In the first installment of a new monthly column for The Fish Site, Professor Greg Lutz looks at how Louisiana’s crawfish farmers are faring in an extraordinary year for the sector.

This time of year, farmed crawfish season is winding down and mature animals that weren’t harvested before season’s end are already down in their burrows – hovering above tiny pools of water in sealed chambers and dreaming of eventual re-emergence in the fall, when producers re-flood their ponds to kick off the next season. For the crawfish, it’s a pretty straightforward, uncomplicated plan. One that Mother Nature has perfected over the past 200 million years.

Author: Prof C Greg Lutz / The Fish Site | Read the full article here

According to the MMO, more than 1900 UK under-10-metre fishing vessel owners have registered on the system, representing 77% of the fleet. Over 27,000 individual catch records have been recorded and submitted so far.

The catch recording application was introduced by the Marine Management Organisation (MMO) at the end of 2019, intended to enable better management of fisheries and provide evidence of sustainable fisheries practice across the under-10-metre fishing fleet.

‘The number of catches being recorded on the catch app by fishers across the under-10-metre English fleet continues to rise, with the average number of catches recorded up to over 930 every week. 

Author: Quentin Bates / FiskerForum | Read the full article here

Large reductions in quotas for cod and other key species present major challenges for the Danish fishing industry next year, according to the president of the Danish Fishermen's Association, Svend-Erik Andersen. The fishermen's representative claims that ‘with these Danish fishing quotas, there is a possibility of a financial storm in the coming year. Danish fisheries will be strongly affected financially with quota reductions, especially for cod in all waters, "said Svend-Erik Andersen, President of the Danish Fishermen's Association.

The expectation is that the Danish fishing industry will be under financial pressure next year, with quota reductions in cod in the North Sea, Skagerrak, Kattegat and in the Baltic Sea, where heavy losses in turnover are forecast for the industry every quarter.

Source: Blue Europe | Read the full article here

As a new decade dawns, seafood seems poised to have its moment.

The seafood category has all the right stuff for it to become the preferred protein of the future – it’s supported by nutrition and food systems research, consumer preferences, and global trends in health, technology, product delivery, and more.

One of the healthiest proteins people can eat, seafood is also sustainable to produce, and it’s got backing from a growing field of research surrounding “blue food systems,” highlighting the category’s importance to the future of the planet and its popular status with consumers.

Author: Ned Daly / SeafoodSource | Read the complete article here

Viewpoint Seafarm is considering buying the “Polar Pioneer” oil rig, although development licences are not in place.

The Viewpoint Seafarm is a project that wants to reuses oil rigs as a base for large scale ocean-based salmon farming. And it wants to to buy Transocean’s oil rig “Polar Pioneer”, which has long been in circulation in Western Norway.

The redevelopment is expected to cost around EUR 64 million, and the company believes the project can provide 663 man-years during the construction period.

In the summer of 2018, Viewpoint Seafarm was rejected by the Directorate of Fisheries on applications for 20 development licences. The company appealed the decision, but the directorate upheld it and passed it on to the Ministry of Industry and Fisheries for a final decision.

Source: SalmonBusiness | Read the complete article here

The unique design of a corrugated cardboard composition pack for the transportation of fresh fish and shellfish has added registered status to its list of accolades.

Developed for Scottish Shellfish by the specialist transit packaging team at Cepac, the novel ‘Chiller Pack’ design was formally registered with the Intellectual Property Office last month.

The design allows for dry transportation of fish and shellfish, to avoid the fresh produce sitting in water, which can compromise freshness. Traditionally, fresh seafood is transported in expanded polystyrene (EPS) boxes.

Source: The Fish Site | Read the complete article here

Water treatment equipment supplier CM Aqua Technologies has appointed Camilla Cetinkaya as the new director for the Danish section.

Cetinkaya has been Copenhagen office manager with the company since October 2016.

CM Aqua supplies German-made HEX drum filters, GALAXY protein skimmers, Oxywise oxygen generators, and AL2 sludge system belt-filters for recirculating aquaculture systems.

Source: fishfarmingexpert | Read the complete article here

Aqua Bridge Farm’s Company hatchery in Al-Lith, Makkah Province, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has achieved an important milestone by becoming the first hatchery to produce the juveniles of European sea bream and European sea bass in the Kingdom at commercial scale.

This is an important step in fulfilling the Vision 2030 of the Saudi government which envisages a seafood production of 600,000 tonnes by 2030.

Aqua Bridge produced 3 million juveniles in the year 2019 and has a production target of 10 million juveniles for the year 2020 of which 5 million have already been produced and delivered to local farms, despite the COVID-19 pandemic.

Source: Worldfishing | Read the complete article here

In a videoconference with Sernapesca Director Alicia Gallardo, Chinese authorities confirmed that there are no restrictions on the importation of Chilean salmon, despite European salmon being blocked due to unfounded fears it had served as a carrier of the coronavirus.

Gallardo, the director of Chile’s national fishing service, also announced Chinese officials had carried out an unprecedented remote joint inspection of several Chilean salmon processing plants, according to a post on Sernapesca’s Twitter feed.

Author: Christian Molinari / SeafoodSource | Read the complete article here

NOAA has deployed a series of marine drones in the Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic oceans to collect environmental data for fishery resource management and weather forecasting. Three units were dispatched to the north of the country, bound for the Bering Sea, to examine the largest US fish stock. USA

"We are accelerating the use of unmanned systems during COVID-19 to meet basic mission needs at a time when some of our ship and aircraft missions have been postponed for security reasons," explains retired Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet. , undersecretary for ocean and atmosphere trade and deputy administrator for NOAA.

Source: Industrias Pesqueras | Read the full article here