*********************************** Please Help Hungry Families eat more seafood: PSPA and APA have a joint venture underway to help feed hungry families, children, and communities more seafood in 2020. We realize that in this age of COVID-19 all of us in the seafood industry are navigating challenging times. Even so, there are friends and neighbors in our nation that have it even worse than we do. Food banks are struggling to keep up with demands to feed hungry people protein and seafood is largely absent from their menus. SeaShare is a nonprofit organization that was established 25 years ago to help us maximize the results of our collective donations and we’ve once again partnered with them to get food to people in need. PSPA and APA have worked with others to donate over one million pounds of high protein seafood over the last 3 months, but the need remains. We know there is more seafood available for hungry families if we can raise the funds needed to process and distribute to food banks. PSPA and APA are asking our friends, colleagues, and associates to consider giving during this time of incredible need. We have set up a live donation page at https://www.seashare.org/donate/pspa-apa-donate. Please make a donation to help. Thank you.
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Alaska With Another Four Weeks to Go, Alaska Salmon Landings are at 55% of Pre-Season Forecast SeafoodNews.com by Peggy Parker - August 4, 2020 A total of 72.05 million salmon have been landed as of Sunday, August 2, 2020, putting all five species below expected harvests, Garrett Evridge reports for the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute. Sockeye salmon came in closer to expectations than any other salmon species, at 91%. “This week and next will be dominated by pink salmon production. Landings for the species will need to improve significantly to meet the ADF&G harvest projection of 61 million fish,” the economist from the McDowell Group noted. The most recent numbers reported from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game show 43.8 million sockeye have been harvested, a level similar to the long-term average. About 1.3 million sockeye were added last week. Bristol Bay contributed about half this total followed by AK Peninsula & Aleutian Islands region and Kodiak. Chignik continues to suffer from low escapement which is limiting commercial harvest. Chignik’s early run of sockeye this year is the lowest on record, and it failed to meet its lower-end escapement goal for the third year in a row, reported KDLG.com last week. “As of right now, the way it’s trending, it’s looking like one of the worst years in Chignik history,” says Ross Renick the management biologist for the Chignik area told the Dillingham-based radio station last week. Chignik has two sockeye runs -- an early run and a late run. This is the third year in a row that the early run has failed to make escapement goals, and this year, the late run seems to be failing as well. “Usually the criteria for a stock of concern is 3 years of not meeting the minimum escapement goal, so there is the potential that this early run could turn into a stock of concern,” Renick told KDLG. Chignik’s 2018 salmon season was declared a disaster last fall, and $10.3 million has been allocated in relief funding to the community. The federal government is asking for comments on the draft proposed distribution of those disaster funds until August 14. Pink Salmon Last week’s production of about nine million pinks brings the yearly total to 23.48 million fish. Harvest pace is nearly identical to 2018 and 2016. Total harvest for both of those years was less than 40 million fish. Prince William Sound has supplied about half the YTD production, with the region’s harvest lagging 2018 but in line with expectations. Other areas have seen strong fishing: Kodiak’s harvest of four million pinks last week was double the 5-year average and AK Peninsula & Aleutian Islands’ YTD harvest is more than triple the 2018 level. Productive fishing in Cook Inlet last week brought the region close to the 2018 pace. Weak landings persist in Southeast and AYK, Evridge noted. Keta landings remain slow with current production of about 4.3 million fish down nearly 10 million keta salmon from the 5-year average. Among all salmon harvest regions, Kodiak is experiencing the smallest deficit with keta landings down only 17% from last year. PWS has contributed about 45% of the harvest with volume down 36% from 2019. Harvest in the AYK region and Southeast are particularly slow, down 79% and 66% from last year, respectively. Coho production of 341,000 fish is 65% behind the 2019 harvest level at this point in the season. Major production for coho is still two weeks away. A projected 4.2 million coho salmon are predicted statewide. Landings are traditionally heaviest in statistical week 35, starting August 23. Chinook landings are 32% lower than last year, though some data may be withheld. https://www.seafoodnews.com/Story/1177485/With-Another-Four-Weeks-to-Go-Alaska-Salmon-Landings-are-at-55-percent-of-Pre-Season-Forecast Industry Adapts As Fish Move North KNOM by KJ McElwee - August 4, 2020 For the first time in twenty years, there were no commercial red king crab fisheries in the Norton Sound this year. Instead, some local fishing crews are now catching cod, a new development in the region. https://www.knom.org/wp/blog/2020/08/04/industry-adapts-as-fish-move-north/ East Coast Fishery The lawsuit trap: Maine lobster certification suspended on technicality National Fisherman by Jessica Hathaway - August 4, 2020 The Marine Stewardship Council has suspended Maine's lobster fishery certification, citing an ongoing federal lawsuit, according to the Maine Certified Sustainable Lobster Association. https://www.nationalfisherman.com/the-lawsuit-trap-maine-lobster-certification-suspended-on-technicality National USDA: Seafood is key to healthy immune systems and childhood development National Fisherman by Laine Welch - August 4, 2020 Seafood netted some historic firsts in the nation’s new dietary guidelines. The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee submitted a report in July to the secretaries of Agriculture and Health and Human Services that recommends what Americans should include in their diets from 2020 through 2025, a task it has undertaken every five years since 1980. https://www.nationalfisherman.com/usda-seafood-is-key-to-healthy-immune-systems-and-childhood-development
Pacific Seafood Processors Association 1900 W Emerson Place Suite 205, Seattle, WA 98119 Phone: 206.281.1667 E-mail: admin@pspafish.net; Website: www.pspafish.net Our office days/hours are Monday-Friday 8:00 A.M. - 5:00 P.M. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. *Inclusion of a news article, report, or other document in this email does not imply PSPA support or endorsement of the information or opinion expressed in the document.