to take place in St. Petersburg on Sept. 21.

AC Covert, a member of Canada's Cooke group, has launched nine themed seafood boxes to be purchased online for home delivery across Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.

The Dartmouth-based seafood distribution company, which caters to retailers, restaurants, and the tourism and hospitality sectors, has pivoted amidst the pandemic, its parent said.

The boxes feature Cooke's True North Seafood products and other locally farmed and fished products from Atlantic Canadian companies.

The most popular, according to Cooke, include the "Fin-tastic Fresh" box offering 2 lbs of fresh haddock fillets and 2 lbs of fresh Atlantic salmon fillets, and the "Slammin’ Salmon" box offering 2 x 4 oz frozen Atlantic salmon portions, 2 x 6 oz frozen trays of Alaska sockeye salmon, 2 x 4 oz packages of cold-smoked Atlantic salmon, and a 16 oz package of candied Atlantic salmon.

Other boxes for home delivery include an oyster set; "East Coast Comfort Fish" – haddock fillets, scallops, Icelandic cod fillets and mussels, to cook individually or use everything and make a classic East coast chowder; and "Smoke From The Water" – a variety pack of smoked seafood.

Then, it offers a box of frozen seafood options; the "Get Hooked On This Party Pack", with 25-30 servings of appetizers; a pack containing a recipe card and all the seafood required to make fish cakes; and the premium option, with scallops, halibut and lobster.

The prepared boxes range in price from $55-$125 and overnight delivery is offered to residents of the Maritimes at a flat rate of $9.99.

"With the travel restrictions we saw an opportunity to make it easier for people to buy seafood from our region," said Joel Richardson, vice president of public relations for Cooke.

"We have been working hard to supply grocery stores, because in the Maritimes, seafood is a huge part of our culture which brings comfort during challenging times. Our seafood boxes are an ideal care package to send to family or friends you haven't seen for a while. As a local family company, it is important for us to conveniently provide people with the seafood they love so we can all support sea farmers and fishers."

The recovery period after COVID-19 is a "golden opportunity" for Scotland's seafood processors to set the highest global standards, according to the sector's leaders.

Scottish Seafood Association (SSA) chief executive Jimmy Buchan called the outbreak's impact on the sector severe, with demand hemorrhaging in both export and domestic markets since mid-March.

"Most businesses have been operating at significantly reduced capacity and some, unfortunately, have been forced to close."

But as the situation eases, as appears to be happening in the UK, and with Brexit now just over six months away, there is an opportunity to set new standards in the supply chain and "create a fit-for-purpose, profitable processing sector that will complement our sustainable fisheries and modern fishing fleet", he said.

In a paper, "Securing Recovery from COVID-19", Buchan said success would require the support of both the Scottish and UK governments in relation to COVID-19 recovery and Brexit.

"Economic viability will be restored through the rebuilding of markets, and the vast repository of knowledge and understanding of these markets that exists within the sector will be accessible to ministers and officials through giving processors’ representatives a seat at the table when solutions are under discussion."

"A similar level of engagement is required on Brexit, since the maintenance of tariff-free trade with the EU beyond December 2020 will be critically important to ensure that the COVID-19 recovery is not crushed. The industry anticipates signs of recovery in shellfish markets in particular just as the transition period comes to an end."

The SSA is also calling for both governments to involve the sector in the design of the replacement for the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund, which it said must be open to companies of all sizes, not solely small and medium-sized enterprises, and relax state aid rules.

The US’ National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said that it was canceling five of the six planned research surveys for waters off the state of Alaska this summer used to gauge the status of stocks of pollock, other groundfish and crabs.

NOAA said in a press release that the canceled surveys include the Aleutian Islands bottom trawl survey, the eastern Bering Sea bottom trawl survey, the northern Bering Sea bottom trawl survey, the Bering Sea pollock acoustics survey, and the agency's fall ecosystem survey. NOAA intends to hold its annual Alaska longline survey as planned.

"Over the past two months, we have been engaged in careful planning and rigorous analysis of various options for conducting surveys this year. After much deliberation, we determined that there is no way to move forward with a survey plan that effectively minimizes risks to staff, crew, and the communities associated with the surveys," NOAA said.

It added that hosting the vessel surveys as normal would have required "extraordinarily long surveys, well beyond standard survey operation" and extended pre- and post-survey quarantines.

NOAA said that it will mitigate the loss of one year's survey data by relying on fisheries observers, using unmanned surface vehicles to collect acoustic data for pollock stocks and "working with federal, state and industry partners to collect other fisheries, oceanographic, and ecosystem data".

Another industry event has been cancelled due to the coronavirus crisis.

Aquaculture Canada and WAS North America 2020 was set to be held from Aug. 30 to Sept. 1 in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The has now been canceled, said the organizers.

"As we know, the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak has impacted all events and travel planning globally. The health, safety and well-being of attendees is paramount in any decisions made by the steering committee," said organizers Aquaculture Association of Canada, World Aquaculture Society and the Newfoundland Aquaculture Industry Association.

The group said submitted abstracts to date will continue to be processed by the program committee and all registrations will continue to be valid for next year's event.

Direct-to-consumer sales from fishers and increased retail offerings from processors are helping to make up for losses that the US seafood sector is experiencing from the prolonged restaurant closures nationwide, the Wall Street Journal reported.

But the good news for the sector is, according to the research firm Nielsen, US seafood sales at grocers topped $1.4 billion for the four weeks ending on May 9, a 40% increase year-on-year.

The article quoted large seafood producers and distributors such as Taylor Shellfish, Samuels and Sons Seafood Co, Fortune International and Blue Harvest Fisheries, among others.

The companies all cited large impacts from the pandemic that have caused losses and forced them to lay off workers.

"We’re doing whatever we can to keep busy and find new customers in a world that's been turned upside down," Sean O’Scannlain of Fortune was quoted as saying.

Ireland's producer organizations have accused their government of "failing to recognize the gravity of the unprecedented crisis", in response to measures announced this month.

"In rejecting impassioned appeals for specific COVID-19 supports from a beleaguered fishing industry which is fighting for its very survival in the face of the pandemic, agriculture minister Michael Creed and his officials have effectively turned their back on the sector," said the Killybegs Fishermen's Organisation (KFO), speaking on behalf of four such groups.

"Earlier this month, the minister did announce a COVID-19 voluntary fleet tie-up scheme which is completely unfit for purpose. Instead of achieving the key objective of matching current supply and demand, the scheme will do the reverse with very little voluntary uptake as almost all vessels will continue to fish thus making an already oversupplied market worse," it said.

Crucially, not one single cent of new financial support is being made available to the industry, KFO said.

"We have met with the minister and his officials and set out clearly what we need to survive this pandemic. Moreover, we have already successfully lobbied at EU level to have amendments to the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund provided for under EU Regulation 2020/560 to mitigate the impact of the COVID‐19 outbreak," added KFO's chief executive, Sean O’Donoghue.

Like many others, Ireland's fishermen are struggling desperately at present, his group said. "Demand has fallen to such an extent that some fishermen are actually receiving no bids for the fish that they have risked life and limb to catch. The closure of sales venues, such as restaurants, markets and other outlets has seen prices for all fish plummet."

Over the last few weeks, the price drop across many popular species has been in the region of 50% to 70%, he said. As a result, fishing has become a loss-making enterprise.

"The entire industry is united in our unequivocal rejection of a botched and ultimately useless ‘scheme’ which does nothing to provide reassurance to fishermen. We’ve been endeavoring to try to manage a safe passage through Brexit and its consequences, now we’re hit with this. I’ve never witnessed anger like it in the sector and I’d implore the minister to review the scheme, deliver the very basic support that we need to survive," said O’Donoghue.

The fishing and seafood processing sector in Brazil is asking the country's government for tax breaks, subsidized credit and emergency loan guarantees after COVID-19 cut sales by an estimated 50%, Reuters reported.

According to Eduardo Lobo, president of industry group Abipesca, Brazilian economy minister Paulo Guedes told the industry that government aid measures would be announced next week. "Brazil's response to defend the sector has lagged, while competing fishing nations are protected," Lobo said.

Brazil's fish exports totaled $300 million and imports were $1.1 billion in 2019, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization.

The impact of COVID-19 on Scotland's transport services and the rural economy is to be investigated by members of the country's parliament.

The Scottish Parliament's Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee has issued a call for evidence on the Scottish government's response to the pandemic.

Views are sought on the impact of the emergency and the implications for public transport of easing the lockdown over the coming weeks and months.

The Committee will also explore how agriculture and fisheries in Scotland have been affected by the crisis, and whether these sectors have received sufficient support to deal with the unprecedented challenges caused by COVID-19.

Hamish Macdonell, director of strategic engagement with the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation, told Undercurrent News that while the salmon farming sector was showing great resilience in its operations — and that farmers have worked hard to keep their key workers safe, livestock healthy, and supplies moving to UK supermarkets — the pandemic has "significantly hit sales to the restaurant and foodservice sector, as well as exports".

"Salmon farming operates from remote, rural locations in highly competitive, global markets and it will be essential to hold fast to our market share and explore new ways into markets as they open up, to secure the economic benefits to local and national economies. We look to the Scottish government to help find ways to ensure supply lines to customers are kept open and are competitive."

Hilton Food Group has noted in a trading update that COVID-19 lockdown measures have delayed the completion of its New Zealand factory.

The meat and fish packing facility is set to be the firm's first expansion in seafood since the meat firm snapped up Tesco and Waitrose seafood processor Seachill UK, in 2017.

"The completion of the New Zealand meat and fish plant has been delayed compared with our original estimates due to lockdown measures, as well as the continued quarantining of individuals entering New Zealand," it said.

More generally, the group has experienced increased demand, working almost exclusively in the retail sector as it does.

"Hilton Seafood UK has progressed well, where we have seen a shift from counter sales to centrally packed products," it wrote.

The group's financial position remains strong, having put in place committed facilities to cover current expansion plans, it said.

"Hilton continues to explore opportunities in which to invest and to grow the business both domestically and in overseas markets and we are also exploring a number of options for growth with our existing customers."

Infofish's World Tuna Trade Conference & Exhibition has become the latest event to cancel outright for 2020, and instead rearrange dates for next year.

The organizer said it had consulted with the Thai Tuna Industry Association and the "chairman of Tuna 2021", Phil Roberts, and agreed to postpone the conference to May 19-21, 2021, at the Shangri-La Hotel, Bangkok, Thailand.

The event usually occurs every two years; the plan now is to hold the 16th edition in 2021, the 17th in 2022, and then revert back to the biannual format for 2024.

Seafood show organizer Diversified Communications will move the 2020 edition of its Seafood Expo Asia event, normally held in Hong Kong, to Singapore this year, the company said.

The three-day event will be held alongside the Asia Fruit Logistica show at the Singapore EXPO & MAX Atria beginning on Nov. 18. The show, while not as large as Diversified's Brussels and Boston seafood shows, attracts over 7,500 buyers and suppliers, Diversified said.

"Moving to Singapore this year will provide our exhibitors and buyers the opportunity to connect and further explore business potential throughout Asia," Liz Plizga, group vice president for Diversified said. "The decision is based on feedback from our customers on the potential of the Asian seafood market. Our third-party research also reaffirmed the growing need for buyers in these markets to meet international seafood suppliers."

Diversified did not say whether the shift away from Hong Kong, where the 2019 event was canceled amid widespread street protests, would be permanent.

The events company based in the US state of Maine has had a rough run of it this year due to the pandemic. Diversified postponed and ultimately canceled its Brussels event and had to push its Boston show, the US’ largest such event, until September. The company said earlier this week that it has canceled its 2020 Aquaculture UK show, an event Diversified acquired in February.

Fish Tales, a seafood restaurant and bar in the US beachside town of Ocean City, Maryland, rolled out a new innovation on Saturday to help maintain social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic: "Bumper Tables".Patrons climb into the mobile tables, which consist of an inflated inner tube affixed to a wheeled aluminum frame with four legs, allowing them to engage with friends or staff members at the bar from a safe distance, as reported by Newsweek. Several employees modeled the tables for a video online.

The tables are the idea of Revolution Events, a Baltimore, Maryland-based marketing company, according to the article.

"We had a lot of time on our hands to try and reimagine what events were going to look like as we kind of tiptoe out of this, and how we could inch near something new that would make people feel safe while being festive and having the party aspect to it," Erin Cermak, the company's CEO and founder, of Revolution Events, reportedly told Newsweek.

Cermak said she reached out to her cousin, Donna Harman, who owns Fish Tales, sending her a mock-up and photo. Harman ordered 10, which she plans to use outdoors."I told her, ‘You totally need these things. These are right up your alley,'" Cermak said. "She has always been on the cutting edge of bar fun."

The weekend publicity has sparked interest from at least 12 other businesses, Cermak said.

The organizer of the Nor-Fishing event — Stiftelsen Nor-Fishing — has unveiled plans to launch a digital event this year, in place of its canceled trade show.

"For a long time, we have had a vision of organizing a digital event – as an addition to the traditional exhibition. The recent situation has accelerated the work of launching Nor-Fishing Digital," it said.

It has not yet set an exact time, but the digital event will last two-to-three days during what would have been "Nor-Fishing week", Aug. 18-21.

"For those ‘visiting’ the exhibition, this will be like watching a live TV show. We will set up a studio with a host – and alternate between exciting reports and guests in the studio. Norwegian TV personality (and active seafood trader) Arne Hjeltnes will escort us through the exhibition days."

Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM), Ireland's seafood development agency, has launched a temporary voluntary fleet tie-up scheme "designed to assist in adjusting the supply of fish coming onto a market that is currently depressed".

The scheme should help protect quota availability for later in the year, it said. It will be implemented under Ireland's European Maritime and Fisheries Fund operational program.

"The new scheme, which complements the government COVID-19 measures such as wage supports and loan arrangements already being provided, will offer support to vessel owners for fixed costs incurred while tied-up."

The closing date for applications for June is 5 pm on May 27. Applications for July and August will be accepted up until June 20 and July 20 respectively.

UK industry body Seafish has launched free digital workshops for the seafood industry, with additional ‘clinic’ time for personalized advice.

The workshops will offer fishermen, merchants, fishmongers, fishing family members, and processors the chance to establish a strong social media presence.

Designed to help seafood businesses market their catch and products, two workshops will run; a beginners session for those starting from scratch, and a more advanced session for individuals or businesses looking to boost impact.

The training aims to enhance direct sales of UK seafood to consumers, which has grown during the current pandemic.

"Since the start of lockdown, we’ve seen the seafood industry be incredibly adaptable in its approach to marketing catch — making sure households across the UK can continue to buy seafood from merchants, fishmongers and on occasion direct from the boat.," said Aoife Martin, director of operations at Seafish.

For those new to social media, the beginners’ session is on May 22. The following, more advanced, session will take place May 28. They may be repeated if interest is high.

The US state of Louisiana's Department of Health (LDH) confirmed on Monday that about 100 workers at three crawfish farms have tested positive for COVID-19, The Advocate, a local newspaper, reports.

The finding, in Louisiana's Acadiana region, a large area along the southwestern part of the state, marks the first workplace clusters of the virus since the outbreak began. The findings were at least in part among migrant workers living in dormitory-like settings, Alex Billioux, assistant secretary of the state's Office of Public Health, is quoted as saying.

"LDH is declining to name these private businesses," a spokeswoman said. "We will continue to work with them to prevent further spread of this illness and to ensure workers understand where and when to be tested."

Louisiana, one of the US states that saw a large spike of coronavirus cases in the early going, has had 34,709 illnesses and 2,440 deaths linked to the virus, according to the LDH website.

The owner of UK restaurant chains Cafe Rouge and Bella Italia has filed intent to appoint administrators at the High Court, reports the BBC.

Owner Casual Dining Group, whose brands also include the Las Iguanas chain, employs about 6,000 people.

The company said the move would give it ten days’ breathing space to consider "all options" for restructuring.

On May 19, Casual Dining Group said it was working with advisers from corporate finance firm AlixPartners over a potential restructuring program.

A Casual Dining Group spokeswoman said: "As is widely acknowledged, this is an unprecedented situation for our industry and, like many other companies across the UK, the directors of Casual Dining Group are working closely with our advisers as we consider our next steps."

"These notifications are a prudent measure in light of the company's position and the wider situation."

Some 11 aquaculture businesses, including Scottish shellfish growers and trout producers are among the 11 aquaculture businesses that will receive shares of some £800,000 ($869,024) worth of grants being made available by the European Maritime Fisheries Fund (EMFF) to help mitigate the impact of the global coronavirus pandemic, the Scottish government reports.

The funding includes nearly £100,000 for phase two of the expansion of Seaforth Mussels on the Isle of Harris and around £200,000 for new specialist trout harvesting equipment at Dawnfresh Seafoods Ltd in Lanark.

Of the £800,000 awarded, £600,000 comes from the EU and £200,000 from the Scottish government.

Additionally, phase nine of the EMFF includes £1.4m for two Marine Scotland Science projects and £58,950.00 for a Scottish Government project.

The Scottish Government has already invested £22.5m in the seafood sector in response to COVID-19.

"COVID-19 has had a devastating impact on the seafood sector with the market for some products disappearing almost overnight, leaving many businesses at risk of financial ruin.," said Fergus Ewing, Scotland's rural economy secretary, in a statement. "This new funding is being awarded to businesses working in rural areas who have been hit the hardest by this pandemic, helping them to strengthen their business and recover from the loss of markets."

Intermediate wholesalers at Tokyo's Toyosu food market are focusing more on direct online sales to consumers at a time when seafood demand has plunged due to restaurant closures, reports Japan Times.

Online sales are gradually becoming more popular as high-end fish is often offered at huge discounts.

Otatsu Shoten, one of the wholesalers, started online sales in mid-April. It offers various types of specialty fish, including natural bluefin tuna and sekiaji, a horse mackerel brand from the prefecture of Oita, at prices usually reserved for restaurants.

"Our sales fell by some 70-80% in April" due chiefly to restaurant closures, Ryotaro Kono, Otatsu Shoten's president, said in explaining the reason for pushing online sales. Such sales have so far totaled nearly JPY 1.5 million (around $14,000), according to Kono.

Yamawa, another wholesaler, is selling domestic bluefin tuna in large blocks weighing over 700 grams for JPY 2,000 ($19) apiece, instead of the smaller blocks usually intended for consumers.

The Aquaculture Roundtable Series (TARS) 2020 has officially been canceled, with the next event to take place in 2021, organizers said.

With the health and safety of attendees the top priority, the event will not take place Aug. 18-19, 2021, still in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.The theme — shrimp markets, margins, and productivity — and program remain the same.

"After much deliberation, the organizers, Aqua Culture Asia Pacific and Corporate Media Services have concluded that the new dates for TARS 2021 will provide the all-around best conditions for our shrimp aquaculture community to convene, as well as optimal business performance for all stakeholders."

TARS 2020 was originally scheduled to take place on Aug. 19-20 2020 in Vietnam.

The European Aquaculture Society has canceled its three-day Aquaculture Europe 2020 event that was scheduled to begin in Cork, Ireland, on Sept. 29.

Instead, the group will organize two three-day European conferences in 2021, one in Cork beginning on April 12 and a second, previously scheduled conference in Funchal, Madeira, Portugal on Oct. 5.

The group said in a press release that it is making the changes in order to "maintain our commitment to our chosen locations and to provide delegates, exhibitors and attendees with more scope for participation".

In its latest update, the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) notes that there have been rapid changes in the flow of fresh whole salmon to different global markets during week 19 of 2020.

For instance, exports to the Netherlands and the UK have increased by 20%, while those going to Italy and Lithuania have declined by 29% and 31% respectively.

In Asia, exports of fresh whole salmon to China are up by 28%, while those to South Korea and Japan are down by 2% and 44% respectively.

China in particular has been encouraging, the NSC said, with total salmon sales to the country growing by 44% over the past six weeks.

Elsewhere, sales of fresh whole salmon to France dipped, down by 6% y-o-y to 1,305 metric tons. The country's horeca [hotels, restaurants and catering] sector is not expected to reopen until the end of May at the earliest.

Meanwhile, exports of fresh and frozen fillets, as well as salmon by-products are up, meaning the total volume of Norwegian salmon exports is up by 4% y-o-y for week 19, at 22,645t.

However, the average export price for fresh whole salmon in week 19 was NOK 54.89/kg, down by 11% compared to the same point last year.

Although exports of fresh whole cod were up by 60% y-o-y last week, the NSC noted that exports are usually low in the week of the Seafood Expo Global in Brussels, which was held in week 19 last year.

Export flux in fresh whole salmon during week 19. Credit: NSC

A shortage of available lobsters in the market leading up to Mother's Day weekend (May 9-10), due in large part to coronavirus pandemic-related delays, helped boost the price in Canada, reports the Fish Food and Workers Union (FFAW). Based on Urner Barry price calculations, the price was $6.80 per pound (CAD 9.51) during the week of May 3-9, resulting in a minimum shore price in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador of CAD 6.76, according to FFAW, the union that represents NL harvesters.

The short supply for what is normally one of lobster's biggest buying periods of the year was due to delays to fishing seasons in both NL and Nova Scotia, FFAW said. The supply is expected to improve, however, as several areas in Canada's Gulf of Saint Lawrence open up May 15.

Whitefish processing firm A. Espersen's McDonald's-focused plant on the Danish island of Bornholm could start-up before July, as the fast-food giant gradually reopens its stores in Europe.

"McDonald's is slowly opening in most countries in Europe – but the restaurants are not open for seating, so too early to say anything about demand," Klaus Nielsen, Espersen's CEO, told Undercurrent News.

"We can't really say when we will open the factory again – hopefully sometime before the summer holiday begins in July. For now, we supply from the inventory we had when the lockdown happened," he said.

On May 1, Reuters reported that McDonald's is trialing a new restaurant concept in Arnhem, the Netherlands, which accommodates the need for social distancing. You can see a gallery of the new concept here.

Shellfish expert Les Hodges delivered his regular report on Wednesday, advising that the snow crab harvest in Canada's Gulf of Saint Lawrence has been "slower than anticipated" while the harvest off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador has started late due in large part to the coronavirus pandemic.

The combined Canadian total allowable catch for 2020 could result in more than 100 million pounds of finished sections, he said. However, combined with expected closures due to North Atlantic right whale sightings, "there is a question whether the TAC can be caught before the crab get soft in mid to late June and [the] fishery [is] closed".

All plants in the Canadian provinces will be processing, although with trip limits, Hodges reported. He added that most retailers are currently buying only one or two loads at a time, but said "this could change quickly if the catch is good as there is a track record of success for Canadian snow crab."

"Most early production is going to the US market as there is little inventory in cold storage and packers aggressively priced 5/8's to jump start sales and have supermarkets featuring crab as quickly as possible into the summer selling season," he said. "The producers simply must sell more to retail than usual to move the inventory."

The U.S. imported 81% of Canada's snow crab in May and June 2019 (59.1m lbs), he noted.

Meanwhile, in Alaska, the snow crab season is about complete with 99% or 30.4m of the 30.6m TAC harvested.

A large offshore pen designed by Dutch-owned firm De Maas is undergoing open water tests in China.

The tests follow the 140-meter-diameter pen's arrival off the coast of Fujian province for installation in the East China Sea after being dry-towed from a shipyard in Zhoushan.

"We are testing the mooring, submersion, power systems, etcetera," Philip Schreven, co-founder of De Maas, told Undercurrent News on Wednesday (May 13).

The coronavirus pandemic has largely not affected China's offshore aquaculture projects. According to Schreven, welding work on the pen even continued when the rest of the country was in lockdown over Chinese New Year.

The Global Aquaculture Alliance's (GAA) annual Global Outlook on Aquaculture Leadership (GOAL) meeting, originally scheduled for Oct. 6 to Oct. 8, in Tokyo, Japan, will still be held, but webcast instead of in person.

The GAA said in a press release that the October 2021 edition of the event will be held in Tokyo.

"The silver lining of this terrible COVID-19 cloud is the unifying force of virtual meetings," GAA founder and president George Chamberlain said. "This presents new opportunities to broadly share the latest information and advances to accelerate progress toward our collective goal of responsibly producing more healthful seafood."

The GAA said that its individual and corporate members "will be able to access to the functionality of the conference platform and application, including live-streaming, live Q&A and polling, and virtual meetings".

Those members will be able to access presentations and recordings of the live-stream on demand, the group said.

"Corporate members will be able to access virtual networking and matchmaking opportunities, with the ability to ‘call’ face-to-face meetings within the conference platform," the group said.

The 2020 GOAL will live-cast the first day of the conference free of charge to members of seafood associations and other "strategic partners" worldwide, it said.

"Though GAA anticipates the return of the live event next year, today's announcement signifies a transition of the GOAL conference to a "hybrid" model with a cohesive live and virtual event," it said.

Processing companies in the EU will go under due to the coronavirus pandemic, said the CEO of a large player.

"There will be casualties" from the situation in the sector, said Thomas Farstad, CEO of Milarex, which operates a processing plant in Poland producing smoked, fresh and frozen salmon.

"There is overcapacity in European processing", said Farstad, during a webinar on the outlook for salmon from Undercurrent News.

Rather than causing acquisitions, it's more likely capacity will just reduce, he said.

As Milarex sells around 95% to the retail sector. So, it's been largely unimpacted by the pandemic in terms of sales, he said.

Click here for the full story on Milarex and here to watch the webinar in full.

The seafood industry is set to play a key role in getting Norway's economy and workforce up and running again in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, claimed the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC).

"For Norway and other seafood nations, this is a real opportunity for a blue revolution and illustrate the real meaning of sustainability – social, economic and environmentally," said NSC CEO Renate Larsen.

"Seafood can be an important part of the solution in terms of rebuilding communities, creating jobs and responsible and low-carbon footprint food production."

As Norwegian society slowly opens up after successfully curbing the spread of the virus, the job of how to get the economy back on track has started in earnest, NSC said. In the past week, prime minister Erna Solberg and fisheries minister Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen have been meeting with representatives from the seafood industry to discuss what role it should play in rebuilding the economy.

During the pandemic the Norwegian seafood industry has been fully operating, as it is classified as essential for food security. Exports of salmon, cod, and other seafoods have also been relatively stable, but with large differences between species, products, and markets, the NSC said.

"The world is awakening to a new world order after this crisis, and we will feel the repercussions for a long time, both in terms of economic uncertainty and in our everyday choices. But the world will move on, we still have a mountain to climb when it comes to tackling climate change and food security, and investments into responsible seafood production is part of the solution."

"In Norway we are in a very fortunate position to be in the financial situation to boost industry and to get new and sustainable projects off the ground in the seafood sector quickly after this crisis. It can be a huge opportunity for the seafood industry, not just in Norway, but also in many of our important export markets, where jobs are created in processing, distribution and sales," said Larsen.

Ragnar Tveteras, professor of industrial economics at the University of Stavanger, has also highlighted seafood's role.

"There is a potential to create jobs in all parts of the value chain in the seafood sector," he said. "Since the financial crisis in 2008 nominal value added in the Norwegian seafood sector has tripled, and employment has increased by over 50%."

"Through quick and decisive action by decision-makers the seafood industry could create even more jobs in a situation where there are many competent hands and heads available."

High Liner Foods has resumed operations at its Portsmouth plant in the US state of New Hampshire, which was temporarily closed last month after some workers tested positive for COVID-19.

Heather Keeler- Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, Canada-based seafood processor, which is publicly traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: HLF), confirmed that the plant, which closed on April 20, reopened a week later on April 27.

"During the temporary suspension of operations at the plant, as part of our COVID-19 response plan, we completed deep cleaning, contact tracing and a detail risk assessment," she told Undercurrent News. "As part of our detailed risk assessment and continuous monitoring of industry best practices, we identified even further measures to reinforce our COVID-19 safety procedures including related to social distancing, hygiene, sanitation and employee training. Safeguards include: active health screening, mandatory masks, temperature scanners and face shields (at 2 of 3 plants) and were rolled out to all of our active sites."

She added that the company was able to minimize supply chain disruption by transferring some of the Portsmouth plant's production to the company's other plants in Newport News, Virginia, and Lunenburg.

The company said it is "continuing to leverage our diversified production footprint to rebuild inventory and ensure a steady supply of seafood to families across North America".

Seafood traders under lockdown in Pakistan have taken issue with the economic relief package delivered by the country's central bank, which they believe is ineffective for handling the current crisis, reports The News.

Traders are demanding sector-specific support programs, zero-rated tax facilities, and rebates on exports.

The country's seafood industry has remained closed since February, while salaries continue to be paid. The situation is expected to remain in place at least until September, while a constitutional ban exists for fishing in June and July, according to The News.

Pakistan's Fisheries Exporters Association (PFEA) has argued that the refinancing scheme offered by the bank of Pakistan providing concessional loans for wages is ineffective as it only shares half of payrolls, which won't work as the industry will have no earnings for five months, it said.

The association is therefore pushing for loans on soft terms and subsidies to do balancing, modernization, and replacement and upgrading for value addition. Furthermore, there have been calls for the resumption of a freight subsidy allowance for frozen and fresh seafood exports, just like live sales.

The PFEA has also called for obstacles around trade with the EU and the US to be removed, as monthly earnings continue to fall — in April, national seafood export value amounted to $39 million, down 16% year-on-year.

Vietnam's relative success at handling the coronavirus pandemic could see it become a more attractive place for investors looking to reduce their dependency on China, reports VNExpress.

The country has only had 288 reported COVID-19 cases so far and zero deaths, an impressive record for a nation with more than 96 million residents.

According to reports from the National Assembly's economic committee, US and South Korean tech firms have been pushing to diversify their production outside China, with some choosing Vietnam.

Furthermore, seafood production and export is expected to increase following the pandemic, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).

Vietnam's main competitors, India and Ecuador, are having to impose strict quarantine measures that will cut their exports by as much as 50%, VASEP claims, adding that the situation represents "a huge opportunity."

Cindy McLain, owner of a Flying Burger and Seafood restaurant location in the US city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, had expected to open in April after beginning construction in late 2019 but was put off when the city mayor closed all dining rooms over concerns about COVID-19, the local television station KTUL reports.

Now the restaurant is scheduled to open Monday, allowing diners to come inside as long as they obey social distancing measures, while also allowing curbside and drive-thru pickup.

It's hiring 45 employees, according to the article.

The franchise has another location that opened in Catoosa, Oklahoma, in December 2019.

Stolt Sea Farm, a land-based grower of turbot based in Spain, reports that it has donated 1,000 kilograms of its Prodemar brand fish to the main hospitals in Coruna and Ourense. The two cities are in the autonomous community of Galicia, an area in the northwest corner of the country that has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic.

Stolt, part of the Stolt-Nielsen Limited Group, maintains 15 farms and 400 employees producing 8,500 metric tons of turbot annually and is heavily concentrated in Galicia. Its main office is in Santiago de Compostela.

"This initiative is the company's contribution in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic," Stolt said in a press release. "The object is to help, as far as possible, the hardest hit medical centers in Galicia, whose health workers have been fulfilling such outstanding work.

"

The German distributor All-Fish Handelsgesellschaft told Undercurrent News on May 6 that it was considerably more upbeat for the near future as lockdown restrictions lift in the country over the coming days.

The company had acquired the smaller German foodservice-focused distributor Intercont Grosshandels last November, and as such the HORECA sector (hotels, restaurants, catering) lockdown could not have come at a worse time for both firms.

But chief financial officer Stefan Schulze told Undercurrent: "We are optimistic for the future, the lift of certain restrictions in the HORECA sector in Germany and other markets are coming into place during the next couple of days. This will certainly lead us to come back on the performance level All-Fish and Intercont could have realized in the past."

Although the firm has been having issues on the demand side — only 15% of its pre-pandemic business was intended for retail channels — Schulze added that revenue had "stabilized on a reasonable level given the circumstances."

"All-Fish and Intercont have been, are and will be financially strong and healthy companies regardless of the COVID-19 pandemic and their consequences," he said.

UK retailer Morrisons has launched an 18-piece fish box as part of its home delivery range.

The box contains four different varieties of fish, designed to create a variety of dishes. In total it includes 18 portions — six Scottish farmed salmon fillets, four Atlantic cod fillets, four haddock fillets, and four Turkish seabass fillets — for £35.

All the portions can be frozen upon receipt.

The retailer previously introduced a range of measures to support the 2,700 farmers and fishermen that keep it stocked, it said.

For starters, the chain has opened a BBQ and steak bar from next week, offering customers a broader choice of meat and fish — see earlier in this blog.

The intention is that the BBQ and steak bar will allow suppliers to sell a wider range of steaks, joints and seafood that would normally be destined for foodservice outlets, shut during the current lockdown.

As the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic became felt across the US in recent weeks, shoppers stocked up on the essentials — including more toilet paper, frozen foods and fresh meat and seafood, a survey conducted by the research firm Kantar confirms.

The survey, reported on by Supermarket News, asked 2,000 adults about their recent shopping experiences.

It confirmed that 46% of respondents spent more on groceries and essentials. According to the survey, 41% of respondents bought more toilet paper, 40% bought more frozen food, 38% bought more dry and canned goods, 36% bought more cleaning products and water and 35% bought additional fresh meat and seafood.

Shortages of some products at their normal stores moved US shoppers to new routines, the survey added. Online shopping, drug stores, convenience stores and warehouse chains were among the biggest beneficiaries of this.

Amador Suarez, president of the Spanish fishing confederation, known by its Spanish abbreviation Cepesca since its founding in 2007, passed away in San Sebastian, Spain, on May 5 after 41 days fighting against the COVID-19 virus, Cepesca stated.

As well as chairing the confederation, Suarez was also the president of Grupo Amasua and the co-founder of the Spanish association of shellfish freezer vessel owners, Anamar.

"In his 13-year presidency, Amador exercised his leadership in favor of the unity of a sector that he —with his knowledge, effort and strategic vision— contributed to make more profitable, more modern and more sustainable," the processing and marketing arm of Grupo Amasua, Krustagroup, stated.

Click on here to read the full statement.

UK supermarket chain Marks & Spencer has extended its home delivery service via Deliveroo, while rival J. Sainsbury has introduced a one-hour delivery service, reports the BBC.

M&S customers can order from a range of about 130 food and household items through Deliveroo. It is one of the few big food retailers without its own internet-based delivery service, but is planning to launch in conjunction with Ocado in four months’ time.

M&S has kept its Simply Food stores and food halls open during the coronavirus pandemic, but the delivery service will make its products available more widely to those confined to their homes. Deliveroo has now added 20 M&S stores in city and town locations, and is providing a more extensive range.

The service, which costs £4.99, is available from 142 outlets across the country.

Sainsbury's one-hour service, named Chop Chop, costs the same amount. It allows customers to order a top-up shop of up to 20 items.

Iceland Seafood International (ISI) will re-open its Havelok processing plant in Grimsby, UK next week, at a reduced capacity.

At the end of March, Undercurrent News reported Havelok was one of several processing plants focused on foodservice to close down.

"We’re planning to start up with restricted operations next week and are currently doing the risk assessments to allow that to take place in a safe manner for all our people," Peter Hawkins, managing director of ISI's UK operations, told Undercurrent.

The company is assessing what level of processing it will start at, but it will be greater than 50% capacity, he said.

"It's due some sales in foodservice rather than retail as existing stock has sold through," said Hawkins.

Public health officials in the US state of Oregon are testing all workers at Bornstein Seafoods’ facilities in Astoria after 11 workers there were found to have coronavirus.

The Clatsop County Public Health Department began investigating the seafood processor on May 1 after learning one of its workers had tested positive, the department said in a press release. Bornstein has agreed to close its Astoria operations until further notice and directed employees to shelter in place at home.

Public health workers tested 35 workers and of the 30 results that came back, 11 were positive. The company is waiting to hear on the results of the other five workers.

"The 11 positive cases reported Monday included four women (one aged 30-39 and three aged 40 to 49) and seven men (two aged 30 to 39, four aged 50 to 59 and one aged 60 to 69)," the public health department said.

Seafish, the public body that supports the UK seafood industry, has released a new online tool to help seafood businesses identify what government financial support schemes they may be eligible for.

Seafish's new "Government support measures for the UK seafood industry" tool allows seafood businesses to quickly identify what government support they may be eligible to access during the COVID-19 outbreak.

By selecting their business type and location, seafood businesses can access information about packages that may be available to them and details of how to apply. The tool covers seafood sector specific packages and those open to businesses more generally from the UK government and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

As well as developing this tool, Seafish also provided economic data and analysis to the governments to allow them to develop support packages, said Seafish director of operations, Aoife Martin. "We’re also supporting industry with similar queries and continue to respond to all of these requests."

As reported previously, the Scottish fishing sector has been angered this week by the suggestion that France has ceased imports of its produce in order to protect French fishermen, while the pandemic crisis shuts down the foodservice sector across Europe.

A statement from the Scottish White Fish Producers Association (SWFPA) stated the trade between Scotland and France has been threatened after "a section of the French industry applied pressure through political routes to the large retailers, to ensure that only fish of French origin is purchased at auction".

The situation has worsened since, with the SWFPA tweeting that, having agreed with the Scottish government to restrict fishing vessel activity, there are now foreign vessels taking advantage of the situation.

"Scottish Producers Organisations have agreed with Scot Gov to restrict vessels fishing activity," the SWFPA tweeted. "We see foreign static gear vessels gaming the situation by moving into the areas vacated by Scottish vessels. Gaming at this time is beyond belief and very wrong."

Twitter account Shetland Fishermen agreed: "We could hardly agree more. A massive presence of these vessels west and east of Shetland," it wrote.

The map below shows a cluster of fishing vessels to the west of Shetland (marked in orange, via Marine Traffic). They are Norwegian, French, Faroese, Icelandic, German, Dutch, and Russian.

One of Ireland's oldest fishing industries has been forced to postpone its traditional start date due to the coronavirus pandemic, reports Irish News.

The multi-million-pound eel operation is managed by the Lough Neagh Fisherman's Co-Operative Society. Traditionally the commercial eel fishing season begins on May 1 and runs through the summer months, coming to a close in the fall.

Lough Neagh is home to Europe's largest wild eel fishery and supports dozens of families who earn a living from its waters.

During peak season up to 3 metric tons of eels are handled every day.

80% of eels caught there are usually flown to the Netherlands daily where they are processed and sent on to markets across Europe.

Some Indian shrimp farmers have found they are better off selling their smallest products on the domestic market during the COVID-19 lockdown, according to one source on Linkedin.

Durai Murugan, owner of Tamil Nadu-based Sea Gem Aqua Farms, said most farmers have been "forced to look after domestic market".

"Some of them able to sell 100 count for INR 300 [$3.99 per kilogram]. This is absolutely fantastic."

According to Undercurrent News‘ prices portal, the current export price for 100 count shrimp out of Andhra Pradesh is INR 180/kg.

Murugan suggested Indian farmers should look to open the "domestic door" to 100 through to 80 counts, while premium sizes should go for export.

Rajendra Damle, an aquaculture consultant with long experience of working with shrimp, commented on Murugan's post to say it would benefit farmers in the future to plan a mixed production, with small sizes for the domestic market and larger for export.

"But for this stocking density of 60pc/sqm (the highest permitted limit by the govt) would be essential. Low-density operations won't be ideal to target both markets. A low-density culture will be economically viable only with producing large sizes for export market," he wrote.

He also observed that while prices now are far better than a week ago, they still vary greatly across states, let alone the country.

"In place[s] like Maharashtra, Gujarat, rates are still pathetic, much lower than these.

And all this is happening on the pretext of COVID-19 situation, which gives liberty to buyers to throw [any] number of reasons at farmers."

If the Alaska salmon fishery does open, we can be sure that this season will not proceed as the status quo in the past, said Candian wholesaler Tradex Foods, in a market report.

The assumption is the fishery is going to happen, but we really won't know for sure until it does happen as we know a sudden COVID-19 outbreak in multiple Alaskan communities could see the whole thing shut down, wrote Tradex.

"We should expect to see a reduced production of Alaskan salmon due to COVID mandates, reduced employees, and facilities shutting down due to a COVID outbreak as work and living conditions can be quite confined to put it conservatively," the company said.

In the event of facility closures, larger companies will have the means to transport salmon to another facility however the smaller operations will struggle.

Another variable for consideration is the local community backlash where we could see protests and blockage of major road networks, according to Tradex.

"All of this also raises concern for the quality of salmon that will come out of Alaska this season," the company said.

Even without the pandemic, the forecast is for lower catches. A lot of people will be tuning in to watch how things proceed in the upcoming Copper River fishery in what is to be a strong run.

Several sources have confirmed to Undercurrent News that fishing vessels in the Scottish port of Peterhead have adopted a pattern of eight days fishing, eight days tied up.

A "normal" situation sees them fishing more or less every day. From March the port authority has implemented a reduced capacity at the fish market, to ensure social distancing can be complied with.

Fish landings at Peterhead topped £200 million for the first time ever in 2018.

One source said the decision to tie up was purely down to the lack of hotel and restaurant demand in Scotland and the UK, rather than anything to do with an apparent ‘boycott’ of Scottish produce across the channel in France.

A second source — Stephen Bruce, who runs online fishmonger Peterhead Fish Company — said that situation "wasn't helping", however.

"The likes of haddock and cod, there's plenty of [UK retail] demand for that, but a lot of other fish is exported. The French are wanting to use their own fish just now, so that's not helping. But all those dealing with retailers, they’re quite busy."

"We’d like to see the prices a wee bit better for the boats, just to encourage them to get going, at the moment the prices are pretty depressed," he added.

One processing source, based elsewhere in the UK, said he had heard the vessels were beginning to tie up, and that while it had not impacted on fresh fish supply yet, he was concerned it might.

Peterhead Fish Company has seen strong demand for its online services of late, Bruce noted. Pre-lockdown, the delivery van would park up at one spot and customers would come to collect their purchases; now it has to do doorstep deliveries, stretching its capabilities somewhat.

Its Facebook page shows that when it opened the latest online market on May 2, it rapidly sold all the fish it had to offer. It is working on increasing its offering, it states.

"The feedback's been amazing. People have been living out of their freezers, so when they get this fresh fish off the dock they’re dancing on their doorsteps," said Bruce. "We hope a lot of them will stay with us when the lockdown is over, but I’m just happy to be doing some business now, when a lot of people can't."

He hopes that if the lockdown eases somewhat he will at least be able to move to a "fish drive-through" model, where customers can come to him to collect purchases, and he can deliver to their cars while everyone remains "socially distant".

Ultimately though, it will take the opening of the hotels and restaurants to bring prices back up again, he said.

Pictured: Stephen Bruce. Credit: Peterhead Fish Company on Facebook

NGO Future of Fish is launching several projects to try and aid Peru's seafood sector during the coronavirus crisis, it has said.

"Starting with an ear-to-the-ground approach, we reached out to fishers, partners, NGOs and more to learn what is happening and what is needed. We’re now launching a number of initiatives to respond to the critical needs fishers and seafood workers are facing," it said in an email update.

These include a media and public-awareness campaign to promote buying and eating local seafood in Peru. "Seafood sales have dropped dramatically, partly because the Peruvian public doesn't have a culture of preparing and freezing seafood at home. This means that the livelihoods of fishers and seafood workers are at risk."

It is also setting up online platforms to support direct-to-consumer local seafood sales in Peru.

Then it has established "Move the Fish" initiatives in Lima and Piura to increase the flow of fish under safe conditions from coast to market centers and to potential consumers directly, in order to improve access for people and secure continued income for fishers.

Finally, it is working on strengthening connections between fishers and open-air market vendors in Chile to support direct sales and ensure fishers can continue to sell their catch during the current crisis.

A project being run out of the University of Guelph, based in Ontario, Canada, is tracking the "real-time" impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak for fishermen and women via a weekly podcast.

"Social FISHtancing" — run by graduate student Emily De Sousa alongside colleagues Phil Loring and Hannah Harrison — sees the team interview fishermen, processors, retailers, and others involved throughout the seafood supply chain.

The podcast can be found here, or by searching "Coastal Routes Radio" on Spotify or Apply Podcasts.

Towards the end of April the UK's Pesky Fish launched what it claimed was the world's first online marketplace for fishermen to sell their catch directly to people across the country.

One week on, it rated its opening week of business as "sensational", and noted the number of vessels it operates from is set to double this week.

"The fleet have landed a cracking haul over the weekend, with more variety than ever. Thanks to all of your support, we’ll be doubling the fleet this week so that we can return more value back to our amazing British fishermen."

It warned the weather was set to be poor this week, and suggested stocking up early on. It's anticipating pollock, place, lemon sole and turbot to be popular options.

The Fort Pierce, US-based seafood broker Day Boat Seafood has learnt to adapt and thrive during the pandemic by switching its sales strategy, but local construction plans loom large over its long-term future, reports TC Palm.

Based on the Treasure Coast, Day Boat Seafood has been selling its catch directly off the vessel for the past three weeks, after its typical clients saw sales dip in the lockdown. The response has been remarkable, according to TC Palm, with 30-odd customers waiting in line for portions of yellowfin tuna, mahi-mahi and swordfish down by the dock.

However, Day Boat's business is currently threatened by the replacement of the existing drawbridge at Fort Pierce with a new, $65 million project which will pass over the seafood trader.

When construction of the bridge begins in 2022, Scott Taylor, co-owner of Day Boat, suspects his business will be forced to close by the state health department, as the construction project will kick up significant volumes of dust and dirt, a death knell for any nearby fresh food business.

The company has already sued the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) after it informed Day Boat that it was planning to take over 3,000 acres of property for its bridge. Nevertheless, the FDOT redesigned the bridge so it would no longer require Day Boat's land via laws of imminent domain.

The company could potentially move to a nearby plot land in Fishermen's Wharf, adjacent to Fort Pierce, with deep enough water for Day Boat's fleet of longline vessels.

However, the area's redevelopment remains uncertain while coronavirus has temporarily halted the bidding process. Other sites along the coastline either lack deep enough dockage or are attempting to move away from commercial fishing, Taylor told TC Palm.

Sysco Corporation has pledged its support to small local restaurants in the US during the crisis with its latest campaign ‘Foodservice Doesn't Brake for Adversity’.

The campaign "will consist of strategically placed messages across multiple channels designed to encourage Americans to support their local restaurants and also highlights the resilience of all foodservice workers," Sysco said.

The national campaign will include both television and digital advertising, customer toolkits, and other resources designed to help restaurant owners stay afloat.

Sysco will also be extending its current pledge to donate $0.50 for every photo of a restaurant takeout meal shared on social media to the non-profit campaign No Kid Hungry until May 31, it added.

"In these extraordinary times, Sysco is proud to launch this important campaign to further demonstrate our commitment to ensuring neighborhood restaurants survive and succeed now and in the future," said Kevin Hourican, Sysco's president and chief executive officer.

The food distribution conglomerate has created a webpage devoted to the campaign with advice for restaurant owners on how they can create effective takeout programs, as well as instructions for consumers on what they can do to keep their local restaurant in business.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic's impact on merchant seafarers, fishers and their families, charity Seafarers UK has created a new emergency fund of £2million, with £500,000 immediately allocated to assist fishing communities across Britain.

Included in the grants that have been awarded to charity partners providing advice and support arising from the widespread impacts of the coronavirus are:

The European Commission (EC) has approved Greece's modification of a previously approved guarantee scheme to support companies affected by the coronavirus outbreak, extending its scope and increasing its budget to €2.25 billion.

"This amended scheme…will help Greek businesses, including the self-employed and undertakings active in agriculture and aquaculture sectors, cover immediate working capital needs and continue their activities in these difficult times," said EC executive vice-president Margrethe Vestager.

"We continue working closely with the member states to ensure that national support measures can be put in place in a coordinated and effective way, in line with EU rules."

The impacts of the coronavirus pandemic for Norwegian seafood has been a mixed bag so far, with volume growth in some markets, and a significant fall in others, according to the latest Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) update.

"So far, we have seen a decline in demand for Norwegian seafood overall. For example, for salmon, we see that the export volume is stable while the price measured in euros falls by about 30%, said Tom-Jorgen Gangso, NSC director of market insight and access.

"Expectations of a decline in purchasing power also create uncertainty about future demand for, for example, clipfish," he added.

NSC analyst Paul Aandahl noted a shift in salmon exports towards more processed products, a trend which has been strengthening as the pandemic period wears on. "The export of salmon fillets to several of the overseas markets is somewhat better than the export of fresh whole salmon to these markets. For example, we see growth in Japan, Israel and South Korea," he said.

Norwegian fresh whole salmon has seen a 2% decrease in export volume, while fresh fillet increased by 8% and frozen fillet has increased by 36%. For frozen whole salmon there has been a decline of 30% during the pandemic period.

Exports of fresh whole salmon to Asia declined by 6% during the period, while the EU saw a 1% decline.

"The export of salmon to markets that process it for the grocery trade has increased during the corona period. Poland and the Netherlands increased by 5% each and Lithuania increased by 46%," said Aandahl. "We also see growth in exports of fresh whole salmon to consumer markets such as the UK by 5% and Spain by 12%."

Exports of fresh salmon fillets to Sweden have increased by 23% over the last two months, with retail chain Hemkop chain currently running "a full-page salmon fillet campaign for SEK 99/kg, which is the lowest price we have seen in several years," noted Sigmund Bjorgo, NSC envoy in Sweden.

Exports of fresh cod decreased by 7% in week 17 2020, compared to week 17 in 2019, to 1,119 metric tons. Exports of frozen whole cod have been positive so far this year, though, and in week 17 exports were up 26%.

"The decline in exports of fresh whole cod during the corona period is due to both reduced demand and reduced catches due to bad weather," wrote NSC analyst Ingrid Kristine Pettersen. "The drain on exports of fresh cod to the processing market such as Poland and the Netherlands also continued last week. Increased demand for frozen and fresh prepackaged grocery products in several markets explains some of this growth."

However, the increase in grocery retailing is not offsetting the decline in the restaurant segment, she added. "This means that prices measured in Norwegian kroner will fall, from historically high levels earlier this winter, to the same level as last year. This despite a weak Norwegian krone."

The Faroe Islands’ Fishfacts is hosting what it claims is the world's first virtual fish expo later this year.

Due to be held on June 9-10, the event will combine live streaming, events, and meetings in a bid to replicate the expo experience.

The "virtual floor plan" of "hall one" shows several Faroese, Norwegian, and Danish firms already in attendance.

The UK government has opened a £1 million ($1.24m) grant program that will help English seafood businesses invest in infrastructure so that they can sell more seafood locally.

According to a press release from the UK's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Marine Management Organisation (MMO), the program is part of a £10m fund to support English fishing and aquaculture businesses amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The application process for the £1m fund opened today, April 29. The MMO will accept applications until May 11 and announce the winners on that date.

"The scheme will fund measures that assist the industry to set up local and regional distribution such as plant and equipment to help with local fish processing, or assets that can be shared at port such as storage and refrigerated vans," the organizations said in the release.

Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) announced Tuesday that the snow crab fishery in Newfoundland and Labrador, one of the largest in Atlantic Canada, will not open before May 11, 2020 — adding another 10 days to what the agency previously said could be the earliest start date.

The date is in line with comments by the Fish, Food and Allied Workers’ Union (FFAW-Unifor), which has expressed concern about the safety of operating during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The areas effected include 2GHJ, 3K, 3LNO, 3Ps and 4R3Pn, which combine to account for a total allowable catch this year of 29,551 metric tons, a 10% boost over the 2019 season.

"Once season dates are determined on an area by area basis, they will be communicated via Notice to Fish Harvesters," DFO advised.

Plant-based alternatives to meat, poultry and seafood already were on the rise, but they are really jumping during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Financial Times reports.

US sales of plant-based meat substitutes rose 200% in the week ending April 18, compared with the same period in 2019, and surged by 265% over the same eight-week period a year ago, according to the consumer data group Nielsen.

By comparison, fresh meat sales jumped 30% during the week that ended April 18 and 39% over the same eight-week period last year.

Plant-based substitute sales remain a small portion of the US protein market, but they’ve been on the climb and causing the other traditional meat, poultry and seafood industries consternation. Undercurrent News reported in July 2019 how plant-based alternatives to seafood was a small and ambiguous part of the growing trend but gaining form.

And now that slaughterhouses and processing plants are being threatened as a result of difficulty maintaining social distancing. plant-based alternative companies are seeing another window open, said Bruce Friedrich, co-founder and executive director of the Good Food Institute.

"With plant-based meat, supply chain factors are much easier to manipulate," he told the Financial Times.

As of Monday, 32% of US pork production capacity was offline, according to Steve Meyer, an economist at Kerns & Associates, a consulting firm. Also, beef production capacity is down by 14%, according to Bill Lapp, president of consultancy Advanced Economic Solutions.

The bottleneck has caused the price of pork to jump, while the price for live pigs to slaughterhouses has fallen sharply.

Beyond Meat's shares jumped more than 40% last week on the news of meat plant closures and also based on an announcement from Starbucks that it was going to sell the company's plant-based protein in products in Chinese stores.

8F Asset Management has confirmed its plans to roll out land-based salmon aquaculture facilities globally have not yet fallen foul of the coronavirus pandemic, co-founder and partner Martin Fothergill told Undercurrent News.

In March 8F completed the first round of fundraising for its Pure Salmon land-based aquaculture project, bringing in $358.8 million.

It now has the capital required for phase one of its global rollout covering projects in Poland, Japan, France and the US.

"Since the new Pure Salmon facilities are at the pre-construction stage, COVID-19 has not currently had any material impact to plans," Fothergill said.

"Travel restrictions and lockdowns have impacted efficiency in certain situations, but discussions, for example with local authorities and contractors, have continued as planned albeit not in person."

It was too early to say what future longer-term impact there may be on timescales until there is more clarity regarding the situation in the various countries involved, he added.

8F declined to outline its current timeframes for construction and first harvests at its planned facilities. All it has detailed so far are plans for Japan — the furthest along in its sites — where construction is still due to begin in "early summer 2020".

Completion of works is expected by late 2021 with the first harvest planned for 2023.

Canada's Ocean Choice International has obtained a court injunction against protestors who blocked trucks from getting to fish plants on the island of Newfoundland, to unload crab from out of province, reports VOCM.

Two out-of-province boats were turned away from unloading their crab in Port-aux-Basques, in the extreme west of the island, on April 26-27, according to the Fish, Food & Allied Workers union (FFAW-Unifor). However, seafood producers are accusing the union of being disingenuous and dishonest.

The Association of Seafood Producers (ASP) sees the blockade as an attempt by FFAW-Unifor to influence crab prices. Executive director Derek Butler said the union was using it as a bargaining chip.

The union continues its call to prohibit crab from outside of Newfoundland and Labrador being processed locally until proper measures are in place to launch the local fishery.

The ASP and FFAW-Unifor have been waging a war of words over the upcoming snow crab season in the province, for which the total allowable catch has been increased by 10%. ASP wants the NL season to get underway, but FFAW-Unifor wants it held up further, due to the coronavirus pandemic. The start date is yet to be announced.

John Tyson, chairman of US chicken giant Tyson Foods, has warned the country's supply chains are struggling.

"In small communities around the country where we employ over 100,000 hard-working men and women, we’re being forced to shutter our doors," he wrote in a blog post on the company's website.

"This means one thing – the food supply chain is vulnerable. As pork, beef and chicken plants are being forced to close, even for short periods of time, millions of pounds of meat will disappear from the supply chain. As a result, there will be limited supply of our products available in grocery stores until we are able to reopen our facilities that are currently closed."

He added that in addition to meat shortages, this was a serious food waste issue.

"Farmers across the nation simply will not have anywhere to sell their livestock to be processed, when they could have fed the nation. Millions of animals – chickens, pigs and cattle – will be depopulated because of the closure of our processing facilities. The food supply chain is breaking."

US firm Blue Harvest Fisheries planned to reopen its new 220,000-square-foot wetfish processing plant in New Bedford, Massachusetts, on April 27, after being forced to close it three days earlier, reports WBSM.

The New England groundfish and scallop harvesting and processing giant confirmed for Undercurrent News on April 24 it had received a cease and desist order from the city's Board of Health, after voluntarily alerting the agency that as many as three of its employees may have coronavirus.

The plant was to reopen after thoroughly cleaning and disinfecting the facility.

Earlier in April the UK government announced support for more than 1,000 fishing and aquaculture businesses in England, which were to receive direct cash grants through a fisheries support scheme.

Up to £9m is available for grants to eligible fishing and aquaculture businesses, while a further £1m is to be made available to support projects to assist fishermen to sell their catch in their local communities.

This money is intended to help fishing businesses find new ways to market and sell their catch while traditional markets are restricted, not only supporting the sector but also the local communities that depend on the industry.

"This £10m scheme will provide a lifeline for more than 1,000 fishing businesses so they can continue to maintain and operate their boats during this challenging time, which has seen falling prices and lack of demand for fish from the restaurant industry," said environment secretary George Eustice.

The scheme is to run for three months, commencing April 17.

Bernadette Jordan, Canada's minister of fisheries, oceans and the coast guard, has announced CAD 62.5 million ($44.5m) of new coronavirus-related assistance to the nation's fish, aquaculture and seafood processing sector, in part to help deal with an expected increase in storage needs.

In a press release issued Saturday, the government said the Canadian Seafood Stabilization Fund — delivered through the previously existing programs Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions and Western Economic Diversification Canada – can be expected to help the seafood industry: access short-term financing to pay for maintenance and inventory costs; add storage capacity for unsold product; comply with new health and safety measures for workers; support new technologies to improve productivity and quality of finished seafood products; and adapt products to respond to changing requirements and new market demands.

Details on how and when processors can apply for assistance will be confirmed at a later date, the government said.

"The women and men in our fish and seafood sector have been feeding this country for generations," Jordan is quoted as saying in a press release. "Through the new Canadian Seafood Stabilization Fund, our government is investing directly into this sector, ensuring the industry has the support it needs to adapt to current realities brought on by COVID-19. Bolstering our processing sector is vital to supporting fish harvesters and feeding Canadians."

Several of Canada's seafood industry players issued positive responses over the weekend, including the Fisheries Council of Canada (FCC) and the Canadian Aquaculture Industry Alliance (CAIA), which issued a joint release. Today's announcement acknowledges the very challenging situation that our industry is facing, they said.

"It has been the top priority of our members to ensure the health and safety of our front-line employees while we continue to provide the essential service of supporting the food supply chain," said Paul Lansbergen, FCC's president. "Many additional measures have been put in place to respond to social distancing mandates and market disruptions, which have come with significant costs."

CAIA noted that its members in the aquaculture industry generate more than CAD 6 billion in economic activity, CAD 2.45bn in GDP, and employ over 25,000 Canadians.

The Fish, Food and Allied Workers, a union that represents harvesters and workers at seafood processors, and the Association of Seafood Processors (ASP), the group that represents the processing industry in the province, were also complimentary before their responses turned into a resumption of their battle over the safety of the fishery and when to open the season.

"Today's announcement of federal support for the fishing industry is a good first step but does nothing to support fish harvesters," said Keith Sullivan, FFAW's president, in a statement. "Given the serious health and safety concerns expressed by plant workers in the province, this new funding must be used by processing companies to ensure adequate personal protective equipment is available in plants to keep workers safe."

FFAW noted that it sent Jordan a proposal earlier that include recommendations for an extension of employment insurance benefits for a 12-month period for fish harvesters, plant workers and other industry support workers and a waiver or reimbursement for all 2020 federal fees related to the commercial fishery. Additionally, the group seeks a wage subsidy program and interest-free loans for inshore enterprise owners and an extension of deferral periods (without interest or penalty) for personal and business income taxes for a period of 12 months.

"The government is doing the right thing – and it is very appreciated – by providing financial assistance to the sector as it puts in place additional safety measures and adapts to the challenging circumstances of COVID-19," said Derek Butler, ASP's executive director, in a separate release.

"The safety of people working in the sector is of utmost importance and will continue to be our main focus as we navigate this situation," he added.

The Association of Seafood Processors (ASP) in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador has stressed the safety protocols in place for seafood plants, wharves and discharging of vessels are up to scratch, after the Fish, Food & Allied Workers union (FFAW-Unifor) said plant workers had raised alarms.

The ASP and FFAW-Unifor have been waging a war of words over the upcoming snow crab season in the province, for which the total allowable catch has been increased by 10%. ASP wants the NL season to get underway, but FFAW-Unifor wants it held up further, due to the coronavirus pandemic. The start date is yet to be announced.

"Plant workers in Newfoundland and Labrador are raising the alarm on protocols that put their health and safety at risk as companies push to prematurely begin operations during the COVID-19 pandemic," the union said, going on to reject ASP claims that FFAW-Unifor members want to shut the fishery down in favor of federal supports.

Read the full story here.

The UK's Pesky Fish has launched what it claims is the world's first online marketplace for fishermen to sell their catch directly to people across the country.

The platform brings fish caught in the southwest of England directly to customers, with deliveries despatched overnight and arriving less than 48 hours after the fish was landed.

The first market, open April 27, featured line-caught bass and pollock, live lobsters, place, brill, and mussels from the river Teign.

The Freshwater Institute on Friday morning announced that it has now formally canceled its Aquaculture Innovation Workshop (AIW), in New York City, which was scheduled for April 30-May 1.

The event has become, in recent years, an annual highlight for professionals in the recirculating aquaculture system space, especially in North America.

Brian Vinci, director of Freshwater's Conservation Fund and the chief organizer, had earlier postponed the conference, which had more than 200 attendees registered, expressing skepticism.

"We had planned to re-schedule the event for the Fall of this year," he said in an email sent to prospective attendees Friday. "However, given the uncertainty of the global COVID-19 pandemic we have decided to schedule the next AIW for 2021, or beyond, if necessary."

Attendees have been instructed to reach out to AIW event coordinator Kata Sharrer at [email protected] to receive a full refund of registration fees.

The organizer of the Nor-Fishing event — Stiftelsen Nor-Fishing — has said a decision will be made on whether the event goes ahead as planned by May 15.

The show is currently scheduled for Aug. 18-21.

"We have extended all deadlines and postponed billing of stand rentals, so that the financial consequences of any cancellation are as small as possible for our exhibitors," it said in a notice.

While May 15 is the latest date by which it will make an announcement, the organization noted new government guidelines on events are expected by May 1, which may force its hand before that time.

Stiftelsen Nor-Fishing has agreed with Trondheim hotels that the deadline for canceling accommodation has been put back to June 15, in a bid to make life easier for attendees.

Iceland's Stofnfiskur, a subsidiary of Benchmark Genetics company, has managed to get its second successful delivery of Atlantic salmon ova out to China since the pandemic began, it said.

The consignment, consisting of almost 400,000 eggs, was sent from Reykjavik on April 16 and arrived safely in Beijing the following day. A quality check was made on arrival, before the boxes were dispatched and further sent on domestic flights for delivery to three different customers.

Two of the customers are operating land-based farms, and a third is cage-farming in a freshwater lake.

"We are very pleased that the logistics so far have gone well," said Robert Runarsson, global sales manager of Benchmark Genetics. "It is a challenge to plan airline shipments these days due to the corona crisis. Cancellations and changes of flights are made on short notice. Fortunately, there are still daily connections between Iceland and Europe that makes it possible to get our products further exported to the global market."

Indian aquaculture support network Aquaconnect has conducted a survey of "industry veterans" across the country, in a bid to ascertain the current impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

Over 30% of its respondents were farmers, and over 20% farm technicians or consultants. Roughly 5% were retailers and processors.

It found that the "slowdown in global shrimp imports and nationwide lockdown put the processors in shutdown mode", and that resulted in an oversupply of shrimp with low demand.

Since the lockdown relaxed for those businesses, processors have been working at reduced capacity, which has maintained low prices and poor market absorption.

As shown in Undercurrent News‘ prices portal, Indian shrimp farmgate prices plunged due to the COVID-19 lockdown, and led to market instability, said Aquaconnect.

"Price reduction and unavailability of processors to procure the harvested material are baffling the shrimp farmers and delays massive summer crop stocking throughout India."

The transportation of raw materials and farm inputs between producers and retailers, distributors and farms have been affected badly, and have led to the closure of farm input services, it found.

There is also an ongoing lack of laborers for hatcheries, processors and large farms, as well as a lack of technical and advisory support.

See Aquaconnect's infographic on what its survey respondents said they needed below.

Vietnamese aquaculture portal Tep Bac Company has launched a farm management mobile application, which it hopes can improve the sector.

The app, named Farmext, acts as an easy-to-use farming diary in which stocking and harvest information across both shrimp and pangasius can be recorded.

"By keeping a farming diary, the farming history will be stored for traceability," Tep Bac's Tran Thi Thuy Loan told Undercurrent News. "Thus each aquaculture product will have a clear traceability code."

"Through Farmext we look forward to helping the aquaculture industry become more productive, with early warning alerts and transparent outputs."

For now, the company is focused on trying to increase the use of the app; enticing smallholder farmers to try new technologies is something many entrepreneurs have faced.

One promising sign is Tep Bac's cooperation with pangasius giant Vinh Hoan Corporation.

"Vinh Hoan makes their own farming area management solution, while we make the application to serve smaller and more populous customers" Tran explained.

The UK supermarket chain Morrisons has introduced a range of measures to support the 2,700 farmers and fishermen that keep it stocked, it announced.

For starters, the chain will open a BBQ and steak bar from next week, offering customers a broader choice of meat and fish, it said.

The intention is that the BBQ and steak bar will allow suppliers to sell a wider range of steaks, joints and seafood that would normally be destined for foodservice outlets, shut during the current lockdown.

Morrisons is also offering a 5% discount on shopping to its farmers to thank them for their consistent supply, the company said. Farmers will receive a 5% discount gift card on Morrisons shopping which will last at least until July 12, when the scheme will be reviewed.

However, the discount has only been granted to livestock suppliers, egg and dairy producers, and fruit and veg growers, with fishermen and fish farmers not included at this stage.

The director of Indonesian shrimp exporter PT Sekar Bumi — Harry Lukmito — has said several countries have turned to his country for vannamei with India locked down.

This was according to KKP News, which reported on a virtual meeting between Indonesia's minister of maritime affairs and fisheries, Edhy Prabowo, and several industry representatives.

"The factories [in India] are not operating, demand has soared to Indonesia. Fishery commodities remain a mainstay of foreign exchange at times like this," said Lukmito.

(It should be noted that Indian shrimp processors have been deemed essential and are not closed down, but the extent to which they are able to open with limited workforces varies.)

He took the opportunity to urge the government to support and modernize Indonesian aquaculture.

Minister Prabowo argued the current pandemic could be seen as an opportunity.

"I am optimistic that our sector will win. Potential exists, demand is high. People keep eating."

New Zealand's rock lobster harvesting sector, which is heavily dependent on exports to China, is starting to rebound after seeing sales plummet earlier this year as COVID-19 caused Chinese imports to crash.

According to the publication Stuff, New Zealand exporters such as the Te Anau-based Fiordland Lobster Company, which exports about 40% of the country's lobster to China, has restarted exports. Its lobsters are due in Shanghai, China, in the coming days.

Additionally, Andrew Harvey of the trade group Lobster Exporters of New Zealand confirmed lobster exports into China had resumed after "stopping dead" in late January.

Vietnamese pangasius firm P&H Seafood Processing Co. has faced a tough start to 2020, with its main market of China, of course, closed to it for a fair number of weeks.

As reported at the Vietfish event in 2019, P&H is in the process of constructing a new factory, taking its daily capacity from 130 metric tons of pangasius raw material processed up to 300t.

The aim of the new plant was to help bring it the volumes to target the EU and US markets.

But, a source in Vietnam, working with P&H, told Undercurrent News plans have had to be put back.

"It has been difficult months for all the processors in Vietnam, and of course P&H can not avoid that situation, also as they mainly export pangasius to China with the current plants."

"The new plant construction was supposed to finish in August this year but probably it could extend a bit more, maybe until the end of this year, due to the current situation," they said.

The loss to the Indian shrimp sector as a result of the COVID-19 lockdown could surpass $500 million, reports the Economic Times, citing the president of the Society of Aquaculture Professionals, Ravi Kumar Yellanki.

"We reckon that the loss could be as high as INR 4,000 crore [40 billion] with exports to the US and Europe slowing down," he said. "China is buying low volumes at cheaper prices."

Since the lockdown began, imports of vannamei broodstock from the US has largely stopped, causing a shortage in the industry, the news site said. Undercurrent News recently reported that SpiceJet, an Indian low-cost airline carrier, is flying shrimp seed to Surat in Gujarat, to support the state's hatcheries.

The COVID-19 pandemic is not only a major public health concern but also a threat to global food security, one that can be mitigated by avoiding measures that disrupt food supply chains, FAO director-general Qu Dongyu has told the agriculture ministers of the G20 countries.

"Preserving access to safe food and nutrition is an essential part of the health response," he said, recommending countries to strengthen local production and shorten food supply chains.

"We need to collaborate with every actor in the supply chain, build public-private partnerships and promote innovation", Qu said at the Extraordinary G20 Agriculture Ministers’ Meeting on Food Security and Nutrition, convened by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which holds the rotating G20 presidency.

Qu also urged G20 ministers to include long-term goals in their policy frameworks. "The crisis opens an opportunity to accelerate food system transformation," Qu said, pointing to e-commerce tools as a way to enhance local resilience and bolster direct links between producers and consumers. "New business models are needed. It is the time to speed-up e-commerce in agriculture and food systems across the globe", he said.

The latest export statistics published by the UK's HM Revenue and Customs show that the Scottish salmon farming sector reacted swiftly to the impact of coronavirus as it began to spread through Asia and into Europe, according to the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO).

The HMRC figures for exports in February 2020 show a drop of 2,700 metric tons compared to the same month last year. Valued at £32 million, this represented a decline of 32% on February 2019.

Exports to Asia accounted for the majority of the decline with volumes only just exceeding 200t in February, down by 1,360t (-87%) compared with year-earlier figures. As a result, exports to Asia accounted for only around 4% of total volumes and 5% of value, where they previously accounted for around 25% of each — as distribution logistics became more complex and foodservice and consumer demand fell as the coronavirus spread.

However, the Scottish salmon sector shifted export sales from Asian markets to Europe, achieving a boost in market share, rising to 59% and 55% for volume and value respectively. Some additional value was also found in European markets – 3% – despite volumes being down 10%, said SSPO.

"The coronavirus pandemic has, predictably, seen the impact on exports mirroring the geographic spread of the virus," said James Park, head of insights with SSPO.

"With the experience and expertise in exporting fresh Scottish salmon globally to more than 50 countries, companies have been able to manage January and February fairly well."

However, as the pandemic lockdowns hit major European markets and the US, demand has fallen sharply in the important foodservice and restaurant sectors, he noted. "Retail demand has correspondingly risen as consumers look for healthy products which are versatile and convenient."

As the salmon sector acknowledges, the more significant impact on exports will become clearer when the statistics for the first quarter are reported in mid-May. Ahead of that, companies in Scotland are exploring opportunities for new routes to market emerging from the coronavirus lockdown such as China and how to adapt products and distribution for overseas and domestic markets.

"Regaining share in recovering markets and capitalizing on new opportunities will be a central focus in the second quarter," Park concluded.

The Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) — and the Dutch firm which brings its Marine Stewardship Council-certified tuna to market, Pacifical — have announced the temporary suspension of 100% onboard observer coverage.

"The PNA nations are extremely small and vulnerable island economies," said commercial director to the PNA, Maurice Brownjohn.

"In order to maintain virus-free status, rigid quarantine measures have had to be implemented to protect the health of the people and all parties involved in the supply of sustainable MSC certified Pacifical tuna at-sea. Utmost attention has been paid to preserving the integrity and validation of the PNA chain-of-custody scheme with full traceability, and maintaining consistency in supply."

"With inter-island flights suspended and ports closed, 100% placement of physical onboard observers has been temporarily suspended," the organizations said. "A measure reflected now by the [Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission] for the entire fishery."

All other aspects of the PNA chain of custody are maintained, further enhanced by additional mandatory measures, they added.

SCS Global Services, the MSC conformity assessment body for the PNA, confirmed all was in order.

In the UK fishing port of Plymouth, trawler agents have begun an initiative named Call4Fish, which brings fish direct from the fishermen to consumers.

The project has been funded as part of the COVID-19 Rapid Response Grant program, in conjunction with Seafarers UK and the Fishmongers’ Company's fisheries charitable trust, the latter said.

The #Call4Fish social media presence began in Plymouth, but has spread along the south coast of England and even to London, with deliveries now widely available.

Since a number of markets for Norwegian seafood introduced restrictions that hit the restaurant segment hard, the exporting nation has seen a turn towards more sales of its goods at retail, especially as prepackaged and frozen products, according to the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC).

"If we compare Easter exports with last week's Easter week, we see an increase in both salmon and cod exports to processing markets such as Poland and the Netherlands. These are markets that refine the fish into consumer-ready products for sale in the grocery store," noted NSC analyst Paul Aandahl.

There was a 4% decline in exports of fresh whole salmon during the Easter week, and Norway is now seeing major changes in salmon exports between different markets compared to Easter week last year, he added. "This shows that there is great volatility in the salmon market as a result of the corona situation."

The EU saw a 4% decline for fresh whole salmon during the Easter week, though exports to markets such as Poland, the Netherlands and Lithuania performed well, and sales to Spain, the UK, Germany, and Finland increased, while there was a decline in France and Italy.

"Salmon is the favorite fish of the Spaniards, and we see a turn to increased home consumption which has by far compensated for the decline of the restaurant market in Spain," said the NSC's envoy to Spain, Bjorn Erik Stabell. "Exports of fresh whole salmon to Spain increased by 16% during the Easter week."

Year-on-year exports of fresh whole salmon to Asia were down 4% for the Easter week, at 11,993 metric tons, with China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan looking positive.

"As the Chinese market is gradually returning, Norway continues to strengthen its position in the Chinese salmon market," said the NSC. "The increase in recent weeks shows this and last week's increase to 623t corresponds to an increase of 149% compared with the Easter week last year, said the NSC's China envoy, Victoria Braathen.

Overall average export price for fresh whole salmon was down by as much as 33% in euro terms for Easter, NSC added.

Cod too saw an Easter boost, with exports of fresh cod up 56% y-o-y. Denmark, the Netherlands and Poland were key — normal transshipment/ processing nations.

Clipfish and salted fish saw strong sales, even as "stockfish" sales dived, mainly thanks to Italy's lockdown.

Portuguese retail sales of clipfish boomed, with some stores reporting greater demand for the delicacy than for Easter eggs, the NSC said.

Scottish seafood businesses that normally ship out of the UK on lorries, cargo planes and merchant ships are quickly developing new distribution networks closer to home, with some delivering direct to the doorsteps of their local communities, said Donna Fordyce, interim head of Seafood Scotland.

Normally around 60% of the fish eaten in Scotland is imported, but the current situation has caused a surge in demand from Scottish consumers who want to eat "their own" seafood, the industry body claimed.

For example, across the Inner and Outer Hebrides, Wild Hebridean, Uist Shellfish and Loch Bay Shellfish on Skye are all delivering direct to their customers, with good demand for fresh langoustines, lobster, crab, cockles, and mussels, it said.

Scrabster Seafoods in Thurso is delivering fresh whitefish to locals, and Gigha Halibut is going out by mail to all corners of the UK, as are "smokes" from the East Neuk Kiln House and all types of seafood from Edinburgh-based George Hughes and Son under its ‘Fresh Fish Daily’ brand.

"The Scottish consumer now has fast, fresh and widespread access to Scottish seafood, and it's at times like these when they are really showing their loyalty to home-grown businesses," said Fordyce. "While this trade is not going to replace the business done in international markets — many companies are doing less than 25% of their usual business at the moment — it's a start, and the industry is hugely appreciative of the support Scottish consumers are showing them."

In the last two weeks, the Scottish government has made available three support packages for the seafood sector. These should assist fishing, seafood processing and aquaculture businesses that are facing hardship in the present market to help them maintain a critical supply for the UK market.

The European Commission has approved a Portuguese scheme to support the fishery and aquaculture sectors in the context of the coronavirus outbreak.

The support will consist of loans worth up to €20 million with subsidized interest rates.

The scheme, accessible to small and medium-sized enterprises active in the fishery and aquaculture sector, aims to enable those companies that are most affected by the current crisis to have access, at reduced costs, to the financial means they need to maintain their activities.

Namibia's fishing sector has so far made a loss of over NAD 750 million ($39.8m) since the country imposed a 21-day lockdown three weeks ago, reports News Ghana.

The chairman of the Confederation of Namibian Fishing Association, Matti Amukwa, said the lockdown has had a severe impact on the fishing sector, with most companies closed down.

"Factories have reduced activities, fishing vessels are parked. If the lockdown continues, over a thousand workers in the fishing sector are at risk of losing their jobs," he said.

According to Amukwa, the fishing sector and the government are in talks to see if the industry can be classified as an essential service.

Namibia has extended the country's lockdown until May 4.

Martin Walsh, the mayor of the US city of Boston, Massachusetts, has indicated that his city may follow the example of Los Angeles, California, when it comes to canceling large gatherings like sporting and musical events until 2021.

Walsh, speaking in an interview with CNN, the Boston Globe reported, did not specifically mention Seafood Expo North America, the Boston Seafood show.

However, given that this event, previously set for March, was postponed until Sept. 23 and 24, it could fall under an extension of the gatherings ban.

"It depends on the data and information we have available to us and where we are with the coronavirus, what cases are still active, how much testing do we have, how many people are immune to the virus," Walsh said.

Denmark's A. Espersen is to spend next week, when the Brussels seafood show was supposed to be held, planning for how best to help its customers meet the changing needs of shoppers in the coronavirus pandemic.

"Things have settled into some sort of a new normal now. The business is working, we have cash, we are processing in all our plants aside from Denmark [due to the McDonald's shutdown in Europe], we have raw material," Klaus Nielsen told Undercurrent News, as Espersen posted a profit in 2019.

The next step is to be more proactive, he said. "Consumer behavior is changing, so we need to work out how we can help our customers move with that."

Next week was set to be the Seafood Expo Global trade show in Brussels, Belgium, but organizer Diversified Communications first postponed then canceled the event.

Nielsen and his top team are going to use the time for forward planning.

"As next week was supposed to be Brussels [seafood show], we don't have meetings, so that's what we’re going to start looking at," he said.

Noting some continuing "uncertainties", the Nor-Fishing Foundation, the Trondheim, Norway-based organizers of Nor-Fishing 2020, a conference tentatively planned for August 18-21, is surveying its exhibitors to see what they think is the latest deadline by which it can determine whether to go ahead with the event.

The group has also notified prospective attendees that the deadline for the cancellation of hotel rooms in relation to the event, which is to take place in Trondheim at the Spektrum exhibition hall, has been postponed until June 15.

"This means that no one has to pay the hotel room rate if the hotel rooms are canceled by June 15," the group clarified. "This applies to hotel rooms booked through Nor-Fishing's partner, G Travel."

First organized in 1960, the Nor-Fishing event is one of the largest fisheries technology exhibitions in the world, the group says on its website. In recent years it has drawn as many as 19,000 visitors from 60 countries.

"We want to postpone the final decision as long as it is practically possible for exhibitors, suppliers, hotels and the Nor-Fishing Foundation – without compromising the quality of the exhibition," the group said.

"As the hotels postpone their deadline for when hotel costs will accrue, it is possible for us to postpone the decision about whether go through with Nor-Fishing 2020 as planned or not. The Foundation has made a similar understanding with our subcontractors. This means that they are awaiting the situation and that they guarantee that we will be able to carry out a good quality fair even if we make a late decision."

The Bioriginal Food & Science Corporation, a division of Cooke Inc., has been given the go-ahead by Health Canada and the Canada Revenue Agency to begin producing a range of sanitizer products.

The range includes a sanitizing gel for hands, a surface sanitizer that replaces rubbing alcohol, and a workplace sanitizer for equipment, Bioriginal said.

Based off World Health Organization guidelines, the products have been distributed to health authorities already, and will be set for retail release in the next few weeks, Cooke said, under the brand name BioTide.

"We knew we wanted to step up in the best way we could to help with the demand. We worked with our existing suppliers to source the raw materials necessary to develop the approved formula," said Joe Vidal, president of Bioriginal.

The company's plant in Saskatoon was retrofitted to prepare for the change in production, including a new ventilated proof processing area, a new hydraulic conveyor system, and the installation of true earth grounding to remove static electricity from the system.

The Cooke family originally acquired Bioriginal in 2017 with its purchase of the Omega Protein Corporation, which provides specialty oils and menhaden products.

A Canadian collaboration project is catching and donating fish directly to help feed the people of Vancouver during the pandemic, reports Castanet.

A fishing enterprise, a Richmond-based seafood firm, a packer and a charity are combining to bring 3,000 pounds of freshly-caught lingcod to Vancouver locals.

The project is led by Organic Ocean Seafood, which typically sells to foodservice markets in Canada, the US and Asia. However, since the pandemic struck, the company has been running a seafood home delivery service, supporting projects such as the lingcod catch.

The catch is being made by the Belveal family, who have spent the past few days catching lingcod using a pole and line. The catch will be unloaded at Ucluelet on Vancouver Island, before being taken to the Coldifsh Seafood Company in Vancouver, and then used in soups for those in need by the Goodly Foods Society.

There are few cities in North America that have as many restaurants with grand reputations as the US city of New Orleans, Louisiana. Well, those restaurants may be closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, but you can now buy from the same wholesalers that supply their meat, poultry and fish products, Eater Magazine reports.

JV Foods, a seafood and meat wholesaler based in New Orleans, Louisiana, that used to sell to about 400 restaurants, is now making its products available directly to consumers. That includes wagyu beef and 20 different seafood items, according to the publication.

The business, which is co-owned by Tim Bordes, began its direct sale efforts in late March using only word of mouth. It provides curbside pickup and, for orders of more than $150, it will deliver.

Piazza Seafood also has shifted its operations in recent weeks, experimenting with selling to locals. The company sells fish fillets, crabmeat, other shellfish products and even alligator meat. It does not offer delivery, but allows for contactless pickup.

Major Louisiana meat supplier Natco also has jumped quickly to consumer sales, making product available at its warehouse and via pop-up "meat truck" locations in Metairie and New Orleans, the magazine reports. The company, which has been selling to New Orleans restaurants for 95 years, has rebuilt its website to allow direct sales.

A total of 57.7 metric tons of lobster from Canada has arrived at Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport in East China's Zhejiang province on a charter flight Thursday, the China's General Administration of Customs (GAC) said Saturday.

This is the first cargo charter flight carrying lobsters to the airport, one of the designated ports for imports of edible aquatic animals, since the COVID-19 outbreak this year, the GAC said, reports China Daily.

Hangzhou is well-linked with other popular destinations in China, such as Shanghai, which can be reached by high-speed trains in about one hour.

Panera, a St. Louis, Missouri-based company with 2,100 restaurant locations around the United States, has this week opened Panera Grocery, where it will be offering some of its popular breads, bagels and sweets as well as milk, eggs and fresh produce for delivery or pick up, the Associated Press reports.

Similarly, Milford, Connecticut-based Subway, the US’ largest restaurant chain with more than 41,000 locations, is now selling groceries at 250 of its stores in five states — California, Connecticut, Oregon, Tennessee and Washington.

And Chicago, Illinois-based Potbelly Sandwich Shop, which has 474 franchise locations worldwide, has launched Potbelly Pantry, where it is offering mostly the foods that the chain uses to make its sandwiches, such as meats, cheeses and breads, according to the wire service.

It's part of a national trend as stay-at-home and social distancing orders intended to slow the spread of COVID-19 have almost eliminated all in-restaurant dining in the US.

From large chains to mom-and-pop eateries, restaurants are increasingly turning to grocery sales. Many are offering "contact-free" service in which the customer place orders by phone or online and the goods are delivered straight to the trunk or backseat of the car.

The decision to sell groceries is a reaction to an "unprecedented crisis," Sara Burnett, Panera's vice president of wellness and food policy, is quoted as saying. Burnett declined to say how much the pandemic has cost Panera, but reportedly noted that 30% of its sales are from in-restaurant dining.

The US restaurant industry has lost 3 million jobs and $25 billion in sales since March 1, according to Vanessa Sink, a spokesperson for the National Restaurant Association. As many as 3% of restaurants have closed permanently and another 11% expect to do so by the end of the month.

Wet markets in many provinces and regions across China have been reopened in succession as cities in Hubei Province get released from the coronavirus lockdown, reports the Global Times, a communist party-controlled media outlet.

Restored fresh markets have to "meet strict measurements regarding graded epidemic prevention and control standards", it said. However, Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market — which has been cited as the likely epicenter of the outbreak — has been slated for permanent closure, AFP reported last month.

Meanwhile, Baishazhou market, the biggest wholesale wet market in Wuhan, "is buzzing again this week after the city's lockdown was lifted on April 8", reports the Global Times. All those entering the market must have their temperatures tested and show market inspectors their green code, which suggests the user is symptom-free.

The market stayed open during the past two months, striving to keep normal operation of the city, which was struggling with the coronavirus. "If Baishazhou were closed, there would be no food for Wuhan people," manager of the market, surnamed Zheng, told the Global Times.

There are separated sections for vegetables, fishery products, frozen poultry and seasoning goods in the market.

Global Times also reported the Shanghai Orient International Aquatic Product Center, one of the city's main seafood exchange venues, is also open for business.

Some of the more than 200 processing workers employed by Chilean salmon farmer Blumar who were sent home recently when five coworkers were diagnosed with COVID-19 fear that they won't receive compensation for the lost wages, Chile's BioBio reported.

Around 250 workers at the company's Talcahuano plant were temporarily dismissed from their jobs last week after news of the confirmed cases emerged. Thirty-one of those workers deemed to have been in close contact with their coworkers who tested positive have been quarantined. But according to union president Paola Sanhueza, it is unclear what when or if the other 219 will receive their wages.

Typically, quarantined workers are eligible for unemployment but what will happen to the 219 who did not receive "medical license" from Chilean authorities remains unclear, the union president said.

India has exempted fishing and aquaculture, and related activities, from the country's lockdown as it looks to protect key industries.

The country's Ministry of Home Affairs said on Friday (April 9) fishing and aquaculture could continue to operate as normal, as long as strict social distancing and hygiene rules are followed.

"This is the need of the hour," wrote Sharat Shetty, founder at VSS Aquatech, on Linkedin.

It comes as officials suggested India would extend the lockdown that has closed down India's economy.

On Saturday (April 11), the prime minister's office said there "seems to be a consensus" among Indian ministers to extend the lockdown measures two weeks, reports the BBC. The lockdown was introduced on March 24 and is set to end on Tuesday (April 14).

That said, there has not yet been an official announcement from the government on extending the lockdown.

"After a three-week break the situation is improving in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat, where we see stocking in some parts [of the states] over the last couple of days," Aquaconnect founder Rajamanohar Somasundaram told Undercurrent News.

"Ground sources reported that we may see wider stocking from next week onwards and will pick up further in upcoming weeks amid the lockdown."

Read the full story here.

Salmon farmer Grieg Seafood has delayed some of its investments in order to help bolster the company against the tricky impacts of the coronavirus pandemic, according to CEO Andreas Kvame.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has spread across the globe, and no industry is unaffected. So far, however, production at Grieg Seafood is going relatively well and according to plan," he said.

"We see a reduced demand from the horeca [foodservice] segment and increased demand from retail, as people are eating more at home. As of today, we are still aiming to harvest 100,000 [metric tons] in 2020.

While it is unknown how long the impact of the pandemic will last, Grieg is in a "robust financial condition" after many profitable years, he said.

"Still, we are preparing for all kinds of scenarios. We are postponing some investments to increase our buffer further, and we are making sure that our debt ratio is reasonable."

"In the long-run, though, with a growing middle-class and consumer trends focusing on health and sustainability, we see huge opportunities for our fish in the market."

Grieg did not detail which investments will be delayed.

The firm invested over NOK 600 million ($58.6m) in both growth and maintenance in 2018 and 2019, as harvest volumes reached 83,000t in 2019.

"The largest investment in 2019 was related to several new sea sites in Finnmark, [Norway], totaling almost NOK 185m, together with the expansion of our Gold River Hatchery in [British Columbia, Canada]."

In February 2020, Grieg Seafood signed a share purchase agreement for the acquisition of Grieg Newfoundland in Canada. This is an important step towards the realization of the 150,000t-by-2025 strategy, because it includes exclusivity for salmon farming in Placentia Bay, which has a farmable area bigger than the Faroe Islands, the firm said.

The project currently comprises licenses for 11 sea sites, of which three have been approved, three are expected to be approved in 2020, and the rest are in various stages of application.

The project has a long-term annual harvest potential of 30,000–45,000t.

The first phase targets an annual harvested volume of 15,000t, to be reached by 2025, with the first harvest in 2022/2023. The project includes a high-end recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) facility, which is currently under construction. The freshwater RAS is planned to include a hatchery, a smolt facility, and three post-smolt modules with a potential annual capacity of 7,000t upon completion.

Cermaq Canada, meanwhile, has canceled its CAD 500m ($378m) plan to create up to 20 open-pen Atlantic salmon farms and land-based support facilities in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia.

E. Gagnon Fils Ltee, a snow crab processor based in the Canadian province of Quebec, extended the closure of its plant in Sainte-Thérèse, an off-island suburb northwest of Montreal, this week after detecting as many as five suspected cases of the coronavirus COVID-19.

The company, which sells its products under the brand name "Gaspe Shore", shared a statement on its Facebook page April 7 that said it has "two cases in the plant, one on a boat, and two to be confirmed tomorrow but they will be positive."

"Management wishes to inform the extension of the office and plant pre-trial closure for a minimum period of five days until April 12 inclusive," the Facebook statement reads. "Given the fact that a new positive case for [COVID]-19 in an employee has been reported, the decision to extend closure is essential in order to protect workers and to limit the transmission of the virus as much as possible.

"We are aware that this situation can lead to a lot of fears and questions. We want to assure you that we take all this very seriously and inform and accompany our employees as best as we can."

The company said it will work the government of Quebec and, following the province's recommendation, will reassess the situation on Monday (April 13).

Prices for fish in local Ugandan markets are understood to be dropping sharply as the effects of the coronavirus pandemic begin to hit African traders, reports the Daily Monitor.

Typically, Uganda sells its higher value species such as Nile perch and tilapia to the EU and China, but as many countries have shut borders to contain the spread of coronavirus, exports have dropped by up to 66% from 300 metric tons to just 100t per week.

As a result, prices for Nile perch and tilapia in the country have dropped by SHS 5,000 per kilo ($47) and SHS 3,000, reducing the current average price for each species to SHS 10,000/kg and SHS 5,000/kg respectively.

The price drop has been attributed to the loss of export markets, forcing key exporters to stop buying fish. As a result, the Daily Monitor anticipates that fish prices may drop further in the coming weeks.

Some of the UK's 10,000 fish and chip shops are re-opening for the Easter weekend, if they can do delivery and collection, Undercurrent News revealed.

However, Papa's in Hull, which claims to be the world's largest fish and chip shop, with seating for up to 450 customers, does not plan to re-open, according to a notice on the website of the National Federation of Fish Fryers (NFFF).

"Due to the current situation, the family-run business has closed in line with government guidelines, to protect their team, their guests and wider community. Having implemented and trialed both social distancing and deliveries, "it was found to be impossible, in any takeaway environment, for their team or guests to maintain a safe distance", said Papa's.

The company "has strongly adopted the government guidance to ‘Stay at Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives’ and they’re encouraging everybody to do the same", the company said.

"We have set out the guidelines that they must stick to, pre-ordered with rigid collection times and delivery only, no walk-ins," said Andrew Crook, president of the NFFF.

"Fish and chips has, and hopefully always will be, the center of our communities and we have to do what is right to protect those close to us," said Crook.

US senator Mitt Romney, a Utah Republican, together with colleagues Lindsay Graham, Chris Coons and eight other senators from both sides of the political aisle, have sent a letter to the Chinese ambassador to the US urging the closure of all wet markets in China, citing the threat posed by the introduction of zoonotic diseases such as COVID-19 into the human population.

"It is well documented that wet markets in China have been the source of a number of worldwide health problems, and their operation should cease immediately so as to protect the Chinese people and the international community from additional health risks," the lawmakers wrote.

The senators noted that despite statements made by Chinese premier Xi Jinping regarding a crackdown on wildlife trafficking in the country, many of China's wet markets have resumed operations now that the country appears to have successfully tackled the outbreak.

"Therefore we are urging China to shut down all wet markets that allow for interactions between humans and wild animals that pose public health risks," the senators added. "We understand and respect that wet markets are an important component to Chinese society and way of life, but we believe the current moment, which has disrupted everyday life around the world, calls for extreme precautions."

With the market for fresh fish heavily diminished, the upcoming Copper River sockeye salmon season is going to be challenging, one Alaska seafood sector veteran told Undercurrent News.

"The first test here is going to be the Copper River season. I don't know what's going to happen there, but if that fishery goes off, it's likely going to be a financial disaster because there basically is no fresh market right now," he said.

"There is no way the lower 48 [US States] are going to take that fish fresh in big volumes. And that's what drives the fisherman's price. So, it's going to be a tough one," he told Undercurrent.

"I just don't see how the industry can pull that off. I mean, fish prices are going to have to be exceptionally low because a lot of that fishing is going to go into the freezer and will have to be sold as commodity H&G [headed and gutted]."

The season would normally start mid-May, but a date has not yet been confirmed. "I hope they push it back to the start of June," a second source told Undercurrent.

China's huge squid processing industry faces a shortage of workers despite the country easing lockdown measures last month, while export markets are "in chaos", an executive of a Chinese squid firm told Undercurrent News.

China exported squid and cuttlefish worth $3.055 billion in 2019, according to Chinese customs figures compiled by Undercurrent, making it the world's largest exporter of cephalopods.

"The situation is pretty serious," Lian Guochen, co-founder Huacai Technology (Beijing), an online marketplace for raw squid buyers and sellers, told Undercurrent on Thursday (April 9).

"Chinese factories have reduced production because of a lack of workers. I’d say there are half the number of workers available compared with this time last year," he said.

Last month, an Undercurrent poll revealed just a third of Chinese firms were operating at 90% capacity or above at the time.

Lian said it means export prices are still high even despite a slump in orders from the US and Europe.

"Export markets are very chaotic," he said. "Many orders from the US and Europe have stalled, and only the supermarket segment is still purchasing. [But] export prices to Europe are relatively stable compared with last year. Raw material is quite short and factories cannot process it," he said.

However, he said factories that previously "didn't dare buy goods are now picking up transactions again".

"Trade in the Chinese market is mainly of Indian squid. Raw material prices are slightly weak, but demand in China is rising again. The recovery in China has been pretty quick," he said.

To view latest prices for squid traded in China click here.

Vietnamese pangasius producer and exporter Vinh Hoan Corporation expects a full recovery in orders to China either in April or May, its CEO, Tam Nguyen, told Undercurrent News.

Sales have been recovering since March, but are not yet back to full strength, she said. "We are shipping mostly these days to supermarkets in the US and Europe. Sales to the foodservice sector, of course, have been slowed down."

The firm is looking to shift part of its production to ready-to-eat, value-added items like marinated or breaded fillets, and "kabayaki" fish — square fillets on skewers, dipped in a sweet soy sauce-based sauce (pictured below).

"Demand for pangasius in supermarket chains and convenience stores has increased rapidly," Vinh Hoan said. "In addition to working closely with customers specializing in retail supply, Vinh Hoan created a strategy to promote our value-added items to contribute to the variety of pangasius products," it elaborated.

While these are considered Vinh Hoan's premium line, they remain good value, the firm said. "Consumers will always consider pricing as a key factor during this tough time."

The newly developed ready-to-eat line joins its ready-to-cook retail products, as it looks to "maximize the convenience aspect of our offering".

German frozen seafood and food supplier Frosta Aktiengesellschaft is seeing big gains in its small e-commerce business due to the coronavirus pandemic.

According to Felix Ahlers, CEO of the Bremerhaven-based company, said sales via Frosta's own website have doubled. Frosta produces a range of frozen fish products, mainly using Alaska pollock, under its own brand and also private label.

"We are getting more than double the orders than before. It's only about €1 million, so an increase of two or three times this is not much when you factor in we have sales of €500m," he told Undercurrent News.

"It's very small but might become really significant over the longer term," he said.

Norway's seafood sales to Asian nations including China and South Korea are beginning to gradually normalize, the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC) has said.

"Easter sales are underway and demand growth for packaged products in groceries is reported," said the council's analyst, Paul Aandahl. "In individual markets, we see that fresh fish sales decline due to the loss of the restaurant segment and restrictions in stores. People shop less often and buy products with a longer shelf life."

However, week 15 of 2020 saw a 15% year-on-year drop in fresh whole salmon exports.

"Normally, we see an increase in salmon exports in the week before Easter. This year we see a 13% decline in salmon exports converted to round weight, compared with week 15 in 2019."

"Compared to week 14 last year, there was a 2% decrease for fresh whole salmon, while exports of fresh fillet of salmon increased by 2% and exports of frozen fillet increased by 12%. There was also a 6% decrease in average export prices to NOK 64.27/kg in week 14."

Overall though, exports of fresh whole salmon to the EU rose 1% to 14,235t for week 14.

Although there was a decline of about 7% in exports of fresh whole salmon to Asia in week 14, for the first time since the corona outbreak, exports to China have surpassed the corresponding week in 2019.

Meanwhile there was a 72% decline in exports of fresh whole salmon to the US in week 14, put down to reduced demand from the restaurant market and sharply reduced transport capacity from week 12.

Fourteen workers at a Cooke Aquaculture Chile were evacuated as a preventative measure after a diver at the company began showing signs of respiratory difficulties, one of the symptoms of COVID-19, the newspaper Cooperativa reported.

However, the workers, who were set to be evacuated from their facility in the Cupquelan fjord in the Aysén region to the city of Coyhaique reportedly spent hours outside in the open awaiting transport and had to resort to lighting a bonfire to keep warm after transport reportedly failed to arrive.

"We had to look for sticks to make fire because of the cold , we couldn't be dying of the cold and the COVID-19 (with the symptoms) is bad, it's super bad, it's hard to breathe, " Mauricio Navarro, one of the workers, said.

The workers were eventually transported to a location where they can quarantine, the newspaper said.

Regal Springs has seen mixed results in Europe since the coronavirus outbreak began, as its multi-channel sales approach keeps stocks from piling up.

One of the world's largest tilapia producers by volume, Regal Springs Europe has seen frozen retail sales blossom even as sales to restaurants collapsed during the lockdown, as has been the case across the continent, according to European director Petra Weigl.

Surprisingly, fresh sales in the US, the company's main market, saw a sharp uptick last month, Weigl said. "There was really a huge hike beginning of the month of March, a real run on fresh, which was really surprising for us. But in Europe, it's different — there retail and frozen is booming."

Click here to read more.

According to a breakdown of China's imports by Undercurrent News, exporters around the world of crustaceans, such as shrimp, crabs, and lobsters, are most likely to benefit from the country's recent return to some semblance of normality, but others could also be rewarded.

In 2019, China imported $7.03 billion worth of crustaceans, or 45% of total Chinese seafood imports. Including mollusks, such as squid, octopus and scallops, the figure rises to $8.59bn, or 55% of imports.

However, now a chief worry among Chinese seafood industry executives is the global COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic is impacting supply.

Click here for a full breakdown of China's seafood imports.

UK processor Vistgate, which trades as Ocean Fish, is now doing home delivery of fish from its W. Stevenson fleet direct to customers’ doors.

"W. Stevenson's are now delivering fish direct to your door. It's been a quick turnaround to direct online sales but pleased to say we have taken first steps," wrote Victoria Townsend, head of retail and innovation at Ocean Fish, on Linkedin.

In addition to southwest fish such as hake, pouting, monkfish, lemon sole and whiting, Ocean Fish is offering farmed fish such as seabass, seabream, shrimp and salmon. You can see the company's online store here.

Last October, Ocean Fish closed the deal for Stevenson, having inked the deal in July. HSBC Bank supplied the finance package.

Leigh Genge, managing director of Ocean Fish, said the company has plans to make investments on land and at sea. The deal took Ocean Fish's fleet to 19 and created a company with a turnover of close to £50 million.

Chinese seafood firm Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products has agreed to buy more than 10,000 kilograms of crayfish produced in Hubei province – the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak – each day.

Guolian will spend CNY 500 million ($71m) on buying raw material from the province, China's largest crayfish producing region, according to a local news report by CN Hubei. It will process the crayfish at its plants in neighboring Hunan province. One of the plants can process more than 100 metric tons of crayfish per day, the report said.

China's crayfish harvest peaks during a short window from late spring.

On Tuesday, residents of Wuhan, Hubei's provincial capital, were permitted to take trains and planes out of the city for the first time in 11 weeks, as the province where the outbreak began loosens lockdown measures.

Locals Seafood, a Raleigh, North Carolina, US seafood wholesaler that witnessed a 95% drop in sales to restaurants amid the COVID-19 pandemic, has embraced home delivery as a way to stay afloat.

According to CBS17, the company's owner, Ryan Speckman, said that delivery allows Locals to ensure safety for workers and customers.

"We’re filling that void we lost with the closure of restaurants with home deliveries multiple times a week. We’ve noticed in the last few weeks is a pretty big success. We’re actually surprised at how many people signed up for that," he said, adding that the company is also seeing demand for meal-kits.

"One of the great things about us is we’re in a very unique position. We control our own supply chain, so it minimizes the amount of hands that have touched the product. We go to the coast, bring it back, process it in Raleigh, and send it out and deliver it to your doorstep. Very few people have actually touched that product," he said.

UK seafood sector body Seafish has been inundated with requests for "critical worker" certificates, after it began offering to produce them on April 3.

Three days later it said on Twitter it had received around 900 requests from fishermen wishing to have the documentation they could carry with them, which will show they are making a "necessary journey". Under the UK's lockdown, only "critical workers" or those making essential journeys should be leaving their homes, on pain of fines.

Seafish stressed there was no legal requirement for these certificates to be carried. "We are creating them in response to requests from fishermen in order to provide them with a piece of documentation which – if required – can help them to demonstrate that they are a critical worker making a necessary journey."

It advised applicants wait two or three working days before following up an application, given the volume of requests received.

The Marine Products Exports Development Authority (MPEDA) of India has issued a letter to the country's shrimp farming sector warning that unethical practices by exporters at this time will result in punishment.

The letter, sent on April 3, said MPEDA has become aware that "certain exporters are indulged in unethical practice of offering very low prices to the shrimp farmers, taking advantage of the lockdown situation prevailing in the country in its fight against the [coronavirus] pandemic".

"Exporters are hereby warned that such distortive practices will warrant strict action leading [to] de-registration of the exporters."

MPEDA advised exporters to "remain supportive" of farmers, helping them to continue to practice aquaculture.

At the end of March, Indian shrimp companies in several states independently confirmed to Undercurrent News they had closed following the country's nationwide lockdown.

Shrimp farmers in the country had been panic harvesting, as seen by the drop shown on the Undercurrent prices portal in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat across all sizes. However, the situation is set to cause a shortage in the market and higher prices in the future.

A group of over a dozen salmon farmers in Chile's Aysen region have jointly agreed to carry out a series of measures to protect workers and deter the spread of COVID-19.

The farmers, which include Empresas AquaChile, Blumar, Cooke Aquaculture, Cermaq, Multiexport Foods, Australis Seafoods and several others, said in a joint statement that starting April 6, they will refrain from transporting workers into Aysen by air or land, relying only on sea transport.

The land route will be reserved exclusively for workers who live in the region. Additionally, the farmers have agreed to use flights for medical evacuation only after coordinating with local authorities.

The farmers added that they have already reduced operating capacity to comply with social distancing requirements, changed shifts to reduce employee interaction and taken other steps to prevent the spread of the disease.

Shellfish Promotion And Tasting Inc. (SPAT), a not for profit organization based in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, has earmarked $50,000 to buy oysters and clams from some 54 area growers to distribute to soup kitchens in the nearby towns of Hyannis and Provincetown, the Cape Cod Times reports.

The harvesters and local residents both have been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We want to spread the money out," SPAT executive director Michele Insley is quoted as saying. "We want to keep farmers working and give food to those in need."

Kitchen staff will turn the shellfish into stews and other meals that will be available by delivery only, according to the newspaper.

Norway's minister of fisheries and seafood, Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen, has announced the start date of the country's "fresh fish scheme" will be delayed due to the coronavirus.

"The fishing industry is generally doing well," he said. "The fishing is more or less en route, and it is mainly bad weather conditions that have characterized the fishing so far this year. But given the corona situation, it is important that we follow the development closely, in close dialogue with the industry."

The pandemic has led to reduced demand from the hotel, restaurant, and catering industry, he said; "parts of the fresh fish market have fallen".

Scheduled to begin April 15, the fresh fish scheme was designed to help processing companies gain greater access to fresh produce outside of the main winter fishing season.

However, "on the basis of feedback on possible pressure on the fresh fish market, I have today asked the directorate of fisheries to quickly postpone the fresh fish scheme, in consultation with the trade organizations and the Norwegian Rafisklag [sales body]," said Ingebrigtsen.

A possible new start date will be set by the ministry on April 8.

Icelandic equipment manufacturer Marel is taking its event online later in April, with an interactive event that will cover a range of topics – from traceability software to robotic solutions – and includes a virtual tour of its Brussels expo stand.

The new managing director of Marel Fish, Gudbjorg Gudmundsdottir, will present how "Marel can help transform fish processing with automated solutions and Industry 4.0 technologies".

Following the live presentations and a Q&A session, guests can explore the products featured on Marel's virtual expo stand, with access to product demonstration videos, customer stories and more.

Taking place April 21 and 22, interested parties can sign up here.

Construction has begun at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center — the previous and future site of Seafood Expo North America (SENA) — on an emergency 1,000-bed field hospital for treating COVID-19 patients, Mary Walsh, the city mayor, announced Thursday, as reported by boston.com.

The news broke on the same day that Diversified Communications, the Portland, Maine-based organizer of SENA, announced that it has rescheduled its massive conference for the same venue on Sept. 23-24. It originally was scheduled for March 15-17.

Five hundred of the beds at the emergency facility will be used to care for homeless men and women who have tested positive and need care but do not require full hospitalization, the mayor said. The other 500 beds will be for coronavirus patients coming from area hospitals.

"Whether it's our homeless facility there or it's spillover for additional beds, we’re hoping that we don't need it," Walsh reportedly said during an afternoon press conference. "We’re … building it and I’m hoping it stays empty. These are just for emergency purposes."

The city has released a request for proposal for a partner organization to oversee the homeless care, according to the article.

Boston had 1,233 coronavirus cases on Thursday — up 176 since the day before — and 106 local patients had made full recoveries, the mayor reported. So far, 10 city residents have died from COVID-19 complications.

NFI's Connelly: ‘[A]ction cures anxiety’

Response by the seafood industry to Diversified's rescheduling of the conference in Boston has been mixed. Some executives interviewed by Undercurrent suggest the new date doesn't give enough time and is a risk, while others have applauded Diversified for choosing a September date over earlier considered dates in June.

"There is an old adage that action cures anxiety," wrote John Connelly, president of the National Fisheries Institute, in a statement issued Friday morning. "In these anxious times a date-certain allows the global seafood community to begin planning for a new and exciting Seafood Expo North America/Seafood Processing North America 2020 where we will all reconnect and look toward the future of seafood sales.

"NFI looks forward to working with Diversified to provide a unique opportunity for NFI members and the broader seafood community to plan collaboratively for the future.

"We look forward to seeing our members and friends exhibiting in Boston. In the meantime, stay safe and healthy."

One of the UK's largest crab companies, The Blue Sea Food Company, says provisions in a government scheme covering 80% of furloughed workers’ salaries make it easier in some cases for firms to completely close rather than stay partially open.

The firm — which closed its Devon-based facility last week and furloughed 80 staff — said while it did not intend to stay open either partially or otherwise, it knows other shellfish processors may have stayed partially open but decided not to, in order to take advantage of the furlough scheme.

"It's better for them to actually stop production, which is a shame in many ways because it has a knock-on effect for fishermen," David Markham, director at Blue Sea, told Undercurrent News.

Click here to read the full story.

Killybegs Fishermen's Organisation (KFO), which is the largest fishermen's representative body in Ireland, welcomed in a statement the new measures proposed by the European Commission, emphasizing how imperative implementing "additional financial supports to complement them" is.

KFO’S chief executive Sean O’Donoghue said the new measures "merely allow member states more flexibility in reassigning and transferring unused funds which were already ring-fenced for the industry under the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund".

"No new funding has been provided today, that quite simply must be the next move from the commission if we are to have any semblance of a viable fisheries sector supplying healthy food post-COVID-19. As it stands, fish prices have plummeted by up to 50% at a time when EU governments are keen for the sector to continue to supply the market with a vital, safe and healthy food supply."

Click here to read more about the new measures.

The current disruption in fishing activities due to COVID-19 might lead to an under-utilization of fishing quotas in many EU member states.

However, as the duration and end of the confinement periods are not yet fixed and may vary between member states, it is difficult to estimate the level of under-utilization.

"Once fishing activities resume in 2020 and during the remainder of 2020, it is still possible for them to re-allocate their quotas amongst various national operators and/or to prolong fishing activities until the end of the year in order to fully consume their quotas," one source told Undercurrent News.

"If quotas still remain, it is possible for EU member states to use the inter-annual flexibility clause, which allows them to bank 10% of their unused 2020 quota and use them in 2021."

Sinkevicius, the European commissioner for fisheries, is looking into "the request made by Europeche in recent days to increase that percentage to 25%", Javier Garat told Undercurrent.

You can read the rest of that story here.

The Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association (BBRSDA) in the US state of Alaska has formed an 18-member "fleet team" charged with creating a plan that will allow the region's salmon fishing, processing and support sector to operate safely amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

The team, led by BBRSDA executive director Andy Wink, includes harvesters, processors and others on five "plan component teams" in the areas of fleet travel; fishing operations and medical response; industry segregation and self-quarantine; tender-fleet interactions; and economic relief.

The team will create a plan document with "1) a set of clear protocols (plus alternative protocols) and 2) funding/assistance needs; which 1) is acceptable to all stakeholders thereby allowing the fishery to open, and 2) protects public/industry health", it said.

The team intends to have a preliminary set of protocols ready by April 10.

"We fully expect to execute a summer salmon season without risking public health, but we recognize that strict safety requirements must be established and enforced. Our primary objective right now is to protect public health, while also recognizing that this fishery economically supports thousands of people and is an important food source for the entire nation," the BBRSDA said. "The challenge is to avoid not only a public health crisis, but an economic crisis as well."

Vietnam's next shrimp harvest — due to be carried out towards the end of April — is expected to be down around 30% year-on-year, an executive with a large firm there told Undercurrent News.

"Farmers here are hesitating to stock at volumes as high as last year as they do not see any hope from the market yet," he said.

"From now to April 15, when India stops their lockdown, we find it very difficult to anticipate the market. We are taking very high caution on offering now, because the price is extremely low."

Only retail channels are even responding to those offers the exporter puts out, he added. Other channels have either stopped ordering, or asked for shipments from Vietnam to be delayed.

"I heard the Chinese started buying again, but not much as the border is blocked. Once the virus reaches a peak and things turn under control, I think there will be a huge jump in demand."

The Dutch seafood industry, like many other export-focused countries in Europe, has been hit badly by the coronavirus outbreak, although the full effects differ widely from species to species, authorities in the country's public seafood bodies told Undercurrent News.

In particular, the valuable demersal catch of sole and plaice in the North Sea has felt the full brunt of the market slowdown, as the overwhelming majority of the catch — approximately 85-90% — is intended for export, primarily to the southern European markets of Spain, France and Italy, now all under lockdown.

Click here to read more.

The coronavirus crisis is causing a rise in the costs of transporting fresh salmon from the farm to customers around the globe, whilst also depressing sales prices, Gorjan Nikolik, senior analyst at Rabobank, told Undercurrent News.

It is affecting demand, logistics, and labor in the salmon market. This is likely to cause salmon producers’ cash flows to be negative for the next few weeks, maybe months, said Nikolik.

The outlook is also for an increase in volumes in 2020 as shown in the chart below, which you can see in full on Undercurrent‘s new supply page.

Click here to read the full story.

The Chinese owner of Spanish tuna canner Conservas Albo said the epidemic in Spain is "worsening", which could impact the latter's’ operations.

Shanghai Kaichuang Marine International told investors in China on Monday (March 31) while the Vigo-based firm is operating normally "there is possibly a lot of uncertainty". Shanghai Kaichuang acquired Albo in 2016 for €61 million.

"This [uncertainty] is including but not limited to whether the factory can remain open, difficulties importing raw material, and challenges in procurement and sales. The company is taking various measures to protect operations, and hopes the epidemic is effectively controlled as soon as possible," it said.

Spain is one of the worst-hit countries in Europe by the coronavirus outbreak. There were 9,387 deaths and over 100,000 confirmed cases as of Wednesday, according to John Hopkins University of Medicine.

The Dutch fishing industry, like many across Europe, is likely to face issues even after the coronavirus outbreak due to the sharply increased risk exposure required to make shipments overseas, Undercurrent News learned from an industry source.

Typically, the credit insurance of trade deals is paid based on the usual exposure which seafood companies have on investments made in normal conditions.

However, with risk increasing daily, the cost of such insurance is going to become a serious barrier for small-scale businesses, so the industry is hopeful that governments "would be able to offer some kind of guarantee for that kind of exposure," the source, who preferred to remain anonymous, said.

"When coronavirus is over and the economy's restarting, you’ll see the buyers are very often out of money. So the exposure, the risk is much bigger then suddenly, much bigger than anyone in these insurance companies could have predicted," they told Undercurrent.

Furthermore, the growing trend towards local consumption which is likely to linger long after the pandemic could hit export-oriented businesses like Dutch flatfish hard, according to Pim Visser, director of the Dutch public fisheries body VisNed.

The purchasing power in the sector's key markets in the south of Europe is expected to be significantly reduced over the next year, he told Undercurrent. "We also see people advising to buy local, buy national, not from other countries. That's what's happening in France, so it's bizarre times."

Read the rest of that story here.

The escalating COVID-19 crisis places the 2020 Alaska salmon fishery in question, as the industry works on solutions to getting thousands of workers to the remote state without spreading the highly infectious coronavirus.

As many as 15,000 workers can descend on Alaska from the other US states and overseas for the season, but numbers are expected to be lower than this in 2020, if indeed the industry can find a workable solution, sources told Undercurrent News.

"If you asked me a month ago that a situation like this would be possible, that I was contemplating that the successful prosecution of our 2020 salmon fishery couldn't take place, I would not have believed you," said Norm Van Vactor, executive director of the Bristol Bay Economic Development Corporation, a community development quota group, which owns half of processor Ocean Beauty Seafoods.

Click here for the full story.

Bob Bayer, the former head of the University of Maine's Lobster Institute, believes that one of the answers to slowing the spread of the coronavirus COVID-19 is something that lobster processing plants routinely throw out as waste, the Bangor (Maine) Daily News reports.

Bayer, who is now part of Lobster Unlimited, a startup company in Orono, Maine, is looking for a bio-secure laboratory where he can test hemolymph, a blood-like substance from lobsters, on the deadly virus.

The crustacean byproduct is already to be used as a not-yet-on-the-market topical skin product to treat warts, shingles and herpes, and is in development to be used in cancer vaccines and treatments, according to the article. It contains hemocyanin, a protein that carries oxygen to the lobster's cells, and has anti-viral and immune-boosting properties.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued Lobster Unlimited a patent related to its work in October after experiments showed the substance can reduce the viral load of herpes simplex virus-infected cells, according to documents reviewed by the newspaper.

Whether hemocyanin might be effective against COVID 19 or other coronaviruses is "far from a sure thing," Bayer said, but nonetheless is worth testing.

"A simple test that needs bio-security would give us an answer."

If successful, large quantities of the substance could be made available instantly. Bayer estimated about 2 million gallons of hemolymph is treated as waste every year by lobster plants.

Australia's assistant fisheries minister, Jonathon Duniam, has announced that AUD 10 million ($6.1m) — or two-thirds of all levies collected by the government for the management of Commonwealth fisheries — will be waived.

The South East Trawl Fishing Industry Association (SETFIA), Small Pelagic Fishery Industry Association, and Southern Shark Industry Alliance, have welcomed the move, "during this challenging time".

The three fisheries represented by these associations supply more than 30,000 metric tons of finfish into southeast Australia and Tasmania, they said. Combined, they pay around AUD 6.8m a year to the federal government.

Today's announcement means that around AUD 4.5m of this will not be collected or refunded in a show of direct support for the industry.

"I have thanked the assistant minister for the government's support of our industry; it is a game-changer," said Simon Boag, executive officer of SETFIA. "During our conversation we stressed the importance of keeping fishmongers, food markets and fish and chip shops open, because without them Australians will have to turn to imported fish supporting other countries. We believe he heard us."

More than ever there is a need for Australia to feed itself and not rely on imported seafood, SETFIA said. "We have had positive conversations with supermarkets, and we hope that they will focus on the true value of purchasing a wider range of fresh wild-caught Australian fish".

"Increased demand for red meat has seen prices skyrocket — there has never been a better time to eat fresh healthy Australian wild-caught fish because it remains fantastic value. Supermarkets and fishmongers do a great job of labeling fish so it is easy to find fish that was caught in Australia. This supports Australian fishermen."

Barrie Deas, CEO of the UK's National Federation of Fishermen's Organisations (NFFO), told Undercurrent News the "very visible gap" in the UK government's support package for businesses is for the many vessel operators who have continuing fixed costs.

The UK government has provided grants of £10,000 to £25,000 to businesses affected by enforced closures in the hospitality and restaurant sector, but no equivalent support has been provided for fishing vessel operators equally impacted, he said.

"The very visible gap in the government's support package is for the many vessel operators who have continuing fixed costs during the health emergency but have seen their earnings collapse completely or considerably as demand has fallen away," Deas said in an email to Undercurrent on Tuesday (March 31).

"Support is urgently required for these businesses, who have seen their markets dramatically contract, or disappear completely, as restaurants, fish and chip shops, supermarket counters have closed, and many export markets have faced difficulties," he said.

Where markets have not completely collapsed, vessels and supply chains should be supported to maintain operation to contribute to the food security of the nation, he said.

"[But] this will only be possible if earnings are at a level that can cover costs. Where markets have dried completely, vessels must be supported to cover ongoing business costs so that they are in a fit state to start fishing and trading when recovery arrives."

"We believe that the government shares the industry's goal of keeping fishing businesses and the entire supply chain intact, so that they can recover rapidly once the health measures and movement restrictions can be relaxed. To achieve this, direct support for fishing vessels who face harbor dues, equipment rentals, etc. will be essential."

He warned without help there would be "serious risks of business failures".

The Norwegian government has amended regulations closing its borders, and expelling non-Norwegian nationals, to allow seasonal workers from European Economic Area (EEA) countries to enter or remain.

Laborers will be allowed in to work in agriculture, horticulture, forestry and the food industry.

"This is a scheme I have worked to get into place. Now EEA citizens, who have got jobs in agriculture, can come to Norway and start their work. This change will mean a lot to producers who are currently lacking manpower," said agriculture and food minister Olaug Bollestad.The amendment means that EEA citizens who have a working relationship in one of the mentioned sectors will not be expelled by extraordinary measures put in place in March.

Persons arriving in Norway must stay in quarantine for 14 days after arrival.

A shrimp industry source told Undercurrent News Indian shrimp processors would struggle to export consignments from the country even if they weren't closed because of snarl-ups at ports.

Several Indian ports have declared force majeure due to severe labor shortages and issues with connectivity inland, causing ports to turn vessels away (see map). According to a report by Reuters last week, several liquified natural gas (LNG) tankers were idling off the Indian coast unable to dock.

India also requires vessels to quarantine if they have arrived within 14 days after departing from a country with infections.

"Our company is having difficulties moving product at the moment. Even if you wanted to get product out of India you couldn't. Logistics are a mess," the source, who did not wish to be quoted by name, told Undercurrent on Friday (March 29).

Meanwhile, fear of reinfections in China is causing containerships to be forced to idle there, too.

On March 26, containership Gjertrud Maersk, owned by the world's largest shipping company Maersk, was placed into quarantine in Ningbo, China, after seafarers on board had experienced symptoms linked to COVID-19.

The Danish-flagged containership was awaiting phasing into Maersk's network and was idle at the quayside in Ningbo, China, World Maritime News reported on March 27.

"Indonesia is currently easiest to ship out of but that may also change," said the source with the shrimp company.

After over a week of trying to stave off a drastic cut in their production, at least two of the 11 sardine canneries in the Philippines’ Zamboanga City have reduced their output by half.

This is due to the shortage of workers and fish supply resulting from stringent lockdown rules enforced there, News Info reported.

Edgar Lim, president of Industrial Group of Zamboanga, said that since public transport was suspended in the city on March 20, most cannery workers found it difficult to report for work.

The city has 11 canneries that supply 85% of the canned sardines in the country.

Global commercial flights are down 55% in the final week of March 2020 compared with the same period in 2019, according to FlightRadar24, impacting seafood firms’ ability to get their products to markets.

The trend is expected to continue as airlines continue to remove flights from their schedules, the flight tracker said in a recent blog post.

Read what seafood and logistics companies in Australia and Chile are doing about it here and here.

A new website launched by a couple of seafood markets in the US city of Tampa, Florida aims to showcase the region's options to buy fish even with restaurants closed.

According to ABC Action News, the website, Fishmonger Approved from married couple Margaret and Rachel Covello, gives recipes for species such as snapper and hogfish, provides videos and celebrates locals involved in the seafood industry.

"What we’re trying to do is help the fishermen all the way down the supply chain to the guy that sells the bait," Margaret said.

The removal of 25% tariffs for frozen tilapia fillets will help sales into US retail but not into foodservice, a Chinese industry executive told a local trade publication.

Wang Dongsheng, head of Maoming Xinzhou Seafood, told China's Seafood Guide most Chinese tilapia products weighing 115 grams or less are sold into retail, whereas foodservice typically takes 170g-fillets or above.

Last week, the United States Trade Representative identified "tilapia, frozen, each weighing not more than 115g" among 177 products in a notice of tariff exclusions for publication in the Federal Register, as first reported by Undercurrent News.

"For most Chinese tilapia exports this tariff change won't have any impact. For retail the advantage is pretty big, though," said Wang.

Wang estimated 30-40% of China's tilapia exports would benefit from the change.

Tilapia products exported from China to the US are mainly 2-3 ounces (one ounce = 28.35g), 3-5oz, 5-7oz, 7-9oz, and 9-11oz.

The tax exemption is expected to encourage farmers to switch to harvesting more small-sized tilapia, according to the Seafood Guide report.

Proteon Pharmaceuticals — a Polish biotechnology company and recipient of Aqua-Spark funding — has joined efforts in its home country to create the "SARS-CoV-2 Coronavirus Detection Center" in Lodz.

The facility will conduct large-scale tests for virus diagnosis. The new laboratory was created at a very fast pace with the involvement and cooperation of the Institute of Medical Biology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the University of Lodz, and the Medical University of Lodz, the firm said.

It is staffed by a team of microbiologists, geneticists, doctors and experts, including scientists from Proteon. The goal is to conduct as many tests as possible in the shortest possible time.

"Quick and mass diagnostics is currently the most important tool for stopping the growth of coronavirus infections. If it is possible to detect a virus infection faster and on a larger scale, the infected people will be isolated sooner and receive appropriate treatment. This will translate into a decline in infection dynamics," said Jaroslaw Dastych, CEO of Proteon. "That is why we have made an immediate decision to involve our knowledge and experience in this project."

The UK's largest processor, Young's Seafood, has reassured all its 3,000 staff members and customers they are taking stringent measures during the coronavirus pandemic, reports the Grimsby Telegraph.

It came after complaints from relatives of staff who contacted the press, concerned that many office staff were not able to work from home even though they had laptops.

Concerns were raised about managers at Ross House hosting meetings in one room.

A spokesman for Young's said the firm was carrying out a huge amount of coronavirus prevention work since an emergency lockdown announcement was made by the UK prime minister a week ago.

He stressed the food sector's work was vital at this time.

"From a workforce of over 2,300, only 500 are non-production based of which, since last week, about 300 have been asked to work from home or on rotation when there are shared responsibilities," he went on.

"This means we have been able to put in place generous social distancing in our offices. The remaining salaried employees are involved in technical or operations roles critical in the continued safe production of food for UK supermarkets."

Major salmon farmer Empresas AquaChile has temporarily turned over its molecular biology lab normally used to test its fish to the Chilean military and health authorities to use for testing coronavirus vaccine, the company said.

The Laboratorio Biologia Molecular ALAB in Puerto Montt, Chile, is a modern facility with "trained personnel and world class equipment", AquaChile said in a press release.

The adaptations are already being made and the protocols are being processed so that from next Monday, March 30th our AquaChile ALAB Laboratory can perform and process Coronavirus tests," the lab's general manager, Alexis Martinez, said in the release.

The company said that the lab will become a key facility "to control, through early detection, the expansion of the disease in Puerto Montt, the island of Chiloe and all of southern Chile".

The COVID-19 outbreak and the ensuing excess supply has prompted a group of lobster harvesters in the US state of Maine to offer a dockside deal, TV station WABI reported.

The Maine Working Waterfront Seafood Connection in the city of Belfast is working to connect fishermen who would otherwise be idle with local consumers seeking a good deal on lobster.

"With everything going around most people want fresh and local. They want to know what they’re getting, it's only been handled by one person, the fisherman," said Ali Farrell, the event's organizer.

Fisherman Noah Ames said the event, held at a local parking lot, gives the sector a chance to sell product that might not be sold otherwise.

"We’re just like everybody else, everybody is kind of unemployed right now. We’re having to take these extra measures to sell to the public itself, just to have a job and keep some money going in. We’re selling lobsters at a pretty discounted rate. Like they’re going for $6-$7 a pound right now. Which is way less than what we usually get, we usually get $10-$12 a pound right now off the boat," he said.

Grimsby, UK-based seafood supplier JCS Fish has said it is still yet to see "any major operational impacts" as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak in the country, it said.

"However, we continue to plan for all worst-case scenarios, with an effective business continuity plan and action planning that aims to minimize supply or operational interruptions."

At present, the company's biggest priorities are to protect the health and wellbeing of its employees, JCS said, adding that it had reorganized shifts and work patterns to minimize staff interactions and satisfy new government guidelines.

The entirety of its salmon raw material comes from Scotland and Norway, so JCS Fish does not expect any disruption to its supply chain, the company noted.

"As we anticipated, our foodservice orders have reduced, whilst other elements of our business have seen an upturn, particularly since we have customers in the online delivery sector," commercial manager Jack Coulbeck writes.

"March also saw our highest rate of direct sale yet through our own online platform, and Easter is of course a prime time for seafood, so we expect this to continue for the next few weeks at least."

Iceland's Samherji has noted the markets for fresh seafood have changed drastically in just two weeks, with exports now only about a quarter of what they were before the COVID-19 pandemic began.

Samherji's Kristjan Vilhelmsson, managing director of ship operations (pictured below), issued a public letter to the firm's crews on March 30.

"The current situation is something never before seen and far from what we have ever imagined would happen. We can only hope that this will be over as soon as possible," he wrote.

New regulations in Iceland to try and prevent the spread of the virus have disrupted processing operations, with staggered shifts and even "walls installed in processing rooms to reduce [worker] proximity".

At its Utgerdarfelag Akureyringa and Dalvik plants operations have been reduced by almost half, with only 50% of staff working at the same time, he said.

At sea, meanwhile, Vilhelmsson observed that as long as the crew are free from the virus, there is no risk of infection. Members are, though, in close proximity all of the time.

You can read the rest of this story here.

There will be lower demand for aquaculture feeds in 2020, Lief Chiang, an analyst of grains and oilseeds markets for Rabobank, said in a podcast.

Aquafeed demand has been less affected by coronavirus than poultry and hog markets because aquaculture farming is seasonal and most feed is consumed between May and September, Chiang said.

China has reportedly banned the trading of wild animals at its traditional wet markets after scientists linked the cause of coronavirus to an animal-to-human infection originating from bats at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, China.

Demand from the poultry and hog industries are down, even though China is recovering from African swine fever which decimated a big proportion of the country's swineherd, Chiang said. China has delayed plans to build new industrial-scale hog facilities because of logistical bottlenecks, he added.

Demand for all feed will rebound strongly in 2021, he went on. Rabobank commodity analyst Michael Magdovitz predicted soybean futures traded on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange will close the year at about $9-$9.25 per bushel, compared with about $8.81 per bushel now. Corn will trade at between $3.70-$3.85 per bushel, compared with about $3.46 per bushel now, he said. Both contracts have fallen sharply in the last few months, partly as the China-US trade war weakened Chinese demand for animal feed.

This is a silver lining for struggling salmon, shrimp and tilapia farmers as these two key commodities represent about a third of all modern aquaculture feed formulas in meal form, and up to an extra 20% in oil extracted from these grains and oilseeds. Aquaculture consumes about 44 million metric tons of feed, versus more than 450m metric tons in the poultry market, according to Norwegian salmon research group Kontali Analyse.

The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is offering a six-month extension to fisheries undergoing assessments and certifications amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

"It is the first time in the MSC's 22-year history such a step has been taken, reflecting the enormous challenges the pandemic is posing to the global seafood industry," the group said in a release, adding that the action is effective as of March 27.

However, it added: "fishery partners who wish to go ahead with remote audits and existing timelines, can do so if this is feasible".

Audits for supply chain businesses with an MSC Chain of Custody certificate can still be conducted remotely, the group said.

"This is an extraordinary moment in history, unprecedented in modern times," Rupert Howes, the MSC's chief executive said. "MSC is acutely aware that many of our partners are facing enormous challenges and uncertainty. For some it may be a question of survival."

Indian shrimp companies in several states have independently confirmed to Undercurrent News they have closed following the country's lockdown.

BMR Group, an Andhra Pradesh-based vertically integrated shrimp company, with hatcheries, feed mills, farms and processing plants; Gujurat-based black tiger shrimp farmer and processor Mayank Aquaculture; and Ram's Assorted Cold Storage, an Orissa-based packer, all confirmed to Undercurrent they were closed as of Friday afternoon local time.

Click here to read the full story.

Indian aquaculture support network Aquaconnect has launched an "emergency helpline number" fo shrimp and fish farmers.

Intended to help and inform farmers during the COVID-19 "lockdown" now underway in India, Aquaconnect will aim to provide off-line/on-call farming support; clarification on lockdown regulations; remote support; farmgate prices, and more, it said.

"We witness that there is confusion among farmers around the recent lockdown announcement from Government of India due to the COVID-19 outbreak."

"As the summer culture is about to begin, they are worried about the transportation of important farm inputs such as seed and feed. Also, there is a lack of clarity on the market dynamics due to the COVID-19 lockdown."

The helpline can be reached at: 0091 7299910993.

As of March 26, and before the $2 trillion US stimulus package and US Fed moves come into force, the last time the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average showed similar volatility – chaotic up and down movements – as it has over the past month was in September 1929, when markets collapsed at the start of the Great Depression, according to Planet Tracker.

Called the "fear index" or "fear gauge", the Chicago Board Options Exchange's CBOE Volatility Index — the VIX, a globally used tool describing market volatility based on S&P 500 index options — has spiked to levels last seen in the market crash of 2008-09. And now, governments and monetary authorities are daily rapidly changing fiscal and monetary policy agendas to address extreme market price gyrations.

Planet Tracker puts the volatility of the NASDAQ Salmon Index, which has "bounced around" in recent weeks and months, in the wider context of the $5 trillion global agriculture sector.

"As companies are unfortunately currently realizing in real time, they face challenges when the agriculture commodities, which are fundamental to the food and agriculture systems, they rely on face short-term supply and demand shocks."

It also pointed to changes in national policies, such as China's planned purchase of $80bn in US agriculture products now being in doubt, putting downward pressure on US exports.

The director-general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Qu Dongyu, has urged leaders from the G20 countries to take measures for global food systems to continue to work well, particularly in relation to access to food for the world's poor and most vulnerable during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Qu made his appeal in an online address from Rome to the G20 Extraordinary Virtual Leaders’ Summit on COVID-19. Saudi King Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud chaired the summit which was called to forge a coordinated global response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its human and economic implications.

"The COVID-19 pandemic is affecting food systems and all dimensions of food security across the world," Qu said. "No country is immune."

"We have to ensure that food value chains are not disrupted and continue to function well and promote the production and availability of diversified, safe and nutritious food for all," he said.

The director-general said lockdowns and restrictions on movement could disrupt food production, processing, distribution and sales, both nationally and globally, with the potential to have an "immediate and severe" impact on those restricted by mobility.

"The poor and the vulnerable will be the hardest hit, and governments should strengthen social safety mechanisms to maintain their access to food," he said.

Qu said global food markets are well supplied but there is growing concern and that measures should be taken to ensure that both national food markets and the world market continue to be a transparent, stable and reliable source of food supply.

Referring to the 2007-08 global food price crisis, he said uncertainty at that time triggered a wave of export restrictions by some countries, while others started importing food aggressively. Qu said this contributed to excessive price volatility, which was damaging for low-income food-deficit countries.

As economic activities slow down due to the COVID-19 pandemic, access to food will be negatively affected by income reductions and loss of employment.

"We need to make sure that agricultural trade continues to play its important role in contributing to global food security and better nutrition," Qu said.

"Now, more than ever before, we need to reduce uncertainty and strengthen market transparency through timely and reliable information."

FAO and the Agricultural Market Information System, which was launched by the G20 in 2011, will continue to monitor food markets and provide timely information so that everyone can make informed decisions.

Consumers will demand locally grown foods and there will be less tolerance for products that come from complex international supply chains, a panel of Rabobank's food industry analysts said in a webinar.

"I think there is a lot of reflection on food, how it's made and where it's coming from," said Tom Bailey, a senior analyst in the RaboResearch food industry team. "I think there will be some re-evaluation of that."

Panic shopping and the closure of restaurants has made winners in retail and home delivery, and losers in the restaurant space, the analysts said. E-commerce sales of fresh produce have risen 25% since coronavirus became more serious in Europe and North America, and online takeaway deliveries doubled.

RaboResearch analyst Bourcard Nesin said that many first-time users of e-commerce channels will go back to physical shopping because many online delivery platforms are not able to cope with demand levels and offering a sub-optimal experience. That said, some consumers will alter their purchasing behavior in a definitive way. Consumers could permanently stock up on storable products as coronavirus affects the national psyche for "years to come", Bailey said.

Many consumers will stop consuming premium food products as they prepare for a major recession. But there will continue to be purchases of so-called comfort foods.

The "Whole Foods crowd", a term used for purchasers of premium goods, is still a multi-billion-dollar market, the Rabobank team said. Food companies including start-ups going forward will thrive if they are connected to consumers today, are address their short-term concerns and are able to pivot with new consumers patterns, they said.

Faroese salmon farmer Bakkafrost will delay its previously scheduled dividend payment until after its Aug. 25 presentation to discuss the company's half-year 2020 results. The company cited the ongoing "uncertainty" with the pandemic as the reason for the delay.

"It is important to ensure that Bakkafrost maintains the agility and financial strength to be able to continue the many planned investments in the capex [capital expenditure] program. These investments enable our ambition for future growth as well as being important for the recovery of the economy in the Faroe Islands and Scotland on the other side of the pandemic crisis," the company said.

However, the company affirmed that it "has a very strong balance sheet and good access to capital".

"In December 2019 Bakkafrost refinanced the group's bank facilities by ensuring five-year bank facilities with banking group consisting of Nordea, DnB and Rabobank. The new bank facilities amount to €352 million ($388.6m) plus £100m ($121.4m) and Bakkafrost has an additional accordion option for €150m," the company said.

A major trade association for US fishermen has applauded the Senate's passage of a $2 trillion COVID-19 stimulus bill that includes $300 million in relief for commercial seafood harvesters and aquaculture farmers.

Seafood Harvesters of America (SHA) said that the funding will provide "urgently needed support" for the sector.

"This bill provides urgently needed support for the fishing industry and we are grateful for the work by these Senators to champion our industry's needs," said Leigh Habegger, Executive Director for Seafood Harvesters of America. "The impacts from COVID-19 are severe and widespread across the seafood industry and we look forward to these disaster funds being quickly disbursed to help offset the financial hits we have experienced and will continue to incur."

As previously reported by Undercurrent News, section 12005 of the bill, would reportedly give the Commerce Department authority to provide direct financial relief from a pot of $300m to "fishery participants" who have experienced economic revenue losses as a result of the pandemic.

The losses must be "greater than 35% as compared to the prior five-year average revenue, or any negative impacts to subsistence, cultural or ceremonial fisheries", according to a summary of the measure published Wednesday by the National Aquaculture Association, a US-based group. Fishery participants are defined to include tribes, persons, fishing communities, aquaculture businesses not otherwise eligible under other provisions or other fishery-related businesses.

The bill now needs to be approved by the US House of Representatives, which could happen as soon as Friday.

New Bedford, Massachusetts-based Northern Wind, one of the US’ largest scallop processors, said that it has made adjustments to its operations to ensure continuity of supply.

The measures include keeping non-essential workers at home, suspending business travel, stepping up cleaning and sanitizing efforts, "making every effort to ensure hand sanitizer is always available" for employees and creating new feedback channels to improve communication.

"We’ve been closely monitoring the virus and making changes on how we conduct business," Ken Melanson, the company's chairman and co-founder said in a release. "I want our customers to know that we are doing everything in our power to provide them with high-quality seafood while not compromising on our ability to protect the health and safety of our employees."

The company has "identified the critical areas of its business to ensure they have enough resources to keep their plants open and to make sure they are running safely to fulfill customer needs", Northern Wind said.

One of Chile's most important markets for Atlantic salmon is Brazil. Refrigerated trucks made a 2,480-mile journey from Puerto Montt in southern Chile to cold storage facilities of seafood distributors of major supermarkets in the greater Sao Paulo metropolitan district.

Chilean exporters appear to have dodged a bullet after a raft of land border closures restricted movement between South American countries. Chilean President Sebastian Pinera announced a national catastrophe, shutting land borders but crucially allowing cargo envoys to cross in Argentina, Bolivia and Peru.

Brazil said March 19 that it will continue to allow cargo road transport to pass shuttered borders in an official decree.

In a key step, Argentinian authorities said cargo movement from Chile can pass through Mendoza, where the key land crossing is located, within a 24-hour period. Chilean salmon trucks pass through several Argentine provinces on their long road trip.

As yet, Brazil and Chile have yet to enact restrictions on domestic travel even as coronavirus cases in both countries have risen sharply.

Two of the world's largest offshore aquaculture projects in construction are nearing the final stages of completion in China.

They are Straits One, a 140-meter-diameter pen designed by Dutch firm De Maas, and Havfarm 1, the world's largest offshore aquaculture project being built for Norweigan salmon farmer Nordlaks.

Straits One was loaded onto a barge at Changhong International Shipyard in Zhoushan, east China last weekend, following a fit-out of nets. It is now en route to a location off the coast of Fujian province — some 500 kilometers away — for installation, De Maas told Undercurrent News.

Havfarm 1 was recently undocked in Yantai, also in east China, for the erection of the final two diagonal girders. A timeline for the completion, final launch, and testing of onboard equipment is currently hard to estimate, said Nordlaks.

NSK Ship Design, Havfarm 1's designer, said while it had been affected by the emerging global COVID-19 situation, "the project has seen steady construction progress during the last few weeks".

Click here to view pictures of the progress of both projects.

The Indian state government of Kerala has issued a document stating all parts of the seafood supply chain in the state will be permitted to remain open during the 21-day national lockdown, Undercurrent News has learned.

"The government has examined the matter in detail and accord sanction to permit the activities such as fish/prawn aquaculture, feed, feed ingredients and seed transportation including seed production operations in shrimp and fish hatcheries, supply of chemicals and cold storage facilities," a state government missive reads.

The Keralan government has also permitted processing units for fish and shrimp to remain open "without any hindrance in the interest of state economy and to avoid irreparable losses to the fishers, farmers and processors."

You can read the full story here.

As global demand for fresh seafood dives amid the coronavirus pandemic, Icelandic processing equipment maker Skaginn 3X has seen processors turn to freezing technology.

As the industry prepares to recoup from a faltering fresh market, many producers are "already retooling their lines towards frozen production, either in part or in whole", the firm said.

"We’re already seeing a big uptick in demand for freezing solutions," said Ragnar Gudmundsson, director of sales operations Europe for Skaginn 3X. "As we face this challenge in the industry, we’re proud to be able to equip our partners without delay with the kind of equipment that allows them to freeze product at peak quality in a cost-efficient way and get it out to the market quickly."

UK industry body Seafish has been working to get more of the country's fresh-caught seafood used throughout supply chains, according to CEO Marcus Coleman.

With foodservice operations mainly now closed and many export markets not currently accessible, Seafish is working with businesses across the supply chain to find other markets for seafood landed into the UK, he said.

"We’re currently developing guidance to help fishermen and fish merchants to use quayside sales, fish boxes and fish vans to sell their product locally, and possibly even nationally. We are also making promotional material available to support this."

It is also working with the government and processors to "encourage large retailers to use more fresh fish in retail supply chains".

"Processors face unprecedented demand for product. They need to be able to be flexible, for example, quickly altering supply lines to process available species to ensure business continuity."

Seafish is also supporting "#SeaForYourself" — a new marketing campaign which aims to get more UK consumers to eat more seafood caught in UK waters.

Seafood businesses can download campaign resources and images from Seafish to support their own marketing. It will also be looking to offer guidance and support on buying, cooking and eating species that consumers might not be as familiar or confident with.

"Our fundamental objective is to ensure that the fabric of the UK seafood industry remains intact, so that when the emergency situation passes the sector can recover. As the picture becomes clearer we will assess the impact on the UK catching and processing sectors so we can report on the level of disruption caused, using case studies to show exactly what is happening to businesses and the people working in these sectors."

A range of unprecedented measures have been announced by the government, but with new announcements almost daily it's difficult for businesses and individuals to know exactly what help they are eligible for, Seafish noted. The organization is endeavoring to clarify this for the sector.

In what could be a positive sign for the rest of the global seafood sector, Ecuador's shrimp exports to China increased in the month of February, despite the latter's battle with COVID-19 at the time, trade data shows.

The increase helped drive total monthly exports to 59,874 metric tons, up 32% compared with February of last year.

Ecuador's aquaculture chamber, known by its Spanish abbreviation, CNA, reported that the country exported 33,221t of shrimp to China in February, up 13% compared with the same month in 2019.

Click here to read more.

Maine's Ready Seafood Company has debuted a redesigned package for its "Twin Tail" lobster offering as it plans to ramp up its retail business amid a COVID-19-related slowdown in foodservice.

According to a LinkedIn post from Jack Lombard, a salesperson at the company, the package features two frozen, ready-to-cook lobster tails.

"With such high demand coming at Ready Seafood Company from the retail sector, we will be producing at full-capacity on this item, and others, over the several weeks, into the 2020 season, and beyond," he said.

Several sectors of the Polish processing industry is operating at, or beyond, full capacity, Jaroslaw Zielinski of the country's association of fish processors, told Undercurrent News.

Canners are processing a lot of pelagics, mostly from the Atlantic, and also sprat landings from the Baltic Sea.

"The canning industry is working at overtime, they have so much work," he said. The frozen seafood producers, too, are at full capacity, he said.

Distribution and supply is also at full capacity. "Companies don't have secured stocks for Easter anymore, there is no Easter, so all those stocks are being produced now. [But] the retailers take it and sell it easily."

Companies usually have inventory secured for a month or two, he said. "After Easter, I expect they will be looking for new raw materials."

This leads to an important question, Zielinski said. The raw materials running through Polish processors now was produced by Chinese firms back in December. It was then shipped and arrived in Poland in February or early March.

"The big question is, what will accessibility of raw materials, like frozen whitefish fillets, be like from China now? The production which took place in January and February?"

Meanwhile, Poland's smoked seafood processors have seen a "collapse" in demand, as has the small but developing ready meal segment, he said.

After the news that UK frozen-at-sea fillet suppliers F. Smales & Son (Fish Merchants) and Collins Seafoods have temporarily closed their businesses due to the effective lockdown the country has in place, another supplier to the fish and chip sector has done the same.

Friars Pride — which serves the Midlands, Wales, and the south, west, and east of England — said it would be safeguarding the health and wellbeing of its staff and families by closing as of 5.30pm on March 25.

"As a family run business for more than 40 years, we will continue to supply the fish and chip industry, which we are so passionate about. This is just a pause, and we will bounce back stronger together."

The Scottish Fishermen's Federation (SFF) has welcomed a funding package for smaller vessels as a "good first step to support the industry".

"The markets that these boats sold into have largely disappeared due to the COVID-19 pandemic, depriving many fishermen of their livelihoods almost overnight," said SFF chief executive Elspeth Macdonald.

"The Scottish government's announcement of this initial financial support is, therefore, a very positive and much-needed development."

However, SFF has reports from its members that other markets, particularly for shellfish, have evaporated, and the whitefish market has contracted rapidly as a result of the pandemic.

"We will, therefore, be continuing to make the case to government for similar support for other parts of the fleet that are at imminent risk of hardship."

Both the Scottish and UK governments are reacting daily and hourly to a fast-changing situation that is impacting on individuals and business right across the economy., SFF noted.

"Continued supply and production of foodstuffs is clearly a high priority and we hope that means can be found to keep supply lines open for nutritious, high-protein seafood during this unprecedented crisis."

UK frozen-at-sea fillet suppliers F. Smales & Son (Fish Merchants) and Collins Seafoods have temporarily closed their businesses due to the effective lockdown the country has in place to try and combat the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus.

Hull-based Smales, and County Durham/Leeds-based Collins, announced their decision on Twitter on March 24. Both are important suppliers to the UK fish and chip industry, which Undercurrent News reported on March 24 is undergoing significant pressures from the virus's spread.Read the story in full here.

Several of Ireland's fishing organizations have condemned blockades set up by the country's fishermen to prevent French and Spanish vessels from offloading their catch there.

Recent port blockades in Dingle and Castletownbere preventing access to fishing trawlers have been condemned by seven organizations as "unnecessary, alarmist and without any reasonable nor rational foundation".

The organizations are, namely: Irish Fish Producers Organisation (IFPO), Irish South and East Fish Producers Organisation (ISEFPO), Killybegs Fishermen's Organisation (KFO), Castletownbere Fishermman Co-Op, Clogherhead Fishermen's Co-Op, Galway and Aran Fishermen's Co-Op and Foyle Fishermen's Co-Op.

The management of the organizations said the blockades would only damage the Irish industry in the long run, and sought to reassure the wider public that extremely strict and enhanced conditions apply with regard to movement of crew in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Irish department of transport has introduced emergency measures for all vessels entering Irish ports whereby a "Maritime Declaration of Health" must be furnished ahead of arrival. The authorities may refuse entry in case of incomplete reporting.

Juxtaposed with the obligation to protect human health is the need to maintain a supply of seafood to both the Irish and European markets, and preventing trawler access to Irish ports means a critical food supply is put in jeopardy, the organizations added.

Russia's Norebo Holding, the largest supplier of frozen-at-sea (FAS) cod and haddock fillets, is adjusting to a new reality amid the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus in the UK.

The situation means the UK's 10,000 fish and chip shops have been recommended to close unless they can do home delivery. UK chippies are a major market for FAS fillets.

"Our job now is to meet the consumer where they are, which is in retail and home service. So, we’re fine-tuning our production to align with this shift in demand. Over the years, we’ve always been quite diversified in terms of the products we can produce. This strategy is benefitting us now, being versatile and able to produce so many different products," said Sturlaugur Haraldsson, who runs Norebo's EU and US sales operation.

"Globally, foodservice is facing a huge challenge, but retail is absolutely booming. We’re seeing similar developments in the US as we are seeing in Europe, foodservice is struggling, but retail is doing really well," he told Undercurrent News.

"There's been a level of panic buying over the past few weeks, which has caused a huge boost in retail sales. I’d expect retail to continue to be strong, as people will buy more from retail due to restaurants being closed. But it's going to slow down somewhat from what we are seeing today because the current rate of sale is phenomenal," he said.

Click here for more on the impact on the FAS market.

Following the announcement that India will be put into lockdown for the next 21 days, it will be possible for seafood processing and packing companies to remain open, Undercurrent News has learned.

According to a government document shared with Undercurrent by Althaf Yousaf of the Resource Network Trading Company, the lockdown will see all industrial establishments closed, except for those manufacturing essential commodities or "production units, which require continuous process, after obtaining required permission from the State government".

Furthermore, all transport services, including air, rail, and roads will remain suspended, except for the transportation of "essential goods" the document says, as well as the emergency services.

"The above containment measures will remain in force, in all parts of the country, for a period of 21 days with effect from 25/03/2020," the document concludes.

China's seafood exporters face a "major test" as the coronavirus pandemic hits seafood demand in global markets, according to China's top seafood industry association.

China is the world's largest seafood exporter, exporting some $20 billion worth of seafood in 2019, according to Chinese figures.

With the pandemic worsening by the day "the situation [for Chinese seafood exporters] may become complicated," said the China Aquatic Product Processing and Marketing Alliance (CAPPMA) in a notice last Friday (March 20). "CAPPMA believes that the Chinese seafood export trade in 2020 may face the greatest uncertainty in its history."

Click here to read more.

With many states already under partial lockdown for the next week, the Indian prime minister Narendra Modi has announced that the entire country is to be placed in lockdown for 21 days — starting midnight tonight — in an effort to prevent the virus from spreading further, reports the Economic Times.

"If we don't handle these 21 days well, then our country, your family will go backwards by 21 years," Modi is quoted as saying.

One seafood packer told Undercurrent News that it expects it will have to sit tight with all prepared shipments for the next three weeks while the lockdown is in place.

Another seafood trader, Althaf Yousaf of the Resource Network Trading Company said that he was "very worried by the current situation" although adding that he expects some relaxation of the lockdown for international trade.

"The way I understand initially, they would study the impact of this enforcement of lockdown and in a week or so, there would be some changes made," Althaf told Undercurrent. "There is nothing anyone can do to slow down shrimp growth and harvesting. And production has to happen, so coldstorage will run full."

However, according to the first source, there remains a lot of uncertainty over what the lockdown will mean for the shrimp farming cycle as many farm staff had already returned to their villages a week ago, while other workers will now be unable to go to their packing factories.

Althaf added that all the additional protocols taken by packers and authorities to fight the situation will likely mean most seafood operations and trade are significantly slower until the spread of the virus is contained in India.

At the time of writing, there have been 519 reported cases of COVID-19 in India, and 10 deaths.

The UK's Grimsby Fish Market will close its auction facilities from Thursday, March 26, its chief executive, Martyn Bowers, told Undercurrent News.

The Port of Grimsby East decided early on March 23 to operate the fish market only on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. On Monday, March 23, "the market was good… with firm prices," said Bowers.

"But after the address from the prime minister [that evening], prices have crashed." Said address saw Boris Johnson announce the UK would now be placed under a stricter lockdown, with citizens only allowed to go out if it is absolutely necessary, and police given the power to fine those not obeying the new rules.

"So, we are holding the auction Thursday, and then we close," the fish market chief said. "Whilst the auction is closed we can still handle fresh fish supplies, but only if it is pre-sold."

Rajmanohar Somasundaram, founder of Indian shrimp farming research agency and farmers’ network Aquaconnect, is upbeat on the virus's impact on the sector.

In an interview, he told BW Businessworld there was no concrete evidence to show that the coronavirus pandemic has had an impact on shrimp farming.

"We are constantly monitoring the current stocking phase in major production pockets in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, and Tamil Nadu, and we feel this is too early to assess the impact on year-on-year production growth," he said.

"The virus outbreaks shouldn't have any significant impact on India's shrimp exports in the upcoming financial year, considering the unchanged demand for seafood in major markets," he argued.

He feels that an 8%-10% drop in shrimp exports to China was unlikely, but even if it did occur, export volumes would bounce back in the following quarters of 2020.

The newspaper noted China tends to import low value shrimp and packed, frozen shrimp — two categories where export orders are likely to drop because of the coronavirus.

The UK wholesaler JJ Foodservice has announced that it will be launching a new home delivery service, offering key household essentials, as a response to longstanding grocery delays in the country.

"With schools closing and many of us required to work from home, having essential products like bottled water, fresh and frozen foods have never been more important," said JJ's chief operating officer Mushtaque Ahmed. "We are here to help."

The grocery wholesaler, which has seen demand more than double in the past couple of weeks, offers seabass and seabream fillets, boneless salmon portions, and raw peeled and deveined vannamei shrimp in its list of 21 offers available for home delivery.

Orders placed by 9 pm will be delivered the next day, with a minimum order of £79 in place. JJ added that it has responded to the crisis by lengthening night shift hours, increasing capacity for stock holding, and offering better deals on key products.

The UK's 1,200 fish and chip shops need to plan for a different landscape after the country returns from what is essentially a lockdown, due to the spread of COVID-19 coronavirus.

On the evening of March 23, Boris Johnson, UK prime minister, announced people will only be allowed out for essential activities, such as food shopping, in order to try and contain COVID-19. The National Federation of Fish Friers recommends its 1,200 members stay closed unless they can do home delivery, Andrew Crook, its president, told Undercurrent News.

"We will do a plan to re-launch the industry. It's going to be a different landscape we open up in," he said. "We will have time to plan and come up with a strategy to take the industry forward. Fish and chips will flourish when we come out on the other side. I think we’re also going to have more national pride as everyone is going to have worked together to get through this. People will have been sick of eating at home."

Click here for the full story.

The US fast food chain McDonald's has opted to close all of its branches in the UK and Ireland no later than 7pm GMT on March 23, adding that it "looks forward to seeing you all again as soon as it is safe to reopen", according to a statement from the company.

The company, a major buyer of Alaskan pollock for its Fillet-o-Fish meal, said it would work with local community groups to distribute food and drink in the coming days.

McDonald's has already closed all restaurants in Italy and Spain, while it is operating limited branches in France and Canada, according to a report from CNBC.

In the US, only DriveThru and takeaway or home delivery services are operating, while many locations are working on more limited hours.

Elsewhere, in Asia, the majority of McDonald's outlets in Japan remain open, while 95% of its restaurants in China are also believed to be operating.

Although McDonald's says it cannot yet estimate the financial impact of COVID-19 to its business, the company said last week that it was considering offering rent deferrals to franchisees, which make up about 90% of its restaurants worldwide.

On March 10, McDonald's had previously announced that it would be providing two weeks paid leave for any employees directly impacted by the virus.

China's largest seafood wholesale market in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, is getting back to business with 70-80% of vendors resuming trade.

Undercurrent News‘ China correspondent Hu Luyi visited Huangsha Aquatic Products Market — China's largest wholesale market, which trades some 210,000 metric tons of seafood annually, worth CNY 7.2 billion ($1.05bn), according to management — on Saturday (March 21), more than six weeks after trade ground to a halt following the coronavirus outbreak.

An employee of the market's operator said 70-80% of wholesalers and retailers had returned to business and of those, 100% of local vendors are back.

"Businesses from other provinces are subject to isolation, but will return very soon," said Hu, citing the manager. Hu added the car lot was full.

Norwegian salmon was selling at CNY 130/kg ($18.33/kg); rock lobster from Australia, CNY 520/kg; and American lobster imported via Vietnam, CNY 220/kg, said Hu.

"I bought some seafood from the market and had it cooked in an adjoining restaurant, spending CNY 350." His meal consisted of swimming crab CNY 260/kg, tiger grouper CNY 100/kg, and four scallops at CNY 15 per piece, he said.

"In the past, this lunch would cost more than CNY 400, so prices are low at present," said Hu.

He added a vendor said business had not yet returned to normal, with sales below the same point last year.

In Guangdong, debate has raged over whether the government should ban the sale of farmed soft-shelled turtles and farmed frogs at Huangsha, given the novel coronavrius is thought to have jumped from live mammals to humans following a mutation.

Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan has been identified as the epicenter of the novel coronavirus, although this is yet to be confirmed.

Click here to view a photo gallery from Hu's visit. You can also compare a photo gallery of the same market in summer 2018 here.

One executive with a UK processor told Undercurrent News that goods saved up in case of a no-deal Brexit scenario at the end of January had "ironically" been of some benefit in the current supply picture.

"It has helped a bit. We had extra stocks in from Europe as we were expecting tariffs to come in at the of January," he said. This, in the end, did not materialize, and indeed the logistics of Brexit are now a total uncertainty.

"We were asked by lots of accounts to keep extra stock, and we had that when this [COVID-19] broke out. That helped, we were worried we had so much stock in the UK, but for retailers, it's worked a treat."

However, his company supplies mainly the foodservice sector, and as a result is anticipating a 30% year-on-year drop in sales for the first half of 2020.

"For us, it’ll be the worst drop I’ve seen at this company.We’re hoping for a little bounce back in June or July, but March and April are written off, I think."

He said the company would love to be able to offer goods to retailers who are currently in need of extra, but that as of last week this was not realistic.

"There's not really any talking going on, I think buyers are so busy trying to get stocks in that they don't have time to look outside their contact network, or go looking for new suppliers," he surmised.

He also noted that in the supermarkets he’d been into, frozen seafood was one of the few aisles not cleared out.

"Besides, switching production to retail is quite a palaver. It's a 16-week process normally."

"But foodservice is just wiped out. I think there’ll be job losses, supply and account management, and of course within the industry itself," he added.

By closing the US border to Mexico on Friday to nonessential travel, president Donald Trump has essentially taken back the temporary worker relief promised earlier to blue crab meat processing companies in the Chesapeake Bay bordering states of Maryland and Virginia, the Bay Journal reports.

Following multiple requests by state and federal lawmakers, the US Department of Homeland Security announced March 5 that it would supplement the H-2B program's original allotment of 66,000 temporary workers for 2020, providing as many as 20,000 additional visas with start dates of April 1 and another 15,000 to begin on May 15, as reported earlier by Undercurrent News.

The seafood industry was waiting anxiously to receive word if their companies would be granted any of the temporary workers included in the large new batch, as DHS must first conduct a lottery. However, it now seems the workers might be stuck on the other side of the border regardless.

Mexico is one of the main sources of seafood workers, the article noted. Its likely they will be considered essential workers, but the United States has shuttered its embassy consulates in Mexico, which threatens to halt the visa application process.

It's unclear if and when the additional 35,000 workers will arrive, said Amanda Wright, CEO of Virginia-based Phoenix Labor Consultants, a company whose clients include the Cheseapeake Bay seafood processors. Releasing those visas "is not even being talked about now" at the federal government.

Ireland's pelagic sector has been able to continue operating for the past week or so, even as the whitefish and shellfish industries struggle, a processing source in the country told Undercurrent News.

"Most companies are continuing to process, as at this difficult time, food production is a key necessity," he said. "In Ireland now, the pelagic processors have switched in the past week or two from mackerel production to the production of blue whiting for human consumption, with most being exported to Africa."

As seen elsewhere, processors producing goods for retail distribution across Europe are seeing a peak in orders and are running at full production, with supermarket shelves being cleaned out, he went on. "In particular, canned seafood, smoked seafood, retail packs and ready to eat goods."

"Other seafood processors who supply these final processors are then seeing an upturn in demand."

While supply in the pelagic sector is ongoing, the whitefish sector is "suffering hugely and drastically", he said, "mostly due to drop-off in demand in Spain, France and European customers, which is a natural follow-on of COVID-19".

Other smaller processors that supply foodservice are effectively seeing "an extinction of their businesses" as all pubs — and most hotels and restaurants — are closed, "and even some of the larger multiple retailers have closed fish counters".

"Processing is continuing on a day-by-day basis, but for sure fresh fish demand is down. Frozen goods are obviously easier to manage."

He mentioned — as several sources have — a problem in the lack of reefer [refrigerated] containers for shipping frozen goods, while many coldstores are filling up, despite orders in Asia, Europe and Africa, he said.

"Also, many of the shipping lines have effectively doubled their shipping rates, which is eroding margins."

The Indian government's decision to put millions of people in the country under lockdown has led to a weekend of "head-breaking" work for smaller-scale seafood packers, Althaf Yousaf of the Resource Network Trading Company told Undercurrent News.

"For the past few days, I’ve been having the very hard task of clearing our deliveries, because some banks are not supportive and not offering individual services," he said. "It's a total lockdown, a total shutout across India. It is very difficult to confirm payments now, international courier services have stopped their services in many parts of India."

According to Yousaf, his company has been trying to confirm payments and send shipping documents for all remaining seafood shipments over the weekend, but the lack of staff in many of the banks has meant that very few calls are being answered.

Any payments other than international letters of credit are "facing hurdles in delivery."

"Most of the seafood works are TT, telex transfer. The buyer sends some advance and once the cargo's been shipped, all the documents are made to the fulfillment of the buyer, we send the documents to the buyer. And then the buyer makes full payment and we release the container from India."

"So this has been a huge task for the past few days, I still have a few containers reaching different destinations by the end of this month," he told Undercurrent. "But we are still hopeful that everything will work out well and all our customers can take delivery."

Much of the country is under a ‘people's curfew’ until March 31 at the earliest as India's government looks to contain the virus before it spreads out of control. At the time of writing, there have been 467 cases of COVID-19 reported in India, with 71 cases reported in the past day.

As the UK's retail food supply struggles to meet the surge in consumer demand, the Department for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (Defra) has temporarily eased competition regulations for the nation's supermarkets.

Defra announced on March 20 its decision to allow retailers to share vans, stock and staff in order to meet demand. Furthermore, rules regarding driver hours have been temporarily relaxed, allowing for more home delivery, and the 5p plastic bag surcharge waived for online purchases.

"We’ve listened to the powerful arguments of our leading supermarkets and will do whatever it takes to help them feed the nation," UK environment secretary — and former fisheries minister — George Eustice said in the announcement.

"By relaxing elements of competition laws temporarily, our retailers can work together on their contingency plans and share the resources they need with each other during these unprecedented circumstances."

Andrew Opie, director of food and sustainability at the British Retail Consortium, added: "This is a short term measure, in the spirit of working together, and will allow retailers to agree common specifications for products to bolster food production, and co-ordinate certain operations to ensure customers anywhere in the UK have access to the essential items they need."

More than nine-in-10 Chinese seafood businesses surveyed by Undercurrent News have resumed operations. However, almost two-thirds of Chinese seafood industry executives are gloomy about exports as the global coronavirus pandemic worsens.

The Undercurrent poll of 36 Chinese seafood industry figures reveals a third of polled firms are operating at 90% capacity or above. However, two-thirds of executives anticipate a drop in exports, according to the poll, which was held from March 20 using the social media app WeChat.

Click here to view more results from the survey.

The European Commission (EC) will support affected fishermen and women and aquaculture producers by allowing aid up to a level of €120,000 per undertaking through direct grants, repayable advances or tax advantages that will last until Dec. 31, the Directorate-General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (DG Mare) has stated.

New options and tools are also reportedly being considered to support both the fishing and aquaculture industries to overcome this crisis "in the best possible way", it said.

Click here to know more.

Last week, Norway's new fisheries minister has said the country would allow salmon farmers to exceed maximum allowable biomass (MAB) limits should it become necessary, amid the market chaos.

If the time comes when farmers are unable to harvest fish — for instance, if harvesting or transport capacity has been lost thanks to the spread of coronavirus — then temporary permission to exceed MAB limits would be granted, said Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen.

However, an Undercurrent News source with a big European processor said farmers need to harvest, not leave fish in the water.

"The big fish, the 5-7kg, they got to the US and China, with the market and transport issues. In Europe, we need the smaller fish," he said.

Leaving fish in water means the value will actually be dropping, he said. "There's capital tied up in it. It's actually devaluing capital, due to the dive in China and US demand. They need to harvest and get this fish to the market."

Frank Dulcich, the president and CEO of Clackamas, Oregon-based Pacific Seafood Group, one of the US’ largest seafood suppliers, is reassuring its customers that the company is maintaining its operations amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Through conversations with our retail customers we know they are experiencing challenges keeping enough proteins on shelves, and filling the demand for more ready-to-eat and ready-to-cook products amid restaurant closures," Dulcich said in a statement.

Pacific is in "a unique position to solve this critical need" due to its diversified and integrated supply chain, he added.

"We have already begun flexing our production capabilities, leveraging our availability of frozen inventory, and relying on the strength of our logistics operations and innovative packaging capabilities to rapidly meet customer needs in this unprecedented time," he said. "Pacific Seafood recognizes our unique responsibility to support our nation's response to COVID-19 by continuing operations without interruptions to maintain our critical food supply."

He added that the company stands with its customers and thanks "each and every one of our team members for their continued commitment during this difficult time".

Cafes, pubs and restaurants in the UK must close from tonight, except for take-away food, to tackle coronavirus, reports the BBC.

The announcement came from prime minister Boris Johnson as part of his daily briefing on the government's approach to the virus, on March 20.

Though unlikely to make much of a difference to businesses — UK citizens had already been encouraged to avoid these locations, and the vast majority have been — the news may actually be an improvement to some businesses, which had said they could not claim on insurance until the government officially closed them down.

The coronavirus pandemic and effective shutdown of the foodservice sector in Europe and the US could not have come at a worse time for Indian shrimp packers, one US importer, familiar with the producing nation, told Undercurrent News.

"Over the past several years many new companies have built factories that have come on-line and existing established factories have expanded their facilities, increased their production capacity, and even built entirely new facilities," this source noted.

"In some cases they’ve doubled or even tripled their existing production capacity."

"Those well-established factories with very deep pockets will likely be able to ride out this storm and we will probably see some consolidation."

However, he went on, in terms of consolidation, the appetite for larger, well-financed companies to take over smaller or "more marginally financed factories" will certainly be mitigated by the severity and unprecedented scope of this situation, he suggested.

"There is also the question of banks and to what degree they will be tightening credit facilities due to obviously increased risk factors," he continued. "Even before this crisis, Indian banks were getting more cautious. A further tightening of credit will aggravate even more an already very difficult situation."

Fishermen on the UK's south-western coast have asked for government help after seeing the market for their most widely-caught species vanish within a week, reports the BBC.

After seafood markets in China, Spain, Italy and France closed, fishermen in Cornwall have found themselves with nowhere to sell their catch.

As a result, prices for pollock in Newlyn, Cornwall have dropped from £3/kg to £0.41/kg within a week.

According to the BBC, typical overseas buyers are also turning down Cornish shellfish such as crab and lobster, just as the fishing season is about to start after a six month hiatus. For some vessels, it added, the prices are now so low that the cost of going to sea is outweighing the money made on return.

With fishermen now curtailing trips, leaders of the South West Fish Producer's Association have called on the UK Department for environment, rural and food affairs (DEFRA) to help. DEFRA in turn said it would be "working closely with them over the coming days and weeks," as quoted by the BBC.

European and US supermarkets have asked tilapia companies in Hainan, China, to turbo-charge shipments, an industry source in Hainan told Undercurrent News.

"Supermarket orders are up", said the source at a tilapia processor. "The demand is very strong right now."

As shoppers in the US and Europe stockpile and eat at home supermarkets face increased demand for frozen fish, she said. Orders unfulfilled from February when Hainan's processors were closed — under lockdown due to the coronavirus outbreak — are also being fulfilled this month, she added.

Orders from the foodservice sector have "decreased seriously", however, said the source.

"In Europe, some of the clients already informed us to delay shipment of the pending orders. Some have been delayed to May, some to next month. Just some, not all of them. But the clients from supermarkets have asked us to speed up shipments," said the source.

Her plant returned to full operating capacity on March 4-5, she said. Others in Hainan's export-oriented sector and the supply chain also resumed then, or around that time.

She added raw material prices are relatively stable, increasing slightly this week, up CNY 0.1 per 700-gram fish. Click here to see latest tilapia raw material prices in China.

In January, the US imported 12,749 metric tons of frozen tilapia fillets, largely from China (see chart and trade data page), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The Mazzetta Company, one of North America's largest seafood wholesalers and processors, has added to its holdings in Atlantic Canada, acquiring a 220,000-pound lobster holding facility in Clark's Harbour, Nova Scotia, from the East Coast Seafood Group's Paturel International division.

The pound serves Canada's two largest lobster fishing areas, 33 and 34, responsible for roughly a third of the country's world-leading 90,000 to 97,000 metric tons in annual landings. It joins a pound Highland Park, Illinois-based Mazzetta acquired on Cape Sable Island, Nova Scotia, in 2012.

Other media reports indicate the Clark's Harbour lobster pound garnered a price of $850,000 and involved a loan to Mazzetta from East Coast, however, neither company would confirm the terms of the deal.

After a strong start and high prices in late November, the Canadian lobster industry has been under stress and prices have crashed recently due to the coronavirus COVID-19 severely limiting markets in China and Europe and simultaneously wiping out the prospect of foodservice buyers in the US.

But Tom Mazzetta, the founder and CEO, was optimistic about the future value of his acquisition in an email sent to Undercurrent News.

"My company has been involved in Canada now for more than 10 years, and we look forward to our future in this country," he wrote. "Although the world is experiencing a major hiccup right now, I know it will be resolved in the very near term, and we will be in a good position with a fully integrated North American lobster supply chain."

East Coast, based in Topsfield, Massachusetts, has sold a few of its lobster holding facilities in recent times. Paturel last summer also sold its Dipper Harbor, New Brunswick, pound, to Fredericton, New Brunswick-based Coldwater Canadian Lobster.

"Over the past 10 years the company has inherited several live lobster holding facilities through mergers and has seen a redundancy; the recent sale of Clark's Harbour and other live holding facilities are simply the result of streamlining capabilities," East Coast explained in a statement. "The company is proactively and strategically looking to the future of increasing production capabilities and technologies, aimed at meeting emerging trends in foodservice and retail sectors."

More details about East Coast's strategy and new product developments here.

The COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic is causing an increased uncertainty in the global seafood trade, driving changes in consumer behavior and transport patterns affecting several markets. The foodservice segment has been hit hard, while an increase in grocery and food delivery services is reported as a result of extensive home quarantines both in Europe, the US and, to a lesser extent, Latin America.

A weakening Norwegian krone helps to dampen some of the effects associated with lower demand, according to the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC), which listed some of the ongoing trends relating to COVID-19's seafood trade at present.

Read the five facts here.

The introduction of travel restrictions in Europe and other countries where the European fleet is active are expected to limit fishing operations, a Spanish industry source told Undercurrent News.

Despite a drop in oil prices below $30 per barrel this week, the activity of many European fishing vessels has been put on hold, due to a drop in demand and a consequent decrease in price for some species. Booming sales at supermarkets, however, is supporting demand for other species, particularly tuna.

You can read the full story here.

Spanish fish retail markets are maintaining constant activity, although sales have decreased compared to last week, when much more fish was sold for fear of shortages, Luisa Alvarez — general manager of the Spanish national federation of regional associations of fish and frozen product retailers (or Fedepesca) told Undercurrent News.

"Thousands of people worked tirelessly last week to supply fish anywhere in the country. However, there is still a lot of uncertainty. Sales this week are lower than they usually are on an average day," she said.

Click here for the full story.

Spain's closure of bars and restaurants in a bid to prevent the spread of COVID-19 has caused shellfish prices to drop between 25% and 80% in the country's main fish markets.

"The inshore fleet currently fishing in Spanish waters has already begun to see how prices have sunk for certain fishery products, especially shellfish," Javier Garat, president of the European Fisheries Association, Europeche, and the secretary general of the Spanish Fisheries Confederation (Cepesca, in its Spanish acronym) told Undercurrent News.

"This health crisis is mainly affecting the sale of products that are mostly intended for consumption in restaurants, bars and hotels or at regional festivals, which are now closed or canceled," he added.

Click here for the full story.

Prices for Russian headed and gutted pollock are rising again with Chinese plants back processing, but the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus to Europe and the US is causing uncertainty in the finished product markets, sources told Undercurrent News.

Product "gaps" are appearing in the US market, due to the delay caused by the spread of COVID-19 in China at the end of last year and the start of 2020, sources said.

However, the crash in foodservice sales in the US and Europe will also impact sales. As a result, contract prices for double frozen fillets are not set, they told Undercurrent.

Click here for the full story.

Dutch land-based yellowtail farmer The Kingfish Company, which until last month was known as Kingfish Zeeland, is looking to open new channels to sell the fish it has in the water now rather than freezing them.

Kingfish Company CEO, Ohad Maiman, said in a LinkedIn post that the company is "working hard to adjust to the fast changing reality" of the COVID-19 pandemic and shares "much of the burden of the lockdown" along with the foodservice sector.

"That said, we all still need to eat, and we have fresh healthy fish growing at full capacity right here in The Netherlands. We have long argued for the food security value of local reliable year round production, and we are here now to deliver on that promise," he wrote.

The company, which raises its fish in Kats, Netherlands, and is developing a second facility in the US state of Maine, is prepared to use its "in house cryo-freezing capacity to build up stocks for the day after the world returns to normal", the CEO wrote.

"But the idea of hoarding food at a time of uncertainty does not feel right. And we have the ability to supply almost any fresh/frozen format across the EU (or frozen to the US)," he said.

He advised suppliers having challenges restocking their seafood inventories to contact him or the company's head of sales, Nicholas Hacker.

Farm-gate prices for Indian shrimp are dropping fast. According to Durai Murugan, owner of Sea Gem Aqua Farms and secretary of the Tamil Nadu shrimp farmers association, there's a "total panic" in the market.

"I don't know where it's going to stop. It's time for farmers to stay united and not to stock for [the] next few months," he wrote on Linkedin.

"Oh my god, I don't think anyone can produce shrimp with these prices. Some of them saying calm before storm," he added.

Prices for 40 count vannamei in Andhra Pradesh are INR 330 ($4.39) per kilogram, down 14% on week 10. For 60 count shrimp, prices are INR 240/kg, down 21% on week 10.

As you can see from the Undercurrent News prices portal, which has just been revamped, these price levels are very low historically.

A top executive from one of the world's largest salmon farmers painted a bleak picture of the global markets, speaking under an agreement of anonymity with Undercurrent News.

As the COVID-19 coronavirus spread has North America and Europe locking down populations, restaurants and other foodservice outlets are closing. Then, travel bans are disrupting the global salmon supply chain.

"They’re all a mess. Foodservice in North America is non-existent. Freight restrictions from Chile. Retailers are hesitant to order as everyone has hoarded food. They just don't know. Volume into the market is very low," he told Undercurrent.

We are only running about 60% of capacity. There just is no one buying," he said.

"In Europe, Italy and Spain are a real mess, it's going to be hard going for three months. It's going to get worse, I don't think this is a quick fix," he said.

Scottish salmon companies are discussing the possibility of sharing processing facilities, as UK foodservice demand declines steeply, according to the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO).

"The processing plants are operating as near to normal as possible at the moment (with extra guidance and restrictions on visits in place) but this will change as workers either self-isolate or are diagnosed with the virus," the SSPO said. "Our companies have started talking about sharing processing resources as the situation develops."

Currently, fish is getting to the UK retail market, but there is a concern that there will soon be fewer haulage drivers to get the fish around the country, which could also restrict companies’ ability to get fish to internal markets, it warned.

"All our companies are reporting significant reductions in exports, partly because of a fall in orders, partly because of travel restrictions making it impossible to get the fish to market and partly because of steeply rising costs associated with a lack of aircraft/haulage traveling to export destinations," said SSPO.

The UK retail market has remained very strong, partly because of stockpiling. "Retailers are reporting that consumers are buying significant quantities of fresh produce which can be frozen at home – including salmon. However, this is offset, to some extent, by the steep decline in demand from the foodservice sector."

As Scottish farmers find it more difficult to find overseas markets for their fish, they will try to get more Scottish salmon into the home market, it added.

US processor and distributor Fortune Fish and Gourmet noted that the coronavirus outbreak is hitting every link in supply chains, slowing things down and altering price structures.

"The strength of our creativity and collective imagination is going to be tested, but people will eat," it said.

"The virus-caused slow-down is affecting every link in the food chain. Fishermen have quotas to fill, or they lose them. So, the fish keep coming. Many wild markets are adjusting to the low demand and are lowering prices to try to gain traction. We are seeing the same reconfiguration on farmed products."

On the other hand, due to the travel bans and tight restrictions, some items will suffer an increase in cost, while others will not be available at all, it said.

"If you can reach people and have an outlet for product, there are many items that you can make a better margin on, while also lowering the cost to your customer."

The UK seafood trade has been hit harder than most sectors in the country by the COVID-19 pandemic, as foodservice outlets and European markets close for business, reports The Guardian.

The UK exports approximately 70% of its seafood catch to Europe and Asia, with species such as Dover sole and lobster typically headed for premium foodservice outlets.

However, the catastrophic impact of the coronavirus on the global Horeca sector means that catches of more expensive species may find themselves being sold at local fishmongers for basement prices.

China had been a major market for UK crab prior to the outbreak, while South Korea, which currently has 8,400 cases of COVID-19, typically imports a large volume of whelks from the UK shellfish industry. Now, however, demand is dropping, and it is unlikely that UK consumers will change their notoriously rigid preference away from whitefish and salmon to make up the demand.

Seafood markets across Europe are also being closed as the continent heads into lockdown, hitting EU exports. For instance, Loch Fyne Seafarms, which typically exports, scallops, crabs and lobster to France and Spain, saw its European trade drop from 3,000 shells on March 9 to zero by March 18, according to the Guardian.

However it's not all bad news: marine scientists from the University of York and other acadamic sites pointed out that the potential slowdown in fishing will offer a chance for the UK's marine stocks to recover — although Barrie Deas, chief executive of the National Federation of Fishermen's Organisations, claimed the UK's fish stocks were already well-managed in any case.

Fishing boats operating in Mauritanian waters and coming from COVID-19 infected areas [the vast majority of them Spanish] are from now on formally forbidden to make any contact with Mauritanian ports or ships, 20 minutos reported.

A circular issued by the Maghreb country's Ministry of Fisheries lays down that vessels wishing to enter the Mauritanian fishing zone should be holders of a license and have no contact with other vessels, nor reach port. In addition, formalities must be done by radio.

The European fleet currently operating in Mauritania is mainly made up of Spanish vessels (65 in total), fishing in the Maghreb country's fishing grounds thanks to an extension of the current Euro-Mauritanian fishing agreement, while this is being re-negotiated.

The Global Aquaculture Alliance (GAA) is working closely with the certification bodies (CBs) that conduct Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) audits on a weekly basis to carefully evaluate the circumstance of each processing plant, farm, hatchery or feed mill and decide how to best continue the certification process, it has said.

Following established accreditation, certification and benchmarking guidelines, the BAP team and CBs have agreed on a set of rules to follow during the virus situation, including guidelines for the movement and conduct of auditors when visiting BAP-certified facilities. These guidelines include:

The BAP meets with CBs weekly to focus on re-certifying facilities that are nearing their due dates for their annual audits to discuss any travel restrictions that may, on a case-by-case basis, require a certificate extension, it said. The reasons for a certificate extension may include:

"It is important to remember that, while BAP administers the certification process, the CBs make the certification decision and issue the BAP certificates, therefore this coordination is required to grant extensions on a case-by-case basis."

Previously, extensions only applied to facilities in China.

Stores run by UK retailer J. Sainsbury will, from March 19, close its meat, fish and pizza counters in order to "get more essential items onto the shelves", according to chief executive Mike Coupe.

"This means we can free up warehouse and lorry capacity for products that customers really need. It will also free up time for our store colleagues to focus on keeping the shelves as well-stocked as possible."

It is also putting restrictions on a larger number of products to try and combat panic buying; mainly groceries, toilet paper and soap.

"We have enough food coming into the system, but are limiting sales so that it stays on shelves for longer and can be bought by a larger numbers of customers."

Restaurants in Guangzhou, south China, are re-opening this week, more than five weeks after closing due to the coronavirus.

CCTV, a state media organization, also reported restaurants resuming business in other provinces across China.

Undercurrent News‘ correspondent in China, Hu Luyi, went with his girlfriend to eat breakfast together at a restaurant in Guangzhou on Tuesday morning (March 17), he told this publication.

Hu has spent over five weeks in his apartment, venturing out only twice per week for short walks and only while wearing a mask. "It's very boring," he said. He relied mainly on online food deliveries as most shops were closed.

China has implemented some of the strictest social distancing and quarantine measures since the outbreak in Wuhan, Hubei province, resulting in a drastic drop in new infections.

SalMar, Norway's third-largest salmon producer, on Tuesday announced that its board of directors has decided to not pay its earlier announced dividend of NOK 2.37 billion ($230 million) for 2019 due to concerns related to the coronavirus COVID-19.

"The decision was made after thorough assessments by the board and administration on the basis of the uncertainty that now prevails regarding the spread of coronavirus disease and the consequences it may have for the entire value chain and a number of local communities along the coast," the company said in a statement.

The Norwegian salmon farmer said its board deemed the move a "a proper measure to safeguard the interests of both society and shareholders", adding that it has a "strong balance sheet and a low debt ratio."

"SalMar is now working to ensure the best possible channels to get our amazing sustainable product out to customers all over the world," the statement concludes.

The sale process for Clearwater Seafoods could be disrupted by the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus, but the intent of its founders and majority shareholders to find an owner or investor willing to take it to the next stage remains unchanged, a key executive told Undercurrent News.

"We have to be sensitive to the seriousness of the virus and certainly Clearwater management is actively dealing with the situation with a focus on protecting our people and employees," said Stanley Spavold, president of CFFI Ventures, co-founder John Risley's holding company.

"The market reaction is obviously something that may impact the timing of a transaction, but these are factors outside of our control and do not in themselves necessarily change the long-term value of Clearwater or the objectives of the shareholders," he told Undercurrent.

Click here for the full story.

Norway's Grieg Seafood has said trucking logistics for its salmon remain "relatively good", though "airfreight is a challenge and the industry is working hard to find alternative transportation solutions".

In an update on its latest position given the coronavirus outbreak, Grieg said demand for salmon was there in the markets, "with significant decreased demand from hotel, restaurants and catering…and increased demand from retail".

With farming operations located in close proximity to both the European and the US market, Grieg's dependence on cross-Atlantic distribution is limited, it added.

"Grieg Seafood's operations are currently running as normal, considering the circumstances. So far, the salmon is harvested according to plan, and we will work relentlessly to keep our harvesting schedule also in the coming time," it said.

In Norway, the salmon farming industry is recognized as a "critical public function", where upholding production is a governmental priority. Grieg is maintaining a good dialogue with the authorities in Norway, the UK and Canada through industry organizations, discussing possible arrangements to safeguard salmon farming operations in various scenarios, such as flexibility on maximum allowed biomass and fallow periods, it went on.

"On a broader scale, initiatives implemented by authorities to avoid contamination in the general population reduce the risk of supply chain disturbances."

The firm's financial position is solid, it said.

Its 2020 target of 100,000 metric tons of harvested salmon remains in place, with a current Q1 guidance of 16,800t. It has postponed its capital markets day, which had been scheduled for June 10.

Woodstown Bay Shellfish, one of Europe's largest oyster farmers, faces "disaster" with no oysters shipped to Asia for four months due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the firm told Undercurrent News.

The firm's Paul Barlow, who manages the oyster farming operations, told Undercurrent on Monday it hadn't sent anything to China or Hong Kong since the start of 2020.

"January, February, March, April, nothing. No exports. It [COVID-19] 100% affects us," said Barlow, who was speaking from the firm's office in Coxtown East, Ireland. Woodstown Bay normally sends 100% of its live oysters to China and Hong Kong via air freight.

To read the full story click here.

Scotland's farmed salmon industry is working with the UK and Scottish governments to keep fresh salmon headed to markets both domestically and abroad, the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO) has said.

"As is the case with the whole Scottish food and drink sector, Scottish salmon farmers are working hard with the supply chain to help keep supplies moving, minimize disruption and to continue to provide people with healthy, fresh produce."

It noted there has been a significant reduction in exports, while demand in the UK retail market is particularly strong, with many consumers choosing to buy fresh produce which can be frozen at home.

"Measures to mitigate the impact of the crisis are being taken by all of our farmers with the health and welfare of employees being of paramount importance, so they can continue to offer the best care for their fish," added SSPO's director of strategic engagement, Hamish Macdonell.

The UK's seafood industry body Seafish has postponed the annual Grimsby and Humber Seafood Forum, which had been scheduled to take place on March 26.

Following the lead of many other public seafood gatherings, Seafish has made the decision in agreement with the Grimsby Fish Merchants Association in light of the outbreak of coronavirus in the UK.

"Our purpose here at Seafish is to give the UK seafood sector the support it needs to survive," said Marcus Coleman, CEO of Seafish. "Our stakeholders in the UK seafood industry will also experience disruption and uncertainty and because of this we must demonstrate empathy to their challenges and provide support where we can."

According to Simon Dwyer, speaking on behalf of the Grimsby Fish Merchants Association, the event has been rescheduled for June.

"This was to have been the first of a series of events for the local Grimsby and Humber seafood sector, but we will kick off again in the summer."

The Global Fishery Forum and Seafood Expo Russia are still scheduled to take place in September of 2020, even as several other events look to that same month after postponing.

Ivan Fetisov, general director of Expo Solutions Group, claimed the Russian event "has every chance to become the main international platform for communication of the fishing business" this year.

"So far, the situation is developing in such a way that St. Petersburg may remain the only planned meeting place for the international fishing business. We are seeing an increase in interest in our site from foreign companies," he said.

The show is slated for Sept. 21-23. At present September is slated to hold the Seafood Expo Asia in Hong Kong; the rescheduled Aquaculture UK in Scotland; the Canadian Seafood Show; Thaifex; World Food Moscow; Iceland's Icefish; the Japan International Seafood Show; and Aquaculture Europe, in Ireland.

Diversified Communications, organizer of Aquaculture UK, as well as the Boston and Brussels shows, has offered Sept. 22-24 as one option for the rescheduled Boston event, also.

To date, exhibition space at the Russian event has been increased by 24% compared with last year, with more applications to come, the event said.

"The current situation has highlighted a simple fact, one cannot depend only on Asian markets, even if they are as large and attractive as China," Fetisov went on. "Maximum diversification is crucial. Therefore, in St. Petersburg, we have been doing and are focusing on working with European and Russian traders and retail."

UK seafood industry body Seafish has put out a call to the country's sector for its input on the current crisis it faces.

"The availability of food is crucial and the seafood industry has a huge part to play in this," it said. "We are aware of the impact this is already having on seafood businesses and supply chains and we will do what we can to help."

It aims to play an important role in "pulling together a complete overview of all the impacts of coronavirus across the entire seafood sector", and invited businesses to contribute information and insight so it can try to provide a full picture both to the industry and government, through regular reports.

It called on companies to relay how they are being affected by coronavirus and how they’re responding, by emailing [email protected]. "Your information will be treated confidentially."

UK businesses exporting live shellfish and fish to markets in Italy, France and Spain, are "particularly impacted" by measures around COVID-19, public body Seafish UK told Undercurrent News.

The shellfish sector is one of the UK's largest seafood sectors and relies heavily on southern European markets.

Exporters face transport difficulties due to a significant reduction in available cargo space on passenger flights after flight cancellations, Seafish told Undercurrent on Monday (March 17).

Social distancing practices in many European countries mean consumers are not eating out or buying seafood at local markets, it said.

"Industry is looking at alternative options such as possibly selling this seafood in the UK but that will not be without its challenges," said the public body.

On the other hand, some processing businesses are "struggling to meet demand for products", it said, as consumers increasingly stockpile items, such as fish fingers.

Seafish is asking industry to get in touch to help provide more information about the impact of COVID-19 measures.

"We are asking industry to get in touch with us and tell us about the impact they experiencing and how they are responding so that we can provide a full overview to industry and government through regular reports," it said.

The administration of US president Donald Trump has updated its guidance for coping with the widening COVID-19 pandemic, urging, but not mandating, a series of new restrictions, CNN reported.

In "The President's Coronavirus Guidelines for America: 15 days to slow the spread", the White House advises the public to avoid travel, stay away from bars, restaurants and food courts and to steer clear of gatherings with more than 10 people.

That message comes as several big US cities such as Los Angeles have closed restaurants’ dining rooms while allowing carryout and delivery to stay open. States including California, Washington, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts have implemented or announced similar restrictions.

Still, Trump said he does not plan to implement a nationwide quarantine or curfew at this time.

"At this point, not nationwide, but there are some — you know, some places in our nation that are not very affected at all but we may — we may look at certain areas," he said when asked about the possibility of a nationwide lockdown, according to CNN.

It's very early days in terms of European markets being hit by coronavirus, but still, the processing sector is watching nervously.

"Economically there's very little good news," Peter Bamberger, president of the Danish Seafood Association, told Undercurrent News. I don't think any processors will come out of this situation without some damage."

Currently in Denmark activity levels at processors are down, either the factory is seeing low demand and there's not much work to do, or because the supply chain bringing raw materials into the country are failing, he said.

"The government is helping to pay for some businesses which have had to send workers home, but seafood does not come under that at the moment," said Bamberger. "We are getting lots of requests from members to lobby for that."

Some Danish businesses supplying canned or frozen seafood have seen a rush of extra orders, as might be expected at the moment, though this is only likely to be a short-term boost; once people have stocked up they will not consume any faster, so there should be a normalization later, he noted.

Meanwhile those businesses supplying to foodservice have seen some orders delayed or canceled, he said. Denmark sends fresh fish to Italy, France, and Spain, he said — three countries currently under some of the most severe lockdowns in an effort to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

"Then the raw materials coming in are struggling too," he added. "Getting containers, or space on containers, is very expensive, as so many of them have been to China lately. It depends on how much capital companies have on their books, or how good their relationships are with banks."

He concluded that this remains early days — worse is expected for three or four weeks yet.

Diversified Communications, which has already announced measures to postpone the Boston and Brussels seafood shows, has confirmed it is also pushing the Aquaculture UK event in Aviemore, Scotland.

"We have spoken to many of our exhibitors and supporters over the last couple of days and, based on the situation and the feedback, the precautionary decision has been taken to move Aquaculture UK 2020 to Sept. 15–17, 2020. The Aquaculture Awards have also been moved, to take place on Sept. 16."

Increasing numbers of European countries are implementing social distancing measures to control the spread of coronavirus, as of Monday morning CET (March 16):

Spain: All non-essential shops, as well as bars, restaurants, cafes, football grounds and cinemas, are closed. Travel is only permitted to and from work, to buy food or medicine, and to health centers and banks, and to look after elderly or dependents. Curbs enforced by police and army, with violators likely to be fined. The Spanish government declared a state of emergency on Saturday (March 14) (Guardian).

Germany: Border controls introduced with Austria, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg and Denmark on Monday (March 16). Schools and nurseries across the country closed from this week until after the Easter holidays at the end of April. On Sunday Hamburg joined Berlin and Cologne in closing all bars, clubs, cinemas, theaters and concert halls (Reuters).

Italy: All non-essential stores, as well as restaurants and cafes, are closed. Businesses and factories are limiting activities as much as possible, encouraging staff to take holiday or work from home. Public transport continues to operate. Food and drug stores, as well as post offices and banks, remain open.

France: All cafes, restaurants, non-essential shops and places of entertainment have been ordered to close. Schools will open only for the children of health workers. Edouard Philippe, French prime minister, urged everyone to stay at home except for food shopping and exercise, and told employers to organize teleworking where possible. Public transport will continue to operate and the borders remain open (FT).

UK: Scotland has advised against all gatherings of more than 500 people (BBC). In Northern Ireland, all 10 special schools in Belfast were closed on Monday (March 16) (BBC). UK gov't has advised people aged over 70 not to go on cruises.

Ireland: Schools, colleges and other public facilities closed (as of March 13) (BBC). All pubs and bars closed on Monday (March 16). St Patrick's Day events up and down the country have been called off (Sky).

Norway: All schools, kindergartens and universities are closed. Most public events are banned. Bars and restaurants are closed, except when they can keep customers at least one meter apart. As of March 16, all Norwegian airports and seaports are not allowing foreigners who are not residents of Norway to enter the country (Forbes).

Belgium: All restaurants and cafes are closed. Only shops providing essential services – pharmacies and food stores – remain open. All other shops remain open during the week, but will close during the weekends. All classes at school suspended, but schools will be asked to provide care for parents who are unable to look after their children during school hours. (Brussels Times)

Czech Republic: Travel is permitted to and from work and to buy food or medicine, and to make urgent family visits. Otherwise, free movement is severely limited (BBC).

Goldman Sachs expects the US economy will contract by 5% in Q2, reports Bloomberg.

Beginning in late March and April, the world's largest economy will contract sharply as US consumers and businesses slash spending, the US investment bank's analysts said in a note on Sunday (March 15).

The economy will then shrink 5% in the second quarter after zero gross domestic product growth in the first three months of the year, the analysts said.

World Aquaculture has delayed its 2020 event from June to December, the organization announced.

"Because of the COVID-19 virus situation in the world, we have rescheduled World Aquaculture 2020 in Singapore to Dec. 14-18, 2020. Everything in the meeting will remain the same except for the dates."

Two of the EU's biggest states, Spain and France, have followed Italy in announcing emergency restrictions to contain the spread of the coronavirus.

In Spain, the government ordered people to stay home, except for buying essential supplies and medicines, or for work. The restrictions, announced on Saturday, apply from today, Sunday, March 15.

The French government also ordered on Saturday all restaurants, bars, cafes, movie theaters, and other "non-indispensable businesses" to close starting at midnight.

Both countries had seen an uptick in cases in recent days.

The US is to extend its ban on travel to the US from the UK and Ireland on Monday, March 16, reports the BBC.

The ban will begin at 00:00 Eastern time (04:00 GMT on Tuesday), US vice-president Mike Pence has confirmed.

The move will further shrink the already dramatically reduced number of passenger airplanes that can fly to the US from Europe carrying fresh seafood in their bellies. US seafood importers told Undercurrent News this week that they are scrambling to find ways to get European seafood, including farmed salmon from Norway, Icelandic cod and European seabass from Greece and Turkey into the US.

Read the full story here.

Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products, China's largest shrimp company, has received a CNY 348 million ($49.7m) loan from local banks to help it guarantee supply of daily necessities and hold down prices.

In a stock exchange notice on March 10, the firm said it obtained the one-year, discounted loan from local branches of several state-owned banks in Zhanjiang county, Guangdong province, at a discounted rate of 1.1%, saving CNY 14mfrom interest expenses over the period.

"Zhanjiang Guolian was included in the list of key enterprises to be protected during the epidemic because it actively guarantees a stable supply of daily necessities and commits to not raising prices," said the firm.

Salmon markets seem to be "pretty much in a balance", with any decline in demand or collapse in distribution chains so far absorbed by other regions, particularly Europe, according to online trading platform Jet Seafood.

The platform noted Norway was currently in the low season when it comes to salmon production. "Q1 is generally the quarter with the lowest harvest volume in Norway and therefore also with quite robust prices."

"Where we do see a market change is on the pricing of specific sizes. A normal price distribution would be with the smaller sizes being lower in price and the larger 6+ [kilogram] fish more expensive. This has changed significantly in the last few weeks. The 6+ has gone from being more expensive than the industry sizes (3-5) to cheaper than the industry sizes in some cases. The closing of Italy does not help this situation either."

Prices for 3-5kg salmon are almost completely flat, indicating a higher demand (or lower supply) of 3-4kg then is usually seen compared to 4-6kg, it said.

Larger sizes are less consistent, with some sellers pricing them lower than the 3-5's, while others still have a premium on bigger fish.

"The main excitement now is what will happen in the next few weeks. China seems to be improving, Italy and Norway have taken drastic measures while large markets like Poland, Germany and the UK are operating more or less like normal."

"If one of these three closes, we will experience a significant drop in demand for salmon. As the farmers have limited opportunity to reduce production for several weeks we should expect a significant volume will be frozen. But this will only help so much."

The recent US closure to some European flights also means significantly less transport capacity, the platform added.

International travel restrictions imposed amid the COVID-19 outbreak have prompted the organizers of the Guatemala Aquaculture Symposium to postpone their three-day event, which had been scheduled to begin on May 7 in Antigua, Guatemala.

The organizers plan to announce a new date in April, they said in a press release.

Exhibitors, sponsors and attendees who have already paid participation fees will see those fees applied to a future edition of the event, the organizers said.

While there have been no confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Alaska, residents on the island of Kodiak are still feeling the pinch due to its impact on the seafood trade, the Kodiak Daily Mirror reported.

For example, Julie and Ron Kavanaugh, the owners of F/V Insatiable, have encountered difficulties obtaining their normal bait, saury, as their supplier, Golden Harvest Alaska Seafood, has had difficulty procuring it from Asia.

"The saury supply has been cut off due to the fact that it comes from the Asian market, and we are using a low grade herring that does not fish well," Julie Kavanaugh, said, according to the newspaper.

She added that she and her husband have also struggled to obtain the spools of line they need to repair their groundfishing pots.

"We only have been able to get about two-thirds of the line that we would normally get," Julie said. "That is directly related to a lack of supply out of Korea and China. They are just not getting shipments through because the production of that line has been halted."

The US National Fisheries Institute (NFI) has launched a new website, http://www.seafoodsafetycovid19.wordpress.com, aimed at letting the public know that their seafood is safe amid the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, pandemic.

The NFI's website includes ‘frequently asked questions’ and suggests ‘talking points’ for restaurant and retail employees to use with the public when talking about COVID-19 and seafood.

"The coronavirus is not related to seafood. Seafood is a vital part of a healthy diet and remains a safe, smart choice at grocery stores and restaurants. The US Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends 2-3 servings of seafood per week," the website states. "Do not stop eating seafood."

The government of Western Australia is rolling out a plan to support the state's rock lobster harvesting sector, with a focus on making it easier to sell the lobsters locally instead of exporting them.

The rock lobster sector, a AUD 400 million ($252m) industry annually, was hit hard by the COVID-19 outbreak early on when sales to China, its major market, dried up. Some suppliers quickly pivoted by selling their shellfish locally.

The government's plan would encourage more of this by creating "a new mechanism for back-of-boat sales of lobsters" and "wider promotion of existing ‘registered receiver’ mechanisms" so that Western Australian businesses can access more lobster directly from harvesters, the government said in a statement.

The government's plan would also extend the current season to 18 months and allow for a 9,000 metric ton total allowable catch, which officials said is "well within" sustainability limits.

The Thai food trade show Thaifex – Anuga Asia, which was originally scheduled to take place from May 26 to May 30 in Bangkok, has been rescheduled.

The show, held at the IMPACT Muang Thong Thani, will now take place from Sept. 22 until Sept. 26 after concerns about the spread of COVID-19.

"The decision was made after careful deliberation and extensive discussions with stakeholders, including exhibitors, visitors and other partners," organizers said.

The Scottish salmon sector is working with government and regulators to keep fish in the water for longer, as demand and logistics take a hit from the spread of coronavirus, according to the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO).

"As the UK's top food export, Scottish salmon is prominent in a number of key markets which are now facing restrictions – of various sorts – because of the coronavirus outbreak," said Hamish Macdonell, director of strategic engagement.

"This has led to problems in getting salmon to our customers in different parts of the world, problems which are likely to get worse before they get better."

"As a result, we are working with the Scottish and UK governments and environmental regulators to keep fish in the water for longer, where this is appropriate, and looking at other measures to give our members more flexibility in dealing with these market disruptions."

It has so far been relatively straightforward working through these measures, as the preparatory work was done ahead of a possible ‘no deal’ Brexit last year when similar market problems were anticipated, he revealed.

"It is worth noting, however, that the UK market for salmon remains strong at the moment as customers stock up in anticipation of further restrictions at home and some of our member companies are looking actively at market substitution as a way of coping with the ongoing drop off in demand from other parts of the world. "

SSPO's top priority remains the health and wellbeing of people, and this includes those working in the sector and its customers, he said.

Donald Trump misspoke in his earlier speech to the nation about restricting flights from Europe over concerns related to the coronavirus COVID-19. The ban will not include cargo, as he suggested.

The US president clarified his statement in a tweet sent at 10:13 p.m. EST, less than hour after his appearance on live television.

"Hoping to get the payroll tax cut approved by both Republicans and Democrats, and please remember, very important for all countries & businesses to know that trade will in no way be affected by the 30-day restriction on travel from Europe. The restriction stops people not goods." he said.

Just moments earlier he said: "We will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days. The new rules will go into effect Friday at midnight. These restrictions will are be adjusted subject to conditions on the ground.

"… These prohibitions will not only apply to the tremendous amount of trade and cargo, but various other things as we get approval," he said. "Anything coming from Europe to the United States is what we are discussing. These restrictions will also not apply to the United Kingdom."

The 26 Schengen countries the flight ban applies to are: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

The flight ban was among multiple measures Trump identified as being in the White House's plans. And the live presentation was part of an eventful day in the US as the coronavirus made headlines on multiple fronts.

The US imported 101,313 metric tons of seafood worth $815.3 million from the European Union in 2019. Roughly a fifth of the amount — 20,947t worth $173.5m — came from the UK.

While the US was reported to have 1,281 cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday evening, Italy had as many as 12,462 cases, while France had 2,284 and Spain 2,277, according to a website tracking the disease for Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, Maryland. The United Kingdom was reported to have 459 cases.

Editor's note: Subsequent to making the comments below, Trump tweeted a clarification to note that trade would not be impacted by his flight ban.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday night announced a ban on air travel from Europe to the US beginning Friday at midnight, over concerns related to the coronavirus COVID-19.

"We will be suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days. The new rules will go into effect Friday at midnight," he said in a live speech on national television. "These restrictions will be adjusted subject to conditions on the ground."

Trump, who appeared in the Oval Office, said there will be exemptions made for certain Americans "who have undergone appropriate screenings".

"These prohibitions will not only apply to the tremendous amount of trade and cargo, but various other things as we get approval," he said. "Anything coming from Europe to the United States is what we are discussing. These restrictions will also not apply to the United Kingdom."

The travel ban was among multiple measures Trump identified as being in the White House's plans. And the live presentation was part of an eventful day in the US as the coronavirus made headlines on multiple fronts, including the announcement that celebrities had contracted the illness and that several large sporting events would be played with the stadiums empty and, in the case of the National Basketball Association, the season suspended.

The US imported 101,313 metric tons of seafood worth $815.3 million from the European Union in 2019. Roughly a fifth of the amount — 20,947t worth $173.5m — came from the UK.

While the US was reported to have 1,281 cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday evening, Italy had as many as 12,462 cases, while France had 2,284 and Spain 2,277, according to a website tracking the disease for Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, Maryland. The United Kingdom was reported to have 459 cases.

The coronavirus outbreak has been labeled a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), reports the BBC.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the number of cases outside China had increased 13-fold over the past two weeks.

He said he was "deeply concerned" by "alarming levels of inaction" over the virus.

A pandemic is a disease that is spreading in multiple countries around the world at the same time.

Diversified Communications is likely breathing a sigh of relief over its decision to postpone its Boston (Massachusetts) seafood show after seeing the latest headlines from the area on the coronavirus.

Charlie Baker, Massachusetts’ governor, declared a state of emergency on Tuesday after seeing its number of those infected with the coronavirus COVID-19 jump from 41 to 92, the Cape Cod Times reports.

As many as 70 of the ill have been linked to a meeting held by the biotech company Biogen at a downtown hotel in Boston.

Diversified was scheduled to hold its Seafood Expo North America at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center, March 15-17, before announcing a postponement roughly a week ago. The event normally draws about 2,000 exhibitors and 20,000 attendees from all over the world.

"We heard from those of you who were concerned about health, safety and travel restrictions, and given the short time before the scheduled event date, and upcoming logistics, we have determined that postponement at this time is unavoidable," Liz Plizga, a Diversified group vice president, said in an email sent March 3.

On Tuesday, Diversified announced that it was postponing its even larger Seafood Expo Global event, scheduled for April 21-23, in Brussels, Belgium.

The Portland, Maine-based event company has promised to provide details for rescheduled conferences shortly.

The Boston convention center is 1.3 miles from the Marriott Long Wharf hotel where about 175 managers working for Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Biogen and about another 125 people came from all over the world, including the heavily infected country of Italy, to attend a meeting held, Feb. 26-27, according to the Boston Herald. The conference included a group dinner held on the first night in a state room on the 33rd floor of another building overlooking the historic Faneuil Hall.

Many of those ill were confirmed as infected after returning to their home states and countries, and one man who traveled to another conference in Florida.

The US on Wednesday morning had 1,039 cases of illness and 32 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering. Twelve states have declared states of emergency.

Baker, who had earlier declared the risk of contracting the virus was low, said on Tuesday that the risk has grown. He explained that his declaration gave him greater power to take actions, like shutting down events with large gatherings of people or gaining access to buildings or stockpiling protective gear if needed without getting bogged down in existing paperwork requirements, the newspaper explained. Baker is also restricting travel by executive branch employees.

The governor urged older individuals to avoid large crowds and nursing homes to bar those who have traveled overseas or who show symptoms.

The city canceled its St. Patrick's Day parade, an event that was scheduled for March 15 and has included 20,000 participants and drawn up to a million spectators.

With the news that the Seafood Expo Global in Brussels has been postponed — read more here — DNB and Fish Pool have had to cancel their farmed salmon-focused seminar, due to be held the day before, April 20.

Fish Pool will refund the ticket fee, it confirmed.

The Bank of England has announced an emergency cut in UK interest rates to shore up the economy amid the coronavirus outbreak, reports the BBC.

Policymakers reduced rates from 0.75% to 0.25%, taking borrowing costs back down to the lowest level in history. The Bank said it would also free up billions of pounds of extra lending power to help banks support firms.

It comes as the UK chancellor is expected to announce further measures to support growth and jobs in the Budget later.

Prices of bluefin tuna and Wagyu beef, two luxury food items famously linked to Japan, are dropping in the country as the novel coronavirus outbreak has canceled parties and gatherings.

Additionally, tourism has plummeted and Japanese consumers are largely staying at home and stocking up on perishable goods, the Japan News reported.

The newspaper quoted a manager at a high-end "yakiniku" restaurant in Tokyo's Ginza district that depends heavily on Chinese tourism and business dinners.

"[Recently] most of our customers are friends or couples, and there are not many groups. Not a single Chinese customer has come," the restaurant official told the newspaper.

At the Toyosu wholesale fish market, wholesale prices for bluefin during the Feb. 21 to Feb. 27 period averaged JPY 4,134 per kilogram ($39.58/kg), down by around 27% year-on-year, the newspaper reported.

Italy has extended its strict coronavirus quarantine measures, which include a ban on public gatherings, to the entire country, BBC reported.

Prime minister Giuseppe Conte said the measures, which come into effect on Tuesday, were to defend the most fragile members of society. This comes after the coronavirus death toll jumped 97 on Monday to 463. People will only be permitted to travel for work or family emergencies.

The measures are expected to hit the Italian consumption of goods, including seafood, Undercurrent reported.

As part of a presentation on the state of the warmwater shrimp market at the North Atlantic Seafood Forum, Mike Berthet read out an email sent to him by the Global Aquaculture Alliance's China team on March 4.

They said that prices for farmed "whiteleg" shrimp imported into China had fallen to levels "below the worst that we have seen".

"The catering industry was down 90% during the spring festival. Travel bans have meant delivering shrimp to parts of China has been very difficult."

The latest, though, has seen a 6-9% rebound in prices for shrimp brought in from Ecuador, while locally-produced shrimp have improved 15%.

The strength of e-commerce and retail deliveries has been highlighted, with sales via these platforms triple the usual levels.

"It's looking much better here now, the numbers of new cases [of COVID-19] are dropping. It's estimated the country will remain on high alert until mid-April, but then foodservice will be looking to really push a rebound."

New emergency measures imposed to contain the outbreak of coronavirus over the weekend in Italy — the country worst affected by COVID-19 in Europe — are expected to further hit the consumption of goods, including seafood.

In the early hours of Sunday morning, Italian prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, approved a decree blocking the movement of 16 million people living in the region of Lombardy and 14 other provinces in northern Italy. Movement in and out and within those areas have been restricted with immediate effect until April 3

Bars and restaurants are allowed to stay open from 6 am to 6 pm as long as they ensure at least a meter of distance between customers — with the threat of suspension of activity in case of violations — while malls and markets will be open only from Monday to Friday.

Read the full story here.

UPDATE: Irish Skipper Expo 2020 has been rescheduled to take place on Sept. 4 and 5 at the UL Sport Arena in Limerick.

Add two more conferences of importance to the seafood industry that have been postponed over concerns related to the escalation of the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak.

Mara Media, the organizer of Irish Skipper Expo 2020, described as Ireland's "flagship fisheries show", announced Friday that the event originally scheduled for March 13-14, in Limerick, has been postponed and will be rescheduled for a later date.

Hugh Bonner, managing director of the Irish events company, said he received advice from Health Service Executive Ireland that while the virus is in the containment phase in his country, it is a "rapidly evolving situation" and rescheduling is the "only sensible and pragmatic option". "This is not a decision we have taken lightly, and we appreciate the difficulties this will cause because of the planning involved in attending the expo, but the wellbeing of exhibitors and visitors is of paramount importance to us. We will be working with our show contractors, and with the wider fishing industry, to put in place a new date which will be announced as soon as possible. We would like to thank our exhibitors for their valued support at this challenging time."

Also postponed is the joint Alimentaria and Hostelco trade shows, originally scheduled for April 20-23 at the Gran Via venue, in Barcelona, Spain. The decision was made by the events’ organizing committees, according to Fira de Barcelona, the city's trade fair agency. The events are being rescheduled for September 14-17.

The two trade shows jointly make up one of the world's largest international events for the food, gastronomy and catering equipment industry, with more than 4,500 exhibiting companies from 70 countries and about 150,000 visitors from 156 countries.

The world count of coronavirus cases exceeded 100,000 for the first time on Friday morning. Ireland had six confirmed cases, while Spain had 360.

All eyes are now on Diversified Communications, which announced earlier this week that it was postponing Seafood Expo North America, originally scheduled for Boston, Massachusetts, March 15-17, as first reported by Undercurrent News. The Portland, Maine-based company said it would announce a new date and location in North American within a month.

Diversified has yet to postpone its larger Seafood Expo Global event, currently scheduled for Brussels, Belgium, April 23-25.

The illness count has grown to 109 in Belgium.

Australian seafood prices are falling and fishers are pleading for help as major international markets shut down due to the spread of coronavirus, reports ABC.

Prices paid to fishermen for shrimp, scallops and lobsters have dropped by a third and could slide further as Asian markets continue to hold off buying seafood.

That could mean cheaper prices for domestic shoppers, but agricultural forecaster ABARES has predicted an AUD 389 million ($257.2m) fall in the value of the fisheries and aquaculture industries, to AUD 2.81 billion.

Peter McGowan, of major West Australian scallop operation McBoats, is among those feeling the pinch. He said the business would try to grow its local sales to offset some losses, and was trying to determine how they could continue fishing.

"We need assistance from our banks, and we need the locals to buy our product so we can actually have somewhere to go with it. Scallops have never been at this sort of price, it's a world-class product we produce and so its a great time for people to try it."

Now that Diversified Communications has indefinitely postponed Seafood Expo North America (SENA) 2020, a.k.a. the Boston (Massachusetts) seafood show, over concerns about the coronavirus, COVID-19, another difficult decision looms for the US conference company: What to do about the even larger-in-scale Seafood Expo Global, in Brussels, Belgium, April 21-23?

Diversified is showing 1,613 exhibitors for its European event with almost two months to go, about 417 (21%) short of the 2,030 exhibitors featured at the May 2019 expo.

The Boston seafood show was looking similarly off its mark on Tuesday afternoon with 1,099 exhibitors, 15 fewer than Monday, 22 fewer than late last week and 235 (18%) less than the 1,334 exhibits present in Boston in 2019, when Diversified sent its email announcing its decision to not hold the event on its scheduled March 15-17 dates, as first reported by Undercurrent News.

Click here for the full story.

Infofish has postponed the 16th edition of the World Tuna Trade Conference & Exhibition over the spread of the coronavirus COVID-19, the organizer announced.

The conference — which is held in Bangkok, Thailand every two years — was supposed to be run from May 27-29, chaired by Tri Marine International veteran Phil Roberts.

Infofish, Roberts and the Thai Tuna Industry Association decided the risk of holding an event in Bangkok was too high as COVID-19 spreads from China to the rest of the world.

"We realize that this may come as a disappointment to conference delegates, exhibitors, co-organizers, sponsors, supporters, collaborators and visitors," said Infofish.

The conference had already attracted confirmations of attendance from speakers and participants, and the exhibition booths had been fully taken up, said Infofish.

"The decision to reschedule was, therefore, a difficult one, driven by our responsibility to ensure the best interests of all those concerned, and particularly their good health. Our prime consideration was the safety and wellbeing of all those who would have attended TUNA 2020 this year," Infofish said. "We are monitoring the situation closely and will be announcing the new dates based on global developments as they unfold."

On March 3, Undercurrent News reported the postponing of the conference was being mulled, the same day Diversified Communications made the decision to put off the Seafood Expo North America (SENA) show. SENA was due to be held in Boston, Massachusetts from March 15-17.

Sources are keenly watching what happens with Seafood Expo Global, to be held in Brussels, Belgium for the last time from April 21-23, as COVID-19 is spreading fast in Europe.

The impact of the coronavirus COVID-19 has dominated the Wednesday at the North Atlantic Seafood Forum (NASF) in Bergen, Norway, when salmon and whitefish sessions were held and Undercurrent News is blogging live.

According to the most pessimistic forecasts, global markets will have to absorb as much as 22% more salmon in 2020 than in 2019 in order to make up for the impact of coronavirus, said Kontali Analyse's Ragnar Nystoyl.

COVID-19 removes an "unknown number" of salmon consumption opportunities of the "out-of-home" sector, Nystoyl said, in the NASF salmon session.

Read more here.

Then, China's pollock processing capacity will be "at 100%" by the end of March, after the COVID-19 delayed the return of workers to plants, said an executive with a big Russian fishing company.

The delay had seen the prices for Russian headed and gutted (H&G) pollock dive, but they have since firmed slightly to around $1,380 per-metric-ton for 25cm-plus H&G raw material, sources told Undercurrent.

"In China, they have started to buy raw material. They have reached 60% of the capacity and will be at full capacity at the end of the month," said Frank Temme, the managing director of Pacific Rim Group, the sale arm for Russian Fishery Company (RFC), one of the country's largest fishing companies.

However, RFC, "as a producer, is looking to alternatives", he said, in the NASF whitefish session.

Read more here.

Icelandic fishing and processing group Samherji has implemented a policy to try and prevent the spread of COVID-19, it has announced.

No visits will be allowed at the company's premises for an indefinite period due to uncertainty related to coronavirus, it said.

In addition, employees have been encouraged to minimize travel as much as possible and to cancel travel to areas defined as risk zones where COVID-19 infection is widespread. "This is done according to recommendations from the Icelandic directorate of health." Furthermore, Samherji has directed employees to respect quarantine instructions if they have recently visited defined risk areas, it said.

Sixteen coronavirus disease infections have now been confirmed in Iceland. In all cases, the infected individuals are Icelandic citizens that had been traveling abroad.

"Samherji is currently preparing a contingency plan according to recommendations from the health authorities if there is any suspicion of contagion among crews onboard vessels in the company's fleet. This plan will be presented to crew members as soon as it is available."

The 2020 Boston seafood show has been postponed indefinitely, show organizer Diversified Communications has informed its exhibitors.

In an email sent March 3, Liz Plizga, a Diversified group vice president, wrote that the COVID-19 outbreak has made it necessary to delay the three-day show known as Seafood Expo North America that was set to begin March 15 at the Boston Convention Center.

"We heard from those of you who were concerned about health, safety and travel restrictions, and given the short time before the scheduled event date, and upcoming logistics, we have determined that postponement at this time is unavoidable," Plizga said.

Read the full story here.

The organizer of the Tuna 2020 conference and exhibition, which is currently expected to go ahead as planned on May 27-29 at the Shangri-La Hotel in Bangkok, Thailand, are closely monitoring the coronavirus outbreak situation.

Earlier this month, Thailand has recorded its first coronavirus death, the Bangkok Post reported. Last week, some sources told Undercurrent News that the conference could be postponed or canceled amid the coronavirus outbreak but no decision to do so has been taken so far.

"We are currently monitoring the situation with our counterparts in Bangkok," one of the conference organizers told Undercurrent on March 2.

This comes after the head of China's seafood industry association told Undercurrent that Chinese companies’ attendance at the Brussels seafood show in April may be in doubt given the recent spread of the new coronavirus in Europe. The attendance at the upcoming Boston show is also being impacted.

Reports on how the Covid-19 outbreak is affecting supply chains and disrupting manufacturing operations around the world are increasing daily. But the worst is yet to come, according to the Harvard Business Review (HBR).

"We predict that the peak of the impact of Covid-19 on global supply chains will occur in mid-March, forcing thousands of companies to throttle down or temporarily shut assembly and manufacturing plants in the US and Europe," HBR wrote.

The most vulnerable companies are those which rely heavily or solely on factories in China for parts and materials, according to HBR. The activity of Chinese manufacturing plants has fallen in the past month and is expected to remain depressed for months, HBR said.

A major US natural and healthy foods trade show that was scheduled to take place this week has been postponed indefinitely due to coronavirus concerns.

Natural Products Expo West 2020 had been set to be held March 4 to 6 at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California.

The New Hope Network, which organizes the show, said that they’ve received a spate of cancellations in recent days leading them to believe that attendance would be 40% to 60% lower this year due to the outbreak. The show, which was expected to see attendance of over 86,000 people across all sectors of the food, beverages and natural products space, was expected to draw participation from several seafood companies including Bumble Bee Foods, Healthy Oceans Seafood Company, Blue Harbor Fish Company and several others.

New Hope said in a statement that it hopes to announce a new date and location for this year's show by April.

"Over the last 48 hours, we have worked with the community to try and serve those who want the show by delivering a great experience, and support those who want it, but not now, by working on credits and alternatives," the organizers said in a statement.

Osborne Burke, general manager of the Victoria Co-Operative Fisheries Ltd., in Neils Harbour, Nova Scotia, and president of the Nova Scotia Seafood Alliance, has been in daily contact with his customers in China and other parts of Asia since the coronavirus outbreak began late last year. He remains cautiously optimistic that things will soon return to a more normal state but has been advising his colleagues that the situation remains uncertain, reports the Cape Breton Post.

In particular, Burke has some concerns that the sudden drop in seafood consumption in China could still hit prices at the docks in Cape Breton, in the northern part of the Canadian province, this spring, the Canadian newspaper reports.

"I talk to people in China every day," Burke is quoted as saying. "I was chatting back and forth with a consultant that we’ve been involved with who currently is in Taiwan, her home area, but they’re heading back to Shanghai tomorrow and they’re saying that things are starting to open up. People are starting to go back to work. It's kind of a gradual start-up.

"…So things will change and they’re saying ‘Look, give it a month or so, or two months, and you’ll see things probably coming back to normal,’ and the reality that they believe, in their being from China, is that once things are back up and running, there’ll probably be significant celebrations in China to the fact that the coronavirus has now come down to a manageable level or whatever. And at that time, you’re going to see a peak demand for all kinds of products going back in there again. So they’re hopeful," he said.

The harvesters in Canada's largest lobster fisheries (lobster fishing areas 33 and 34) were still in the middle of their seasons (late November to late May) when the coronavirus hit China, but the impact on Nova Scotia's springtime fisheries (LFAs 27-32), which include the Cape Breton area, remain up in the air.

"There could be a reduction in prices paid for seafood," Burke said. "It will depend on how the market has climbed back up by that time. I think there will be a gradual return to normal and will that have a potential impact on shore prices to harvesters in this coming spring? It's a very real possibility."Market conditions vary ever year, Burke said.

"We’re all hopeful that it won't be a major reduction starting off in the spring and that things will be back to normal by then. Of course, there's no guarantees."

Nova Scotia seafood exports have more than doubled in the past seven years — from $922 million in 2012 to $2.2 billion in 2019 — and a major part of that growth has been into Asia in general and China in particular, the newspaper reported. The estimated total value of Cape Breton seafood exports is about $342 million, based on a study by the Cape Breton Partnership.

Manufacturing activity in China plunged in February as the coronavirus took hold, the latest data revealed, reports Financial Times.

The manufacturing purchasing managers’ index, one of the first official economic indicators published since the coronavirus outbreak, fell to 35.7 this month, an all-time low and down from 50 in January, China's National Bureau of Statistics announced on Saturday, the business paper reported.

A figure below 50 indicates a contraction in activity compared with the previous month, as judged by the managers who fill in the PMI survey.

Early figures show New Zealand exports may have taken a NZD 300 million ($188m) hit due to disruption caused by Covid-19, with a significant drop in forestry, meat and seafood exports, reports New Zealand Herald.

Preliminary figures based on export intentions – as reported by New Zealand Customs — showed that exports to China were down 8% in the past four weeks, compared with the same period a year ago.

In dollar terms, trade to China was down by around NZD 100m on the same time in 2019, and around NZD 300m below what they would have been if recent trends in export growth to China had continued.

The impact of the coronavirus is being felt now in the Indonesian province of Jambi, where most of some 1,300 shrimp harvesters have stopped working due to losing their largest export market, China, Mongabay, an environmental news service, reports.

The province, which is part of Sumatra Island, has seen its exports plunge in value from 23 billion rupiah ($1.6 million) in December 2019, to just 1 billion rupiah ($72,000) so far in February 2020, according to provincial government data. Domestic demand, primarily from Jakarta, hasn't been enough to make up for the loss of business to China.

Shrimp fishermen staged a demonstration in the provincial capital in mid-February to demand government assistance, but there was no immediate response, according to the news service.

One trader told the publication that, in the absence of government support, he and others have joined forces to try to ship more of their shrimp to Japan.

The global seafood trade is coping better with the ongoing coronavirus outbreak than is generally being reported, one UK supplier told Undercurrent News.

He said farmed shrimp prices were not "crashing" across the board, with larger Indian shrimp actually firming in price. "The simple fact is that demand exceeds supply. Crisis? What crisis?"

Undercurrent's prices portal shows Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat prices have been flat for several weeks now.

His firm's chief Chinese squid tube supplier saw 50% of its workforce return to work last week, and is now back in production, he went on.

"It anticipates being two weeks off the pace in fulfilling the contract which we placed last November, for production and shipment after Chinese New Year, from late February through to late April."

Crayfish trading centers in Hubei province — the epicenter of the coronavirus — are using mobile payments and door-to-door collection to help revive trade, reports People's Daily.

Hubei province supplies around half of the crayfish in China, the world's largest producer of the crustacean.

With local trading centers closed to prevent large gatherings and infection, buyers and sellers agree prices in groups on WeChat, a social media platform, then collect the crayfish at designated points or the farm itself, according to the report.

Zhu Jinlei, general manager at local company Qiannet Group, told People's Daily his firm bought 58 kilograms of crayfish directly from a farm in Qiangjiang prefecture. The firm paid CNY 40 per jin ($5.73/500g).

"We sent six employees to the farm to collect the crayfish. The crayfish are good quality. Now they are ready to be shipped to Ningbo [in Zhejiang province]." He added vehicles are sprayed with disinfectant before departure.

As of Feb. 25, Qiannet Group had opened distribution lines to Hangzhou, Shaoxing and Ningbo, with new lines likely to be added in the near future, said the firm.

Keith Colwell, fisheries and aquaculture minister for the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, said Wednesday that he believes it will be "three or four months at least" before the exporting of lobster to China resumes due to the coronavirus outbreak, The Chronicle Herald, a Canadian newspaper reports.

"I don't know how long it's going to last, nobody does," he reportedly said. "I can't answer that question. It's a blip at the moment, but again, we don't know how long it's going to last."

A month ago Colwell was quoted as saying the loss of demand for live lobster in China would be a "minor blip".

"The important thing with this is, it's different than if we lost a market," he reportedly said. "We have not lost a market. The market is there. We are solidly established in the market. As soon as the population in China can get out again, go back to restaurants … we’ll be back in the marketplace."The newspaper also noted that Air Canada this week announced that it was cancelling flights to China until April.

The organizers of the North Atlantic Seafood Forum (NASF) have advised the event is going ahead as planned, stating they are in daily contact with the local authorities of Bergen, Norway.

"We are aware of the situation with the COVID-19, the coronavirus, and we monitor the situation closely. We…follow the guidelines given by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. We recommend our guests to maintain good hand hygiene and cough etiquette throughout the conference."

The hotel where NASF 2020 is to take place has increased the frequency of cleaning and disinfection, and has made "even more hand sanitizers available for everyone to use", organizers added.

Shares in Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products — China's largest shrimp company — have returned to levels before the coronavirus outbreak, after the company reported a boost in e-commerce sales.

Guolian's share price dived 18% in the two days after the Shenzhen stock exchange reopened on Feb. 3. The reopening followed an extended pause in trading over Chinese New Year due to coronavirus.

But the listed seafood company's share price bounced back from CNY 3.45 ($0.49) to CNY 4.30 on Wednesday (Feb. 26), level with early January, after the firm reported a surge in e-commerce sales.

"Since the outbreak, most of the industry's offline channels have been impacted, and consumer behavior habits have partially shifted to online transactions. However, this has ushered in opportunities for the company's e-commerce business," the firm said Tuesday (Feb. 25) on investor relations platform East Money.

Preliminary figures show cumulative e-commerce sales in the first half of February this year exceeded the whole of February's e-commerce sales last year, it said.

The Chinese market for coldwater shrimp has remained surprisingly healthy in recent weeks, a European trader told Undercurrent News.

China, which took big volumes of cooked, shell-on shrimp for Chinese New Year, "has actually held up quite well", he said.

"It looks like they had good sales for New Year and most of them sold out, so they were successful in moving the product. Now requests are coming in again."

Prices for these shrimp remain stable and, unlike many species for which China is an important market, have not fallen.

"Chinese importers are asking for more product, and even some new customers there are cropping up, which is the sign of a healthy market. It's a welcome surprise."

The number of exhibitors from coronavirus-hit China at the 2020 Seafood Expo North America (SENA) is currently at only 22, compared to 200 Chinese companies that had booths in 2019, according to the website of organizer Diversified Communications.

This 88% year-on-year drop in Chinese companies exhibiting at the 2020 SENA, known as the Boston seafood show, means the total number of exhibitors is down 15% to 1,126, from 1,334 in 2019. The three-day SENA show begins on March 15.

Executives with Diversified were not immediately available to comment to Undercurrent News on whether these numbers were current. But sources are suggesting that attendance from Chinese companies will be minimal.

The coronavirus has now killed over 2,700 people, with most of the deaths occurring in China. However, coronavirus is also now present on every continent aside from Antarctica, with a case just reported in Latin America, in Brazil.

Click here for the full story.

Owing to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, The Economist Group has canceled the World Ocean Summit 2020 that was scheduled to take place in Tokyo, Japan, on March 9 and 10.

The cancellation comes amid a tightening of travel restrictions as the Japanese government attempts to halt the spread of COVID-19 from nearby China.

"We have the privilege of convening each year an extraordinary group of ocean experts, policymakers and businesses to exchange ideas and inspire actions that help build a vital and sustainable ocean economy," Charles Goddard, executive director of the group's World Ocean Initiative.

The group will now focus on the UN Ocean Conference in Lisbon in June and the World Ocean Summit in 2021.

North American processing giant High Liner Foods is looking at alternative options to China in light of the spread of coronavirus, the company said in its fourth-quarter earnings report.

As previously reported by Undercurrent News, the return to processing in China has been impacted by workers not being able to return to plants after Lunar New Year.

Chinese processors "are central to High Liner's supply chain operating efficiently and, therefore, it is closely monitoring the current coronavirus disease outbreak ("COVID-19″) and reviewing options, should they be required, to mitigate the impact of any prolonged disruption in supply" from any of its Chinese suppliers, the company said.

High Liner also continues to "closely monitor developments" related to US tariffs on seafood products imported from China "and any potential recovery of previously paid tariffs".

Excluding any impact related to the current COVID-19 outbreak and US tariffs on seafood products imported from China, the pricing and supply of seafood raw materials for the products sold by High Liner "are expected to remain relatively stable throughout 2020", the company said.

A new study from Chinese researchers indicates that the outbreak of COVID-19 did not originate in a seafood wholesale market in Wuhan, China, as first thought, but that the busy traffic at the market contributed to its spread, according to the South China Morning Post.

Researchers from Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden under the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Institute for Brain Research recently wrote in a study that the virus was likely imported from elsewhere. However, they did not suggest where.

Researchers came to the conclusion after sequencing the genomic data of 93 virus samples, the newspaper said.

"The crowded market then boosted SARS-CoV-2 circulation and spread it to the whole city in early December 2019," it said.

Japan, another one of the world's major seafood markets, is now beginning to feel some effects from the growing coronavirus outbreak and changing its approach, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.

The government had earlier urged companies to adopt remote working, stagger shifts and hold online meetings to reduce the spread of the illness in the country where an expert government panel has confirmed 146 infections in more than 16 different prefectures.

The numbers exclude cases from an infected cruise ship and Japanese evacuees from China, according to the article.

The expert panel has recommended changing its strategy of keeping the infection out altogether to containing it and slowing its spread. It no longer makes sense to test everyone who might’ve been exposed, as doing so would overwhelm the healthcare system, the group has reportedly determined.

"The biggest objective of our response from this point should be to control the speed of the infection's spread and minimize the number of deaths and people with severe symptoms," the panel said, adding that the next one to two weeks would be decisive in preventing the spread of the virus.

Prime minister Shinzo Abe asked companies to adopt the new strategy after his cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

Diversified Communications, the Portland, Maine-based organizers of Seafood Expo Global, scheduled for Brussels, Belgium, April 21-23, said Monday that they are "closely monitoring [the] evolving situation" following recent reports of coronovirus victims in Europe.

Based on the latest reports, as of Tuesday morning Italy had 283 cases of the virus and has experienced seven deaths. China, by comparison, had 77,660 of the reported 80,350 cases.

"We understand there are concerns and questions around the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in relation to the event and would like to reassure you that the health and safety of our exhibitors, attendees and staff are our priority," the company said on its new dedicated coronavirus-related news site.

The company added: "We are working with the venue and local authorities responsible to assess risks and protocols and following the WHO recommendations on actions to be taken around the COVID-19. Based on their guidance, Diversified Communications will implement the most effective additional preventive measures as necessary."

China's continued closure to seafood imports has prompted Alaskan geoduck harvesters to again postpone the fishery's opening, KTOO reports.

A group of harvesters open the season each year by engaging in test fishing, but given the closure of the Chinese market, the clam divers have decided not to carry out the tests. The divers will meet again on March 5 to determine if the geoduck market has recovered enough to begin pulling the shellfish from the water.

Harvesters normally would get $5 to $10 per pound and sometimes more for their catch, which is often exported live to China.

Organizers of the Aquafeed Horizons 2020 conference, the specialized conference for aquaculture feed professionals due to take place March 24, 2020, in Bangkok, Thailand, have canceled the meeting.

"This was a very difficult decision, and we waited as long as we could in the hope that the coronavirus epidemic would slow, but unfortunately we are not seeing that," said Suzi Dominy, publisher of Aquafeed.

Moving ahead with the event would have been "irresponsible", and the organizer felt it didn't have a choice, she added.

The 13th Aquafeed Horizons was slated to take place as part of the combined Victam Asia grain and feed expo / VIV Health & Nutrition Asia trade fair and forum. This event is still due to go ahead as planned, according to its website.

Prices at the farm for shrimp in Guangdong province, south China, have recovered slightly after diving to at least a seven-year low, according to local reports and Undercurrent News‘ price portal.

In week five, farmgate prices for live vannamei shrimp, 60 pieces per kilogram, dived to CNY 34.50 per kilogram ($4.91/kg), the lowest weekly average price in the Undercurrent prices data set for the product, which goes back to 2013.

In week seven, however, prices had recovered to CNY 44.70/kg, the portal shows.

Local media reports corroborate an increase in trading activity and prices in south China, according to Undercurrent‘s reporter in China, Hu Luyi.

Four of eight processing lines are operational at China's largest shrimp company's recently opened ‘mega-factory’.

Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products told local media despite reduced staff numbers the plant in Zhanjiang, Guangdong province, is producing "dozens of [metric] tons of seafood".

"Less than half the usual number of staff are back working at the plant," said Cao Luoding, director of the production at the plant. "Thanks to increased automation, production processes are more efficient; though only four lines of eight are working we are still producing dozens of tons of seafood."

Guolian's mega-plant, which the firm said was built at a cost of CNY 780 million ($109m), opened last summer. It can produce up to 120t of seafood products daily, focussing mainly on shrimp products, according to the firm.

An analysis of cargo ship movements in and out of Chinese ports since the January spread of the Covid-19 virus shows a sharp drop-off in trade flows.

An index relying on ship data created by the Boston, US-based firm Cargo Metrics that was published in Freight Waves, declined some 27% between Feb. 7 and Feb. 17.

The firm's CEO, Scott Borgerson, said that the index shows Chinese imports are "totally in freefall".

"It's mainly dry bulk – iron ore and coal – followed by energy. There was actually a slight uptick in container imports in terms of mass being offloaded," Dan Brutlag, the firm's head of trading signal and data product, said.

CargoMetrics’ data covers energy, dry, container activity, and other activity, Brutlag said.

"Our model is based primarily on the net mass transferred by a vessel," he said.

The Global Aquaculture Alliance (GAA) will allow Chinese processing plants, farms, hatcheries and feed mills that are certified under its Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) program extensions to their re-certification deadlines due to the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak.

The GAA said in a statement that it would, on a case by case basis, consider giving facilities that are due to be audited for annual re-certification in the near term or are "due to submit corrective actions for non-conformances cited during a recent audit".

"GAA understands that the outbreak is a unique situation and is working with its associates in China to ensure that they’re getting the support that they require," the GAA said.

Chinese New Year is among the most important shopping carnivals in China, and both seafood prices and sales used to skyrocket during this period. But this year the coronavirus outbreak has turned everything upside down, reports Amy Zhong, of Seafood News.

The imported seafood market has crashed, and industry participants are teetering and working hard to find a way out.

King crabs, for example, are usually popular among Chinese foodies in such holidays, but this year the sales have plummeted. In Shanghai, one of the country's largest markets, there are few buyers, and most sales channels have been blocked. According to one local seller, the city's Jiangyang market has only sold about one or two king crabs within two days in early February.

Due to large sizes and high prices, over 90% of king crabs there are said to be sold through restaurants and catering companies, most of which have closed down and canceled their orders within this Chinese New Year. Because of this, local sellers are faced with unsellable king crabs and great losses.

King crab sales are similarly gloomy in some other cities. One seller from Huangsha market of Guangzhou said that the whole market sold less than 10 king crabs in one day because of this disease outbreak. According to another seller from Nantong of Jiangsu, his sales dived by about 90% compared with the previous holidays, and he had to turn to acquaintances to find buyers.

In addition to the great reduction in sales and prices, sellers are also challenged by problems with cash flow. They have to deal with low revenues and also staff salaries. What's worse, some sellers have stocked more before the holiday, considering shopping frenzy during holidays and greater online sales last year. One Shanghai seller said he had raised the import by over 40%. Now some are on the verge of bankruptcy, while there are hundreds of tons of king crabs in stock.

Salmon sellers in China are also struggling. The average loss is CNY 1,200 for one carton of Norwegian salmon, about CNY 1,300-CNY 1,400 for salmon from the Faroe Islands and between CNY 900 to CNY 1,000 for those from Chile, said one anonymous distributor. Another distributor added that his losses reached about CNY 1 million to CNY 2m by early February, while the number has even exceeded CNY 10m for larger ones.

The whole salmon market was still hustling in the second week of 2020, but distributors have received cancellation calls from more and more restaurants and some other buyers after that. Because salmon were flown to China, it became impossible for distributors to cancel. One Shanghai distributor sold out salmon in stock on Jan. 22 but then got more from Chile which had been ordered earlier. The only choice he had was to process them and wait for the market rebound.

According to another Beijing distributor, he had to sell salmon at CNY 30/kilogram to processing plants, though the cost was VNY 90/kg. No restaurants or supermarkets were buying, and it was impossible to deliver salmon to other cities with logistics companies all stopping delivery service. The situation is especially harsh for distributors in Chengdu and Chongqing.

One retail distributor in Guangzhou was still receiving orders from customers, which was quite rare in this period, but he was still suffering losses. He had to freeze about half of his salmon, and the value of frozen ones dropped to less than a third. In addition, there was a total fixed cost of nearly CNY 200,000 per month, and customers still owed him more than CNY 4m, which resulted in poor cash flow.

To cut seafood waste and economic losses as much as possible, seafood sellers in China are taking various measures. Some have chosen to process seafood while hoping for a better tomorrow. Although seafood value dives to great extents after being frozen, losses are lower in this way.

Another seafood seller said that about 4t of his Boston lobsters have died in storage by mid-February, while some others added that their seafood death rates have increased exponentially.

Considering the limited production capacity of processing plants and Chinese preference to live seafood, there are some others who have furthered cooperation with supermarkets and new retailers like brick-and-mortar stores of Alibaba Group and JD. Alibaba's Hema, for example, has established a partnership with quite a number of seafood companies.

To lure more consumers, its stores are selling seafood at great discounts. For example, king crabs weighing between 2-2.5 kg are sold at CNY 799 each on Feb. 19 in Shanghai stores, while they were priced at CNY 1,199 before this prevalent disease. And compared with traditional sales channels, this new retailer is more advantageous. Its mobile application enables its stores to gain easier access to more consumers, while its cooking service attracts more new-generation customers who find it difficult to cook seafood.

Although it is still uncertain how long it will take for the industry to recover from the disease, things are seemingly getting better. There is an increase in some seafood prices. For example, that of king crabs has raised from CNY 649/kg in this early February to the current CNY 799/kg in Shanghai Hema stores. Moreover, some insiders predict that after the market depression in this first and second quarters, the seafood market is to rejuvenate in the third and fourth ones. Hopefully, most can survive to see that day.

A rock lobster harvester in the Australian island-state of Tasmania is responding to an unexpected surplus by selling his shellfish on the local market, the ABC reported.

According to the broadcaster, when fisherman Scott Inkson found himself shut out of the Chinese market given the ban on live seafood imports, he began selling lobster in the Tasmanian city of Wynyard to locals.

"We thought we needed about two days to sell them and only brought in a quarter of a ton," Mr Inkson said. "After 90 minutes on the wharf, we completely sold out.

He said that because he’d underestimated local demand for rock lobster he had to turn away a 100-meter-long line full of would-be customers.

However, the price for his catch has declined substantially, according to the news service.

The average ex-vessel price for lobster this time last year was about AUD 93 ($62) a kilogram, today it's AUD 60.

The coronavirus has forced the shuttering of Alaska's geoduck fishery, KTOO reports.

Harvesters normally would get $5 to $10 per pound and sometimes more for their catch, but with the Chinese market essentially shut down, the strange-looking clams are going for only about $1/lb, the Alaska radio station quotes dive fisherman Jeremy Leighton as saying.

Though geoducks are native to the Western Hemisphere, Phil Doherty, head of the Southeast Alaska Dive Fisheries Association (SADFA), is quoted as saying that 95% of the catch gets sent across the Pacific to China, where the outbreak has virtually wiped out demand.

Also, geoducks are sold in a live market, so harvesters have only about a four-day window to get them sold, said Leighton, who normally sells his catch to buyers on the docks in Ketchikan.

"Well, most of the divers are just uncertain about what's going to happen," he said. "We’re all sitting on the beach, hoping to go to work."

The 20 divers in the SADFA geoduck committee held an emergency meeting in January and are meeting again on Thursday, according to the article.

"To all of a sudden just shut down, everybody's kind of in shock, you know, not expecting it," Leighton said, "and they’re just like, ‘okay, well, now what do we do?’"

Mowi's Shanghai plant did not close but has been operating below capacity, the company confirmed.

Ola Helge Hjetland, Mowi's group communications director, told Undercurrent News the reporting of the plant's closure was "unfortunately down to a misunderstanding".

"The factory is open, but the production is low due to the lack of demand as previously reported," Hjetland told Undercurrent on Wednesday (Feb. 19).

Norway's Finansavisen previously quoted Mowi CEO Ivan Vindheim as saying Mowi's Shanghai plant had closed.

A large tilapia processor in Hainan, south China, has resumed production after implementing disease containment protocols, reports Xinhua News.

In the photo report, Hainan Xiangtai Fishery's plant in the tilapia-producing province is seen filled with workers; a truck is sprayed with disinfectant on entering the premises; and a lorry driver has his temperature taken, according to the Feb. 18 dispatch.

Last week, four tilapia processing companies in south China confirmed to Undercurrent News they were closed due to strict travel and quarantine restrictions, and they awaited local government approval to reopen.

China's largest seafood wholesale market in Guangzhou, the provincial capital of Guangdong province, has yet to return to its normal state of bustling trade and activity.

On Tuesday (Feb. 18), vendors and customers at Huangsha Aquatic Products Market were few and far between, according to a video reportedly posted online on WeChat the same day (see here). It is a similar scene across much of Guangzhou, according to Undercurrent News‘ reporter in the city, Hu Luyi, with many shops still closed.

Huangsha market's 300 plus vendors trade 210,000 metric tons of seafood worth CNY 7.2 billion ($1.05bn) each year, according to the market's operator. When Undercurrent visited the market in summer 2018, the market was frenetic with trade of everything from live lobster and catfish, to imported geoduck.

Local police had reportedly closed the market, after local authorities banned the live trade of soft-shelled turtles, snakes, frogs, among other aquatic animals, although the closure turned out to be a "rumor", Hu said.

Meanwhile, Huangsha was also the scene of a large loss of rock lobsters imported in preparation for Chinese New Year. The die-off is thought to have occurred when vendors — unable to sell the lobsters — were forced to overstock tanks, leading to the lobsters’ asphyxiation.

Conflicting reports are emerging about the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on the crayfish sector in China, the world's largest producer of the crustacean.

Local media outlet Sina reports in Hubei province — which produces some 50% of crayfish in China — sales, logistics and transportation of crayfish are "completely shut down", citing industry sources, with crayfish dealers still yet to return to work after Spring Festival holidays; "Usually we take just seven days off for Chinese New Year, this year we’re still at home," one crayfish dealer is quoted as saying.

However, the same report says disruption may not be the business wrecker it is for other sectors; Hubei's small-scale, self-sufficient crayfish farms and businesses are less exposed to travel restrictions in the province, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak.

"When the epidemic broke out, a large number of chicken farms in Hubei were trapped, feed was difficult to transport in, and a large number of chickens died. The crayfish sector does not have this problem," the report states.

"The supply chain is relatively complete; crayfish seedling production, crayfish feed processing plants, finished crayfish processing plants, and specialized express logistics companies for finished crayfish are relatively localized."

A dealer in Jingzhou told Sina: "Total production of crayfish in Hubei in 2020 will be the same as in 2019."

The Chinese foodservice sector has been working to find ways to limit the impacts of the viral outbreak since January, reports China.org.

Amid the outbreak nearly all meal reservations and wedding banquets have been canceled, and a large number of restaurants suspended operations, according to a report issued by the China Cuisine Association.

Restaurants that previously relied heavily on eating-in earnings have had to focus on take-out business, hoping the move could help alleviate the pressure from overhead costs such as rent and labor.

"While developing their takeout business may be a contingency plan for many restaurants at the moment, it could be an area they could explore in the future," said Liu Wenjun, deputy president of a cuisine association in Shandong province.

Online food delivery and ticketing services platform Meituan Dianping has initiated a program providing catering services for enterprises that have resumed operations amid the epidemic.

Over 150 catering companies in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen have joined the program.

Alibaba's Hema, a fresh food retailer that offers delivery service, came up with the idea of "sharing employees" with restaurant chains to solve the dual problems of the shortage of deliverymen and surplus of restaurant staff.

As of Feb. 8, over 1,600 restaurant workers had started their new, short-term jobs with Hema in 14 Chinese cities.

Thai Union Group has donated more than 52,000 cans of King Oscar tuna as humanitarian aid in Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, reports ESM Magazine.

The shipment was delivered by a local logistics service and an online food delivery operator in two batches.

The first was given to people working on the Wuhan Leishenshan Hospital Project, one of two new hospitals being built for patients affected by the disease. The second was distributed in more than 15 hospitals in the city including the Wuhan Union Hospital — the main hospital treating people with coronavirus.

Global director of corporate affairs and sustainability at Thai Union, Darian McBain, said part of the company's responsibility was to provide humanitarian assistance through "tuna aid" to help support people living and working in regions where it operates.

The continuing coronavirus outbreak and subsequent disappearance of Chinese demand for rock lobster is hitting harvesters in South Africa and New Zealand hard.

According to 2OceansVibe News, over 90% of South Africa's rock lobster catch is sold to China.

Hazel Wickham of the Cape Lobster Export Association said that orders from China ceased completely on the evening of Jan. 24.

"Most of the tanks are full and people have been told to stop fishing," she said. "If you are in Lambert's Bay or Doring Bay, what else do you go and do if you can't fish?"

South African abalone and oyster sales have also been affected, but the rock lobster sector was particularly hard hit.

That's also true in New Zealand where regulator Fisheries New Zealand is mulling a proposal to allow rock lobster harvesters to carry forward some or all of their uncaught quota, known as annual catch entitlement, into the upcoming fishing season, which begins in April.

According to Waatea News, the New Zealand public has until Feb. 24 to comment on the proposal.

China's General Administration of Customs will implement 10 "core measures" to help normalize trade for importers and exporters, including waiving certain procedures.

The measures include opening up "green channels" to expedite agricultural and food imports at key ports, as well as waiving certain administrative procedures that would occur normally, such as logging changes made to registered importers’ details. Local small and medium-sized businesses will also receive help with import and export declarations until after the epidemic.

The authority, addressing logjams at key ports, said the measures were aimed at "increasing business support and alleviating business difficulties" since the outbreak of the new coronavirus.

Norway exported just 49 metric tons of fresh salmon to China in the two weeks to Feb. 9 compared with 979t over the same two weeks in 2019, according to latest Norwegian trade data from the Norwegian Seafood Council.

Norway's exports of frozen seafood to China remain steady, however; Norway shipped 5,985t of frozen mackerel to China in the first six weeks of this year, up 78% compared with the same period last year.

In weeks five and six, Norway shipped 3,237t of mackerel to the Asian country, up 61% y-o-y.

Some of the drop in Norway's fresh salmon exports is down to an earlier Chinese New Year than in 2019. However, last week Mowi confirmed it had closed its salmon processing plant in Shanghai because of the outbreak of coronavirus.

Zhoushan National Pelagic Fishery Base (ZNPFB) in east China — one of the country's largest seafood industry hubs — is "working hard" to get back to full operations, although it still lacks technical staff and essential raw materials.

On the base's official WeChat over the weekend, photos were posted of workers driving forklift trucks wearing protective masks and inside processing factories.

According to ZNPFB, some 40 seafood companies at ZNPFB — including Zhejiang Industrial Group, a joint venture between a local state-owned enterprise and Japan's Maruha Nichiro, the world's largest seafood company — were granted permission to resume operations if they implement controls on hygiene and quarantine.

However, one problem is a lack of chemicals and technical staff for ZNPFB's wastewater treatment plant.

According to ZNPFB, the plant — which has the capacity to treat 3,000-4,0000 metric tons of wastewater a day — remains closed because it lacks chemicals, lime and technical staff due to continued travel disruption. ZNPFB said it is actively working with local authorities to get hold of the materials.

To view pictures of the huge hub — which covers an area double the size of New York's Central Park — from a visit by Undercurrent News in September of last year click here.

So far this year China has imported 31% less fresh salmon from Norway, according to statistics from the Norwegian Seafood Council (NSC).

The year started brightly, with week three seeing record imports linked to the Chinese New Year celebrations. However, since then, exports have dropped. It's notable that export value has dropped only 1% though, thanks to high salmon prices early in 2020.

In 2019, Norway exported 168,000 metric tons of seafood worth NOK 5.2 billion ($561.4 million) to China. In terms of volume, it was mainly frozen mackerel (47,000t), frozen cod (30,000t), fresh salmon (23,500t), frozen haddock (20,000t), frozen blue halibut (12,000t) and shellfish (670t).

In value terms, Norway exported salmon to China for NOK 1.6bn, mainly as a fresh commodity. Exports of cod were NOK 1bn, mackerel 812m, blue whiting NOK 562m and haddock NOK 553m.

Growth in the Chinese market was 40% from 2018 to 2019, and China was both the largest market for seafood overall and for salmon, the NCS said.

Overall for seafood, Norwegian sales to China in January fell 18% in value and 26% in volume.

"This is due to both a reduction in whitefish exports and a reduced demand for fresh salmon and shellfish," said Victoria Braathen, NSC envoy to China.

"The reduction in whitefish exports is probably due to smaller landings of frozen fish in the season and weather conditions in northern Norway."Most fresh salmon to China is consumed in foodservice, NSC said. "As a result of the outbreak of coronavirus, residents have been encouraged to stay home, and we are seeing a significant decline in demand so far this year."

However, it also noted that "a changing everyday life for Chinese consumers in recent weeks has led to increased sales of groceries and seafood products online".

"Importers and distributors in China reported this week that for frozen seafood products, trade is more or less normal," said Braathen. "Furthermore, it is pointed out that there will be challenges related to domestic transport and logistics. Shanghai Port announced full freezing stock on Thursday and it is urged that the goods be shipped to other ports. For frozen fish, Qingdao is the most important port. Here it is reported that things are going more or less as normal."

Image credit: NSC

Peru has stopped exports to China of fish for human consumption, the country's committee of fisheries and aquaculture of the national society of industries (SNI) said on Feb. 13.

SNI's president, Carlos Milanovitch Nieto, announced that all fishing companies that export seafood for human consumption will stop exporting to China and other Asian countries due to coronavirus.

See the full story here.

The largest salmon farming company in the world, Mowi, has closed its factory in China, as the coronavirus has decimated demand, reports NRK, citing Finansavisen.

Ivan Vindheim, CEO, told the newspaper the company is following the situation closely and Mowi is following the advice of the governing powers.

The Chinese market has stopped completely," he said. The move leaves 50 staff without jobs.

Vindheim said he believes demand will pick up again as soon as the governing powers gain control of the virus.

Diversified Communications, the organizer of Seafood Expo North America, also referred to as the Boston seafood show, released another update regarding the impact of the coronavirus on the upcoming event, Seafood News reports.

Diversified expects to see an "impact in participation from Mainland China". The show, which is set to run from March 15 – 17 this year, attracted more than 22,000 seafood industry professionals in 2019. Based on their stats, China represents about 5% of the combined visitor and exhibitor attendee base, as well as 9% of the exhibit space.

"While the current travel restrictions for those who have been to China will have some affect [sic], the event is focused on accessing the North American seafood market," Diversified explained. "With 80% of our visitors coming from the US, Canada and Mexico, we are confident in the ability to provide important continuity and valuable business connections."

The Japanese restaurant chain Daikiya has pulled an initial public offering (IPO) in Hong Kong as the spread of the coronavirus hits deal-making, reports the South China Morning Post.

The company was planning to raise up to HKD 200 million ($25.75m) through the IPO by selling 100m shares at HKD 1.60 to HKD 2.00 apiece.

"Many promotional events including press conferences and roadshows cannot be held, and companies may not be able to meet their IPO timeline because professional services firms like financial printers are not back to work," said Kenny Tang Sing-hing, chief executive of China Hong Kong Capital Asset Management Co.

The impact will only be short-term, he said, and companies are likely to restore their plans once the epidemic passes.

The Chinese salmon market has ground to a halt with coronavirus, given that 95% of salmon consumption is in restaurants, Mowi CEO Ivan Vindheim said on the company's fourth-quarter earnings call.

Mowi is assuming that China will swiftly resolve the issue, based on the government's past ability to control outbreaks such as SARS, Vindheim said.

"Right now, there is no trade with China of salmon, although you can find the air freight for the salmon," Vindheim said. "It doesn't help because you don't have the clients. And the price is also very high because of the cost of air freight."

Salmon is helped by the fact that it's a truly global product like Coca-Cola or oil and there are many alternative markets for the product, he said. Demand should be theoretically high in Asia without taking into coronavirus into account, and especially for larger sizes, he added.

The number of deaths and new cases from China's coronavirus outbreak spiked dramatically on Thursday after authorities changed the way they count infections, UK's The Telegraph reported.

Hubei province, where the virus emanated from, reported 242 deaths in just one day and 14,840 new patients. This is by far the biggest one-day tally in Hubei since the crisis erupted last month.

The jump raised the death toll to 1,355 and the total number of nationwide infections to nearly 60,000 – just hours after Xi Jinping, China's president, touted "positive results" from the government's drastic measures to contain the virus and a top Chinese expert predicted the epidemic would peak this month.

Dutch giant Parlevliet & Van der Plas has made the decision to move its herring roe production from China to Europe, given the recent difficulties with trading there, CEO Diek Parlevliet told Undercurrent News.

Speaking at the recent Fish International show in Bremen, Germany, Parlevliet said herring roe processing had been moved from Dalian to a plant the company owns on the Baltics.

"It might mean higher processing costs," he conceded, "but there's also lower transport costs, so it might balance out."

"If the current crisis lasts for a while longer there's not much of the seafood sector that isn't going to be affected," he added.

The coronavirus outbreak has also hit Russia's Pacific fishing, as they have been unable to ship their fish across the border to China, he said.

The organizers of the Vietshrimp Aquaculture International Fair 2020 — to be held in Can Tho City, Vietnam — have announced the event has been delayed until later this year.

It had originally been scheduled for Mar. 25-27, but is now slated for June 3-5.

"The safety of exhibitors and visitors has always been a priority to the organizing committee. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused, and thank you for your unconditional support. We wish all health and peace."

Vietnamese exporters are having to put hundreds of tons of shrimp into storage after Chinese traders stopped taking deliveries amid the coronavirus outbreak, reports VN Express International.

Chinese importers have notified Vietnamese shrimp exporters, many of whom had received big orders for shrimp, to stop or delay delivery.

Storage costs are increasing up day by day, said an owner of a shrimp business, who spoke anonymously to the news site. His business had received an order of 600t of shrimp, but was only able to deliver half before the Lunar New Year holiday, the rest headed for storage.

Vietnamese shrimp exporters also complained that negative sentiment induced by the epidemic has made it harder to win new orders from major importers in South Korea, the US or EU.

Shrimp shipments from Ecuador, India and Thailand are also stuck at Chinese ports awaiting customs clearance, reports the news site.

Many ships remain undocked at Chinese ports due to slow or halted cargo handling services. Foreign exporters are also looking for alternative markets like the US or EU, which could affect worldwide demand for Vietnamese shrimp, local exporters said.

Feed production started at factories on Monday after a two-week shutdown, according to China's Ministry of Agriculture.

Around half of Chinese feed factories were set to re-open amid concerns about shortages of animal feed for China's livestock and aquaculture sectors, the ministry said Sunday (Feb. 9).

"According to a survey, the operating rate of feed companies nationwide has reached more than 50%, among which Guangdong, Shandong, Hunan and other big feed-producing provinces have achieved more than 70% of the operating rate," an official from the Ministry of Agriculture said.

"Some large-size companies have operating rates of over 90%," said Kong Liang of the Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council.

Live lobster and crab are no longer available at some of Alibaba Group's Hema bricks-and-mortar and online stores, reports Pengpai News.

Russian king crab and Boston lobster were listed as "sold out today" a reporter for the online publication in China reported Saturday (Feb. 8), when he checked the Hema app.

The lack of availability is likely due to disruption to supplies and demand; prices have also been lowered.

Russian king crab was down from CNY 1,199 ($172) per (2 to 2.5KG / piece), to CNY 649; Boston lobster was CNY 119 per 750-gram lobster, down from CNY 208, the reporter said.

Prices of New Zealand rock lobster and Australian rock lobster were down 30-50%, he said.

To view a photo gallery of Hema when Undercurrent News visited a store in Shanghai click here.

The impact of the coronavirus crisis in China, where the death toll has gone over 1,000 people, is seeing live crab diverted from Russia to South Korean and other Asian countries.

There is concern that, with the additional crab that was destined for China, there will be too much live king crab and snow crab delivered for the South Korean market, wrote Les Hodges, a crab sector veteran and consultant, in a market update sent to Undercurrent News. "The producers will also try to increase live sales to Japan although in 2019 the Japanese market for live crab is not large."

It's likely there will be a "significant reduction or suspension" of fishing for live blue king and opilio snow crab in Russia until the virus situation in China is resolved. Harvesters are saying initially one-to-three months, "although no one really knows", wrote Hodges.

As of Jan. 28, there was about 450 metric tons of live blue king crab and 236t of live snow crab on trampers which was originally scheduled to be delivered to northern China. However, after Jan. 27 the vessels diverted and are moving mainly toward South Korea to sell the cargo. There is said to also be an additional estimated 130-140t currently onboard catching vessels comprised primarily of blue king crab, opilio and bairdi snow crab, wrote Hodges.

"Unfortunately, It is not possible currently to reprocess the live crab into sections and clusters. The capacity of fishing vessels currently set up to process frozen product is limited," according to Hodges.

Prices have dropped in South Korea. For live king crab, prices have gone from $42 per kilogram to $26/kg CNF Donghae and from $27/kg to $23/kg CNF Donghae on live snow crab, according to Korean customs service data.

In the US market, there is little opportunity to quickly increase sales, as the live king crab market is small.

"The live king crab and snow crab could, of course, be processed into cooked frozen crab. However, at this time the capacity of the Russian crab vessels to produce frozen crab is limited. Unless this capacity increases one would expect to see 2020 imports of king and snow crab similar to 2019," wrote Hodges.

Crab sellers in the Indian state of West Bengal are paying a heavy price for the impact of the coronavirus on consumption in China, their main market, reports The Telegraph India.

The Bengali district of East Midnapore, which has nearly 100 kilometers of coastline, exports more than INR 1 billion ($14.02 million) of crabs and INR 20bn ($280.42m) worth of shrimp internationally every year. A bulk of the crabs are sent to China during the Lunar New Year festive season.

Last Wednesday, members of the East Midnapore Crab Farmers’ Welfare Association submitted a memorandum at the office of the district fisheries department mentioning that their incomes had dropped by over 50% in the past month.

"The Chinese exports used to be our lifeline. Now that it has stopped, we need help," said a farmer, adding that roughly 5,000 fish farmers and more than 10,000 fishermen had been impacted by the fallout of the coronavirus on the local economy of East Midnapore.

"Earlier, we used to export crabs at INR 1,200 a kg. Now, we have lowered the price to INR 600 and still there are no buyers," said 45-year-old Anirban Kamila from Nayachar.

"We don't have the funds to assist them right now. We will take up the issue with state-level officials soon," said Ashim Mahanta, assistant director for fisheries in the state.

District officials said that although no official instruction had been issued by the shipping ministry regarding freezing commerce with China, traders had themselves taken such a decision over the past couple of weeks in light of the rising number of coronavirus cases.

"Haldia port, for example, has told all its importers and exporters that if any ship arrives from China, it will be isolated and disallowed from unloading. Its crew won't be allowed to mix with local staff before all health checks are done," said Haldia port general manager of marine, Udayan Ray.

"Following the instructions, traders reduced the commerce by themselves, even though there is no government instruction yet," he added.

Sources said that other than Haldia port, seafood exports from East Midnapore are routed to China through Chennai and Calcutta ports.

Jamaica's B&D Trawling may have to cut half of its 200 workers due to the dive in demand for live lobster in China, due to the spread of coronavirus, its CEO told the Jamaica Gleaner.

CEO Roderick Francis told the Gleaner up to two weeks ago that B&D was exporting three shipments per week of live spiny lobster to China, totaling 20,000 pounds.

But as the Chinese authorities began adopting strict measures to control the spread of the virus, he said, the company has basically been shut off from its market.

"In the first place, you cannot get anything in since the borders are closed, and in megacities like Shanghai and Shenzhen, persons are simply not coming on the road, with all restaurants closed. It's very hard to see such cities become a ghost town at a time when they should be lively," Francis said.

B&D Trawling has been shipping live lobsters to China for over two years and only got the certification to export frozen lobsters in November 2019. Its first shipment of frozen lobster left Jamaica in December and arrived in China last month.

"Thankfully, our frozen lobster container arrived two weeks before the major outbreak. It was accepted in as the first frozen container and it was well-received," Francis said.

He notes that while there is still some demand for frozen lobster in Shandong Province and the capital, Beijing, the lucrative live lobster market is totally dead.

Francis estimates that it will take six months to a year for the live lobster business to come back to pre-coronavirus levels.

He wants the Jamaican authorities to reopen the now-closed conch fishing season. However, the fisheries ministry said that won't happen until March 31, at the earliest.

Tyson Foods, the largest beef, chicken and pork exporter in North America, predicts China will import a massive amount of all protein once ports and trade resume following the coronavirus panic.

"I would expect that once we get past the coronavirus incident whenever that might be, I do think that there's going to be very strong demand coming out of that," Tyson CEO Noel White said on the company's first-quarter earnings call. "But trying to estimate what that time period is going to be is not possible at this point."

His thoughts echo those of Vietnam's Navico — see a blog post below.

There are some other pearls of wisdom from White, a 35-year Tyson Foods veteran, that the seafood industry should pay attention to. White predicted that the spread of African swine fever (ASF) and coronavirus will expedite the demise of wet markets in China, which is still the main channel for seafood distribution.

Second is big demand.

White predicted that "we are at the very early stages of the global demand shifts" that are expected from the impact of ASF and will positively all other proteins.

Tyson recently boosted estimates for its chicken business based on an expected upturn of demand from China. And it is already seeing a 600% year-on-year increase in pork orders from China because of ASF, or at least until the outbreak of coronavirus.

Tyson bought Keystone Foods in December 2018, a unit of Marfrig Global Foods, in a $2.16 billion transaction that saw it scoop up a business unit that makes coated pollock for Filet-o-Fish sandwiches for McDonald's. Tyson also bought plant-based shrimp maker New Wave Foods last September.

The secretary of the Shrimp Association of Tamil Nadu has advised Indian farmers to harvest shrimp early and delay stocking.

Durai Murugan said he is "hearing reports" shrimp market prices are going to go down "very fast" because of the coronavirus outbreak impacting Chinese demand.

"Advise all farmers to delay stocking and as well to watch closely the market. If you harvest, please do so immediately. [In a] single day shrimp prices have fallen by 30 rupees," he wrote on Linkedin.

Indian exporters are suffering from a huge slump in Chinese shrimp demand, causing a build-up of stockpiles in processing facilities, a major exporter said.

The current situation is sure to have an impact on market prices, although no quotes have been set to date because there is no immediate market activity following the Chinese New Year.

"The situation could turn grim if things don't turnaround for China and coronavirus," a senior industry source told Undercurrent News this week. "It will have an impact on farm gate prices."

This week was the acid test for exporters globally as the Chinese market returned from a two-week hiatus for the Chinese New Year celebrations — though businesses in many provinces will remain shut until Feb. 9.

The closure of the market has confirmed worst-case scenario fears, with very few products either entering or leaving the world's most populous nation.

Photos reportedly from the police operation at Huangsha seafood market in Guangzhou (see post below) show dead rock lobster strewn about the market and in baskets.

Andrew Ferguson, managing director of Ferguson Australia Group, said financial losses for vendors who procured the lobsters would be "a lot".

Live rock lobster is pound-for-pound one of the world's most expensive seafood products. The lobster were presumably abandoned by vendors unable to sell them over Chinese New Year, due to the coronavirus outbreak.

"You can bet it wouldn't be the tank rooms fault even though they would have overloaded the small system and ammoniated the lobsters, or wrong salinity," Ferguson told Undercurrent News.

He said the species of rock lobster in the photos are not Southern Australian rock lobster or Western Australian rock lobster. Last month Australian rock lobster firms halted live rock lobster exports to China, due to the coronavirus crisis.

At high-end seafood restaurants in Guangzhou, large-sized live tropical rock lobster can fetch up to CNY 79 per 50 grams ($11.34/50g).

Chinese police have blocked south China's largest seafood wholesale market, amid evidence of live wildlife trade, according to local media reports.

Photos (see below) show police blocking the entrance to Huangsha Aquatic market in Guangzhou, the provincial capital of Guangdong province.

Live animal trade at a seafood market in Wuhan has been identified as the origin of the coronavirus outbreak. Following the outbreak, Guangzhou's city government banned the trade of live soft-shelled turtles, snakes, frogs, among other animals.

To view a photo gallery of Huangsha market, click here.

Scottish seafood exports to China are suffering a double-whammy, as salmon sales have been affected by the coronavirus, adding to an existing freeze on live brown crab exports, reports Shet News.

The Scottish government announced a "package of support" on Feb. 4 in a bid to shore up the flagging fortunes of the crab trade, which had already been effectively halted by intensive Chinese testing for the heavy metal cadmium, the news site said.

Fisheries secretary Fergus Ewing branded the crab export situation as "critical". China, which only opened to crab exports in 2015, has been an important market, especially in light of Brexit uncertainty over Europe.

Chief executive of the Shellfish Association of Great Britain David Jarrad, said the coronavirus had paralyzed all trade with China, but underlying that, the testing regime for cadmium had put the crab trade on hold.

Any positive impact on the US economy from the resolution of the country's trade war with China will likely be offset by the impact of the coronavirus, White House National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow said.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Kudlow said in an interview with Fox Business News that "the export boom from that trade deal will take longer because of the Chinese virus".

However, he believes that the resolution created by the inking of a "phase one" trade deal with China will still create gains longer term.

"I think it's going to be much tougher for China," he said. "The world hasn't stopped. We’re a very vibrant economy in the USA. And, incidentally, this may spur some business investment in equipment and inventories."

Dungeness crab harvesters in the US state of Washington are among those hit by China's ban on live animal imports as the company grapples with an outbreak of coronavirus.

According to the Chinook Observer, harvesters in Ilwaco, Washington, are among those affected.

"We were headed the right way with the live market, increasing in demand for the Chinese New Year [centered on Saturday, Jan. 25]," Ilwaco Landing Fishermen co-owner Mike Shirley said. "The tariffs were lowered, the demand was good and the price was headed up, and then it just completely stopped. The coronavirus has spread significantly across China, where a lot of the live crab goes. At this point they have stopped all imports of any kind of live animals," he said.

Fiordland Lobster Company, New Zealand's biggest exporter of rock lobster, and other suppliers are currently deciding what to do with aroud 80 metric tons of live product that was intended to be shipped to China for the Chinese New Year celebrations.

Fiordland CEO Alan Buckner said that the orders were canceled due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to the New Zealand Herald.

Options include sales to other markets such as Malaysia, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and Japan as well as possibly returning them to the ocean but this would require regulators’ permission, he said.

Vietnamese pangasius producer Nam Viet Joint Stock Company (Navico) sold almost 36% of its farmed fish to China in 2019, but admits sales there will be "strongly hit due to the [current] lock-down".

"China's state council announced on Jan. 27 that the Lunar New Year will be extended to Feb. 2 across the country to prevent the spread of virus. Meanwhile, most provinces have announced that businesses will be closed until Feb. 9. Therefore, all shipments to China will be delayed until further announcement on the back-to-work date from the government," it said.

However, it is optimistic that the issue will be temporary, and that demand for fish will be even stronger after the market shut-down.

It points to African swine fever, which has "just wiped out a considerable amount of pig meat supply", as well as H5N1 disease, which it said "might also decrease poultry supply".

It backed pangasius, as an affordable protein with zero risk of disease, to fill the gaps, supplied in seven days across the border.

Navico put farm gate prices in Dong Thap province at VND 19,500 ($0.84) per kilogram in December 2019 — down 46% year-on-year.

Another source based in Vietnam told Undercurrent that raw material price was down to VND 18,000/kg at the start of February, with export prices for fillets destined for the EU low, at $1.70-$1.80/kg. If so, that's down sharply from the end of 2019, and the lowest prices have been for years (see more at our prices portal).

Iceland has had a free trade agreement with China since 2013, but only in May 2019 did the two governments sign additional protocols which made China a potentially huge market for Iceland's farmed salmon.

Back in October analysts with Sea Data Center noted the great promise of the Chinese market, with 83 metric tons of salmon heading there from Iceland within weeks of the trade route opening. Farmer Arctic Fish noted it was to begin shipments in the fall of 2019.

However, a Westfjords-based salmon farmer told Undercurrent News that both rough weather conditions and coronavirus have made exports tricky since the turn of the year.

"The weather has impacted our logistics to get the fish to the market, which has impacted sales for us, as is the case also for other salmon producers in Europe," said the executive.

"We have also been in the same status as others regarding the Chinese market, which is a new market for us and was still in the starting phase when it reduced."

The market has been "almost closed" since the outbreak, he noted, though optimism remained that there shouldn't be any damage done to the trade in the long-term.

"We look at the situation in China as temporary and we are very pleased with the response we have got on our product in the market. We are sure that when the status on that domestic market recovers they will start again with salmon from the ‘Ice-Island’."

Seafood e-commerce sales in China have surged as Chinese rely more on home delivery services during the coronavirus outbreak.

In the 15 days to Monday, over 11,000 orders were placed for frozen shrimp produced by Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products on JD.com, one of China's largest e-commerce platforms. Guolian is one of China's largest shrimp companies.

In the freshwater fish and fresh salmon categories, pangasius fillets and Mowi's fresh Atlantic salmon portions were the top-selling products respectively, according to JD.com (see below).

China's top leadership has admitted "shortcomings and deficiencies" in the country's response to the coronavirus outbreak, reports the BBC.

The rare admission came from the Politburo Standing Committee, which called for an improvement in China's emergency management system. It also ordered a "severe" crackdown on illegal wildlife markets – where the virus is thought to have emerged. The death toll has risen to 425, with more than 20,000 confirmed cases.

"In response to the shortcomings and deficiencies… we must improve our national emergency management system and improve our abilities in handling urgent and dangerous tasks," the report said.

Click here for the full story.

The New York Times has drawn comparisons between the coronavirus and 2002's SARS outbreak, noting that at that time, China's factories were "mostly churning out low-cost goods like T-shirts and sneakers for customers around the world".

Now, China has evolved into a principal element of the global economy, making the epidemic a substantially more potent threat to fortunes, it said.

China's economic growth is expected to slip this year to 5.6%, down from 6.1% last year, according to a conservative forecast from Oxford Economics that is based on the impact of the virus so far. That would, in turn, reduce global economic growth for the year by 0.2%, to an annual rate of 2.3% — the slowest pace since the global financial crisis a decade ago.

Returning from a long holiday for the first time since the coronavirus's threat became clear, Chinese investors sent shares in China down about 8% on Feb. 3. Stock markets around the world have plunged in recent days as the sense takes hold that a public health crisis could morph into an economic shock.

In a sign of deepening concern, China's leaders on Sunday outlined plans to inject fresh credit into the economy. That will include a net $22 billion to shore up money markets as well as looser borrowing terms for Chinese companies, the NYT wrote.

Spiny lobster caught in the US’ Florida Keys is one of the many global seafood items to have been hit by a collapse in import demand as China essentially canceled its New Year celebrations, reports Key News.

That brought prices for the lobster crashing down by $4, from $10 a pound to $6/lb, at a time when Chinese seafood dealers had paid as much as $20 a pound in previous seasons.

Roughly four days before New Year, the Chinese completely stopped buying spiny lobster.

The good news for fishermen is that it comes at the end of the season, which closes in March, and production has already dropped off. However, the crash comes at the end of a production-poor season.

Diversified Communications, the organizer of the Seafood Expo North America trade show, is "monitoring the situation" with the spread of coronavirus from China, the company said in a statement.

The health and safety of our attendees and exhibitors is our primary concern," said Diversified.

However, "the current situation has not impacted attendee and exhibitor registration and we look forward to a successful event on March 15-17, 2020", at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center in Boston, Massachusetts, the company said.

Read the full statement here.

Tradex, a seafood wholesaler based in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, reported in a bulletin emailed Friday that it has made some moves to protect its eight to 10 employees stationed in China from the coronavirus outbreak.

The company is having its staff work out of their homes or relocate in satellite stations instead of the usual plants or corporate offices in Qingdao, Robert Reierson, Tradex's CEO and president, clarified to Undercurrent News, adding that the goal is to keep them from moving around in public as much as possible.

"Our single most important focus in terms of the coronavirus is the safety of our customers and employees," the company declared.

Processing plants in China were closed for the Chinese New Year and are scheduled to re-open between February 3 and February 10, the company said adding: "At this time we expect minimal disruption to the supply chain."

"Our [quality control] team will be monitoring the processing plants once they reopen after the Chinese New Year holiday to make sure our high quality and sanitation standards are maintained," Tradex said.

Also, it added, that "there is currently no indication or evidence that our products produced in China pose any risk to handling or consumption. The average time it takes our products to reach the closest US port is four weeks after production."

"In general, because of poor survivability of these coronaviruses on surfaces, there is likely very very low risk of spread from products or packaging that are shipped over a period of days or weeks at ambient temperatures," Nancy Messonnier, director of the US’ Center for Disease Control's Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, is quoting as saying.

Seafood companies that use commercial flights to ship their seafood to China now have fewer options to do so as airlines are canceling their schedules due to the coronavirus outbreak.

According to Market Watch, Companies including Virgin Atlantic, Air Canada, British Airways, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, Air France, Lufthansa and American Airlines, among others, have temporarily canceled or reduced flights.

Meanwhile, the Canadian government has cautioned against non-essential travel to China and the US has issued a similar warning.

"Do not travel to China due to the novel coronavirus first identified in Wuhan, China," the US State Department advised.

An interactive map published by a US university is tracking the spread of coronavirus around the world from the outbreak's origin in the Chinese city of Wuhan.

The map produced by Johns Hopkins University's Centre for Systems Science and Engineering lists over 9,700 confirmed cases of the virus worldwide as of 9:30 a.m., Pacific Standard Time, (Jan. 31).

That includes over 9,650 in mainland China, with 14 in Thailand, 12 in Hong Kong, 11 in Japan and a small handful in other Asian, European and North American countries. Six cases have been recorded in the US, according to the website.

According to the UK's Guardian newspaper, the death toll stands at 213 inside China.

Prices for Russian crabs have halved due to the impact of the virus on purchasing, according to a report from business daily Kommersant.

Meanwhile, pollock prices are also dropping. Although a drop in the headed and gutted (H&G) pollock price is typical of this time of year, as fishing ramps up in the Sea of Okhotsk, executives are worried about demand from Chinese plants.

German Zverev, the president of the Russian association of fisheries (known by the acronym WARPE), said Chinese demand for crab has fallen significantly, leading to a drop in prices from $ 15-18/kg last year to $7/kg. The article does not specify the type of crabs, but Russia has been selling big volumes of king crab to China, live.

According to preliminary estimates, the export volume of Russian crab in the first quarter of 2020 may decrease to 7,000-8,000 metric tons, with export revenue dropping more than twice to $60 million-$70m, said Zverev.

Long-term losses, taking into account the time for market recovery could exceed $ 150m, he calculated. According to the WARPE, some Russian crab fishing firms are already halting fishing.

The president of the pollock catchers’ association, Alexey Buglak, notes that H&G pollock prices have already fallen by about 15%, to $1,420-$1,520/t.

"If the situation with coronavirus does not stabilize in a week, more negative consequences for Russian fish exports are also likely," said Buglak. Chinese whitefish plants are set to delay their return to work until Feb. 10.

Alexander Efremov, managing director of the Dobroflot Group of Companies, notes that difficulties have already arisen with the sale of raw materials into China.

So, he is aware of the detention of at least two shipments of fish from Russia, which was intended for Chinese processing plants. "Perhaps the enterprises are idle due to quarantine. Or, China's manufacturers fear that because of the situation with coronavirus, their products will not be bought in the world, " he said.

In any case, the situation with the export of fish is extremely alarming, said Efremov. He adds that the Chinese side seems to have stopped all negotiations with the company on the supply of fish raw materials and has not yet announced new ones.

Donelson Berger, a US shrimp sector veteran, sees the shrimp market only going one way with coronavirus spreading fast.

Especially as Ecuador has lots of shrimp to sell and China has been taking two-thirds of its exports.

"I have been doing this long enough to tell when the market is about auger in, come down. People forget that Ecuador is a southern hemisphere producer and their peak production is now," he wrote, in a post on Linkedin.

"Ecuador is harvesting and packing shrimp and their largest customer has completely stopped buying. The processors’ ability to store is limited to mostly holding shrimp pending being loaded into a container. As a result, they will need to find outlets and the US is the most likely destination," he said.

"The Indian processors have been holding prices in the face of poor demand and will soon have no other choice but to discount prices. This will be an opportunity to lock in some of the best prices in over a decade."

With stocks high in China and the US, read more what Undercurrent News sources in the US and China have to say, here.

Spot prices for Scottish and Norwegian farmed salmon dropped substantially, due to the impact of the coronavirus outbreak's effect on salmon trade, several industry sources told Undercurrent News.

Cancellations of salmon orders in China, due to the impact of the country's ongoing coronavirus outbreak threatens to provoke a price drop in the global salmon markets in the coming months.

Click here for the full story.

Walmart stores are reportedly failing to meet the needs of local shoppers in Wuhan as consumers stock up while the coronavirus spreads across the region, reports Business Insider.

A series of images posted online show Walmart stores in Wuhan and nearby Zhuhai completely missing dairy, meat and groceries.

US retail giant Walmart, which operates 400 stores in China, has reportedly kept all of its Chinese outlets open since the outbreak started; a company spokesperson said the firm was "actively reinforcing" best hygiene practices amongst its staff.

However, sources suggest that transportation lockdown across the country may be preventing suppliers from quickly restocking, while quarantines are also reportedly preventing some employees from coming to work, resulting in the empty shelves.

Credit: @ChinaMidnight via Twitter

The coronavirus outbreak originating from China has been declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO), the BBC reported.

At a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesu said that the agency is concerned that the outbreak is spreading to countries with less capacity to deal with it.

"The main reason for this declaration is not what is happening in China but what is happening in other countries," he said, praising the "extraordinary measures" that China has taken to date.

The virus, which emerged from the city of Wuham, has killed around 170 people in China. Some 98 cases outside of China have also bee reported with eight cases of human-to-human infection in Germany, Japan, Vietnam and the United States, the BBC reported.

Faced with a block on their key Chinese market, Australia's rock lobster harvesters are looking to adapt to avoid a financial crisis.

On Jan. 29 the fishermen's cooperative of Geraldton, Perth, (or the GFC) held a videoconference with members in nearby Fremantle to discuss an industry response to the issue.

One proposed solution was to cut the 2020/21 rock lobster quota; an option the GFC said the government was willing to work with. Now the GFC and the Western Rock Lobster Council are moving to come up with a "prompt and firm recommendation for the minister as quickly as possible", it said.

Meanwhile – in another key rock lobster spot, Tasmania – quotas will be allowed to roll over into the next quota year, reports the Examiner.

"This means fishers who have not caught the permitted amount due to the sudden market changes will be able to add this shortfall to the amount they can catch next quota year, which starts Mar. 1," said state primary industries minister Guy Barnett. "This will avoid any drastic measures by the fishers to continue fishing when there is no market.

The government has also approved the payment of annual fees and levies by installment, to help relieve immediate pressure, he said.

Tasmanian Rock Lobster Fisherman's Association executive officer John Sansom said the measures would provide relief to fishers in the short-term.

"My members were really concerned about the fact that the season finished in four to six weeks time and they would be caught and left with huge financial losses. That has prevented that in the short-term."

Some 80% of Tasmania's rock lobster goes to China.

Back in the west of the country, the GFC said it had been among the first to feel the commercial impact of Chinese New Year holiday celebrations grinding to a rapid halt.

"On Jan. 23, the GFC sales team began receiving order cancellations from our Chinese customers as banquets and other celebrations were canceled on mass. GFC quickly made the difficult decision to suspend deliveries of lobster on Jan. 24 to minimize the financial impact on our members and the broader industry. Quite simply, it was necessary to reduce supply given the significantly reduced demand we were facing. Other seafood markets around Australia and overseas quickly followed suit."

A suspension on rock lobster landings remains in place for the west coast fishery.

Jaco Dingemanse, owner of Netherlands, Rotterdam-based crab packer Le Petit Pecheur, told Undercurrent News he has halted all exports of live brown crab to China.

The firm was sending 30 metric tons of live brown crab to China each week prior to Chinese New Year, he said.

"There are no sales because wet markets [in China] are closed," he told Undercurrent on Thursday. The firm has no cooking equipment to produce crab meat for alternative markets, he said.

"We sell some [live crab] to Europe but, of course, not this volume. Maybe in the next month, China will be open again, I don't know. It depends on when public places open and life starts again. At the moment nothing is happening."

Brown crab packed by Le Petit Pecheur was being landed by an Irish-British-Dutch fishing company fishing in UK and Irish waters unloading catch at a Dutch port.

Dingemanse said he expects landing prices to fall.

McDonald's has closed hundreds of restaurants in China and added its name to the list of global companies bracing themselves for the impact of the coronavirus outbreak, amid signs of a mounting economic effect alongside the human cost, reports the Guardian.

The fast-food chain said it had shut about 300 restaurants and set up an epidemic task force in response to the virus.

McDonald's is an important global buyer of whitefish fillets, for its Filet-O-Fish products.

With Vietnam just wrapping up its new year, or Tet, holiday, European importers are waiting to hear what the impact of China's viral outbreak might mean for the price of Vietnamese pangasius.

Factories are expected to open again at the weekend, with one major European importer telling Undercurrent News it was "obvious" there was going to be an impact on pangasius prices. "We will see in the coming weeks and months what the consequences will be."

It will be up to Chinese importers whether they continue imports of pangasius or temporarily stop, he added. Various sources (see earlier in this blog) have noted a dive in Chinese demand as the virus has seen a dearth of people eating out.

China-Vietnam trade may also be hindered by the fact that the latter closed the border on Jan. 28, as reported by Nikkei Asian Review.

The news site said rumors and confusion were seeing tourism hit in Vietnam, while people living near the border are moving away.

The biggest impact of the coronavirus outbreak on China's seafood industry so far has been felt by buyers and sellers of live and fresh seafood.

Their situation is worsened by the fact many had bought in extra stock for Chinese New Year.

In a video posted on Wechat one trader is heard sobbing as he surveys boxes filled with clams strewn outside a market in Hainan, China's southernmost province. In a second clip, traders in Guangzhou sell grass carp for CNY 4 per kilogram ($0.58/kg), while in a third, another trader in Guangzhou hawks live shrimp for CNY 20/kg ($2.88/kg).

According to Seafood Guide, a Chinese seafood industry publication, some 90% of seafood vendors at Huangsha Aquatic market in Guangzhou, the provincial capital of Guangdong province, expect to suffer a loss.

"Due to the cancellation of foodservice orders, the proportion of imported chilled salmon orders being cancelled exceeds 80-90%, and importers and distributors have no choice but to freeze product," it reported. "Losses are expected to be severe."

Undercurrent News visited Huangsha Aquatic market, China's largest seafood wholesale market, in summer 2018. Click here to view photos from the visit.

The viral outbreak in China has had some early impact on Scottish farmed salmon exports to the country, according to the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO).

"We are obviously monitoring the situation very closely: China is a very important market for us," said an SSPO spokesperson.

"The early indications are that the demand for imports of salmon has slowed as a result of the ongoing health issues in the country, particularly in the restaurant and hotel trade. As a result, the small number of our member companies who are affected are looking for other markets for fish which would have been destined for China, particularly in the US and around Europe."

The SSPO added that the first priority for everybody had to be the health and wellbeing of the people of China, "and we hope this crisis eases as soon as possible."

China's currency has dropped below "a key level" with Asian stocks selling off as fresh concerns over the coronavirus outbreak rippled through global markets on Thursday, reports the FT.

The offshore renminbi, which trades in major hubs outside of mainland China, has dropped below CNY 7 to the US dollar for the first time this year. It has tumbled more than 2% since Jan. 20.

The "whole world needs to be on alert" to fight the coronavirus, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO)'s health emergencies program has said, as reported by the BBC.

Dr Mike Ryan praised China's response to the deadly outbreak, saying: "The challenge is great but the response has been massive."

The WHO will meet on Thursday to discuss whether the virus constitutes a global health emergency.

The Chinese city of Wuhan is the epicenter of the outbreak, but the virus has spread across every Chinese province and to at least 16 countries globally, including Thailand, France, the US, and Australia.

More than 130 people have died in China and close to 6,000 have been infected.

There is no specific cure or vaccine. A number of people have recovered after treatment, however.

Ryan said an international team of experts was being assembled to go to China and work with experts there to learn more about how the disease is transmitted.

The coronavirus crisis in China could impact workers’ return to plants re-processing whitefish and salmon for export after the country's Lunar New Year holiday, which has already been extended three days to Feb. 3, sources told Undercurrent News.

Companies are always in the dark about how many will come back after Chinese New Year, but this year the situation is more acute, with the Chinese government trying to contain the virus and limit travel, industry sources told Undercurrent.

"Right now, they have extended the holiday. However, we need to wait and see the impact," Frank Bodin, a Norway-born whitefish sector veteran with Nordic Group USA who sources from China, told Undercurrent.

"If all public or "group" transportation is contained or recommended not to be used, the workers will have to get to the factories on their own. That could mean delays," said Bodin.

The impact on sales of fresh salmon and live seafood — such as lobster from Australia and Canada and crayfish from New Zealand — is already being felt. For frozen, imported seafood, such as shrimp, as well as the processing sector based largely in Dalian and Qingdao, it remains to be seen what the impact is.

"The government, if they instruct people not to travel, it's going to have a big impact on the economy of China. On the other hand, they know that there should be a big improvement for people to travel again. But the virus seems to be in the development stage, there are more people infected, not less," one executive with a Chinese processor (source A), told Undercurrent.

"I don't know how it's going to impact the start of processing, if that's going to be delayed. There are a lot of rumors. It depends on what the advice of the government is, as to whether people can travel back to the plants. Some companies have more workers who live close to the plant, but you also need to start up with all the workers, not some of them," said source A.

"I think we will have to take some measures, but I am not sure what those measures will be and how they will impact processing," he told Undercurrent.

Another source with a Chinese processor, who also asked not to be named, said he didn't feel the situation would have a big impact on the re-processing sector.

"There will be an impact [on the double frozen sector], but it will be limited. Wuhan is some 200 miles from Dalian and Qingdao. Also, Wuhan is quite an affluent area, so the workers are not really from there," he said.

Towns and villages in Hubei province in China have set up makeshift barricades across roads to stop the spread of coronavirus.

Internet users in China have posted photos on Wechat showing roads in rural areas blocked with piles of earth, wooden fences, large rocks and in one village, a black sedan.

Aquaculture farmers could be affected because travel restrictions and dropoff in demand have reduced trade, it said, and, in some cases, prevented deliveries of aqua feed.

"There's a real concern that fish could starve or suffer from disease because transportation and logistics are affected," reported Aquaculture Frontier, a Chinese seafood industry publication.

"Blocking or disrupting transport facilities is a crime. It could prevent ambulances from reaching critically ill people. Don't block roads with earth or stones," it told its readers.

To view a photo gallery click here.

Scheduled carriers, including United Airlines and British Airways, have said they are canceling flights to China, reports Al Jazeera.

The moves came as demand fell sharply and global companies told their employees not to travel due to deepening fears over the spread of the flu-like virus.

The US warned that Americans should reconsider visiting China, while the UK advised against all but essential travel to mainland China. South Korea also advised its citizens to stay away.

Chicago-based United Airlines said it was suspending 24 US flights to Beijing, Hong Kong, and Shanghai between Feb. 1 and Feb. 8 due to a significant drop in demand. British Airways has suspended all direct flights to and from mainland China after the UK's warning.

The coronavirus has halted exports of New Zealand rock lobster to China and the NZD 320 million industry is seeking government assistance, reports Stuff.

As well as restricting travel and closing local transport services, Chinese authorities are also discouraging large gatherings traditionally held around Chinese New Year, and many Chinese are also staying home to eat for fear of contracting the virus which has so far killed 106 people globally and left more than 4500 sick.

Rock Lobster Industry Council chief executive Mark Edwards said restaurant closures were occurring "well outside the epicenter" of the viral outbreak in Wuhan, and exports of live lobsters from New Zealand to China stopped last week as a result of the "dramatically" reduced demand.

While supporting efforts to mitigate public health risks, the timing was of the virus outbreak was unfortunate because it occurred during the peak demand period over the Chinese New Year when prices were higher, he said.

China has developed into the world's second biggest single-country shrimp market, so the continued spread of coronavirus will have a major impact on the sector, an Asian industry veteran told Undercurrent News.

"The downside potential for the shrimp market is big. If this thing does not get under control quickly, China's foodservice sales to restaurants and hotels will drop significantly," said the executive, who asked not to be named.

In fact, the foodservice market "already has dropped significantly", he told Undercurrent.

Producers of farmed shrimp in India and Ecuador, who are selling big volumes to China, "will need to turn to the US and other markets to sell and this will undoubtedly push markets down, maybe substantially", he said. "There is also production from Vietnam and Thailand that was previously shipped to China that will need to find a new home."

During the Global Seafood Market Conference (GSMC), held last week in a hotel in Orlando, in the US state of Florida, there was a lot of talk of the impact of China on the global seafood market.

As China has started importing direct and not via Vietnam, the sheer size of the market can be seen below, in slides from GSMC.

Also, you can see the dependence from Ecuador on sales to China, where India is also increasing sales.

The view from the GSMC panel — which did not touch on the impact of coronavirus on the sector – was that global production would increase in 2020.

Chilean and Norwegian salmon sellers are having to re-direct salmon to the US and Brazil after Chinese buyers canceled orders, as the coronavirus spreads from the southcentral city of Wuhan to around the world.

As the death toll for coronavirus passes 100 and the number of infections rocketed past 4,500, the impact is being felt in the seafood trade in sectors ranging from Australia's rock lobster to Canadian shellfish.

Orders of fresh salmon from Chile and Norway have been canceled by China, three sources in the trade confirmed to Undercurrent News.

"There were some cancelations of orders last week, some fish was on the way, some were stopped at the Chilean airports," Eduardo Goycoolea, executive director of New World Currents, a sales joint venture for four Chilean salmon farmers to China.

Click here to read more.

After a mad rush to deliver shipments to China in time for its Lunar New Year's celebration, on Jan. 25, Canadian live lobster exporters say they’ve suddenly had their orders canceled or reduced to a trickle in the country due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Other Canadian shellfish catchers and sellers are reportedly feeling the pain, too.

Tangier Lobster Company, a major exporter based in the province of Nova Scotia, started seeing its orders for China canceled on Saturday, Stewart Lamont, the company's managing director, told Undercurrent News on Tuesday, Jan. 28.

And Geoff Irvine, executive director of the Lobster Council of Canada, the industry's trade association, said he has heard similar reports from several of his roughly 100 members.

Click here to read more.

Australia's rock lobster firms have halted exports to China due to the outbreak of coronavirus amidst what is usually the annual peak in demand for Chinese New Year.

The country's largest rock lobster company told Undercurrent News it has sent "only very small volumes" of Western rock lobster to China since the weekend. Chinese New Year was on Jan. 26.

"Most live seafood exporters have been impacted with demand more or less stopping with the Chinese people being told to stay indoors and to avoid crowds," Matthew Rutter, chief executive of Geraldton Fishermen's Co-operative (GFC), told Undercurrent on Tuesday (Jan. 28).

Click here to read more.

Contact the authors [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

To view or post comments, simply

We’ve sent a link to to change your password.

Please check your inbox to reset your password securely and easily.

Get recommendations, data, editor's picks, and the latest news from around the seafood world straight to your in-box.

Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy

We use MailChimp and HubSpot as our email campaign platforms.By subscribing, you agree that the information you provide will be transferred to MailChimp and HubSpot for processing in accordance with theirprivacy policies (MailChimp privacy policy,HubSpot privacy policy)and terms (MailChimp terms,HubSpot terms).

Contact the authors [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Get recommendations, data, editor's picks, and the latest news from around the seafood world straight to your inbox.

Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy