Tom Seaman, editorial director of Undercurrent News, brings you a roundup of the main stories from the previous week.
Several stories from our Global Shrimp Market Outlook webinar made the top ten most-read last week.
Our summary of the production outlook forecast got some attention. The coronavirus pandemic could see 2020 farmed shrimp production drop by as much as 600,000 metric tons, according to data presented during the webinar.
However, a simultaneous reduction in demand, due to the COVID-19 pandemic hitting foodservice hard, means prices are unlikely to increase, according to panelists.
Robins McIntosh, a senior vice president at agribusiness giant Charoen Pokphand Foods, shared a forecast during the webinar of 2020 shrimp production coming in at around 3.17 million metric tons, a drop of 16% on his estimate of production in 2019. That's for both vannamei and black tiger, with the latter making up around 220,000t of the level forecasted for 2020, or about 7%.
Click here to read the full story.
CP Foods' US-farmed shrimp will need to establish 'premium' niche
CP Foods' McIntosh also discussed his company's plans to build a land-based shrimp farm in the US, in the southeastern state of Florida.
This domestically-produced shrimp will never be able to compete with Asian imports on price. McIntosh said CP Foods would be marketing its new shrimp as a fresh product, never frozen, in order to set apart as a separate commodity in the eyes of US consumers, Dan Gibson reported.
"It's got to be separate," he said. "I don't think, given all of the intricacies of working in the United States, you're going to be able to compete on price in the near future, and maybe even outside of the near future."
Click here to read the full story.
China, US shrimp inventories build up as foodservice orders drop
Farmed shrimp inventories have built up in the US and China, importers in the two nations said on the webinar, Neil Ramsden reported.
Jeff Sedacca, CEO of Sunnyvale Seafood Co -- a US division of China's Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products -- said importers have been buying up supplies of Indian and Ecuadorian shrimp; partly to take advantage of historically low prices, and partly to ensure their "legacy suppliers" are supported.
In China, meanwhile, Peng Song -- CEO of Beiyang Jiamei Seafood Co -- said he was confident inventories which have built up there should be used up by the end of 2020, or by the Chinese New Year period at the latest (mid-February 2021).
Click here to read the full story.
Shrimp industry experts: Some COVID-related changes to US market here to stay
Will shrimp consumption patterns return to what they were before the pandemic? Jason Huffman covered the views of our webinar panelists on this topic.
Neither Jim Gulkin -- the CEO and founder of Siam Canadian Group, a frozen shrimp and seafood supplier based in Bangkok, Thailand -- nor Sedacca, CEO of Sunnyvale, think so.
On the contrary, both shrimp industry experts said that they wouldn't be surprised to see more people eating shrimp at home in the future, whether it be from retail or take out.
"I think the entire foodservice sector -- and tourism is certainly part of that, cruise lines, theme parks, hotels, et cetera, et cetera -- it is going to take some time for all of that to fully recover," said Gulkin. "That isn't going to happen overnight. It may happen quicker than one might have imagined a few months ago, but that's all going to be very much dependent on the speed of a safe and effective vaccine and how long that's going to take to get that through to 7-billion-plus people."
Click here to read the full story.
Shrimp importer, producers see COVID-riddled US as ripe for EU-certified organic
A story on the US shrimp market from Jason Huffman also got a lot of interest.
The US might be years from establishing its own organic label for aquaculture, but Donelson Berger, the director of sales and business development at Seadex, a seafood importer based in Issaquah, Washington, isn't waiting.
He's promoting the sale in the US of European Union-certified organic shrimp from two growers on opposite sides of the world, and – despite the high volume and low prices on commodity shrimp being imported -- he thinks the coronavirus pandemic is the best time for the products to make their move.
"Never before in the history of our society have our diet and lifestyle choices had such a direct connection to our health," Berger said. "Before you could cure a lot of these dietary problems with medicines and pharmaceuticals, but now you've got a disease that's killing people who are overweight or with other issues."
Click here to read the full story.
Russian Fishery expelled from MSC pollock client group after asking gov't for more reforms
Russian Fishery Company (RFC) has been expelled from an industry body that serves as the client group for the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification of the Sea of Okhotsk (SOO) pollock fishery, after calling on the government to reform the industry further.
The expulsion from the Pollock Catchers Association (PCA) was caused by the company's contacting of the government to stimulate more new vessel construction, an RFC spokesperson told Kommersant, a Russian business news provider. The decision is supported by most of the PCA members in a vote, a spokesperson for Alexey Buglak, president of the PCA, told Kommersant.
RFC, owned by well-connected businessman Gleb Frank, is working on the issue as to "whether we can carry on selling under the MSC certificate", an RFC spokesperson told me. "However, the exclusion of RFC from PCA may affect the market and may serve as a basis for revising the MSC certification of PCA."
RFC considers the decision of PCA members illegal, he said. "The company will file complaints to the Federal Antimonopoly Service and law enforcement agencies to protect its legal rights."
Click here to read the full story.
Fast-growing tuna firm Frime hires Krustagroup veteran Mugica as CEO
Frime, a Spanish tuna firm investing €12.5m in a major processing expansion, has hired long-time Krustagroup executive Pablo Mugica as its CEO, the latter confirmed to me.
The addition of Mugica after 17 years at Krustagroup comes as Frime pushes toward building the first of two new plants for launch in June next year. The first new plant will be for frozen yellowfin loins in skin-packs, due to increased retail demand, Mugica told me.
Frime claims to be Europe's leading producer of yellowfin tuna steaks, turning over around €135m in 2019. The company is also the European commercial partner of the Mexican firm Pesca Azteca, the world's largest producer of Marine Stewardship Council-certified yellowfin tuna.
Click here to read the full story.
Cooke makes $2.75m bid for bankrupt New Bedford seafood supplier's assets
True North Seafood, a subsidiary of Canada's Cooke, has made a $2.75m "stalking horse" bid to buy New Bedford, Massachusetts, fresh and frozen seafood seller Mariner Seafood from bankruptcy, court records show, Jason Smith reported.
As part of the bid, True North will also assume Mariner's payments on an $853,000 term loan as well as leases to the company's facilities, court records show
Court records show that that Mariner is inviting competing bidders for the company above the Cooke bid, provided that the sale can close on or before Oct. 16.
Click here to read the full story.
Clean Seas plots US yellowtail fire sale after $11.5m inventory write-down
Clean Seas Seafood, one of the world's largest producers of yellowtail, is -- due to sales losses resulting from the coronavirus pandemic -- dealing with a massive excess of inventory that it has now discounted, and it has set its sights on what it reports to be a 13,000t market for its product in North America.
The Royal Park, South Australia-based company's strategy, as spelled out in its latest annual report: write down AUD 15.8m ($11.5m) of its roughly AUD 58.4m worth of live fish and frozen inventory (23%) and then undercut the Japanese suppliers that currently dominate North America by offering low-ball prices, Jason Huffman reported.
"The impairment of inventory will provide a unique opportunity to target this market at a very competitive price point," the company said.
Click here to read the full story.
Town Dock lawsuit alleges Lund's, two top salesmen violated non-compete
"High-level" seafood salesmen Michael Wallace and John Fee were both let go without severance by Town Dock, a major harvester and supplier of squid based in the US state of Rhode Island, earlier this year due to the downturn in business caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
But, in a lawsuit filed in a Rhode Island state court, the company said it still expected them to honor their one-year-long non-compete agreements, rather than going to work for one of their biggest rivals, Lund's Fisheries, in New Jersey, Jason Huffman reported.
In the 37-page complaint, filed Sept. 8 in Rhode Island's Washington County Superior Court, Town Dock has charged Wallace and Fee with breaching their contractual obligations, while additionally charging Wallace, Fee and Lund's with the misappropriation of confidential information and Lund's with tortious interference.
Click here to read the full story.
September 21, 2020 at 03:32PM
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Editor's recap: Pandemic will see 2020 shrimp output dive, but demand may be down more - Undercurrent News
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