Shrimp catch. (Photo: The Southern Shrimp Alliance)
Gulf of Mexico shrimp landing reaches historically high levels in April
UNITED STATES
Tuesday, May 30, 2017, 02:40 (GMT + 9)
Landing of shrimp caught in the Gulf of Mexico for April reached 5.3 million pounds, which is well above historic norms, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
The landed volume is over twice the fifteen-year historic average for the month, which was 2.5 million pounds, and is far and away the most shrimp landed in an April over the last sixteen years, reported the Southern Shrimp Alliance.
NOAA's statistics revealed that so far this year, 15.7 million pounds of shrimp has been landed in the Gulf of Mexico, an amount 32 per cent higher than the prior sixteen-year historical average of 11.8 million pounds. It also stated that more shrimp has been landed in 2017 compared to the first four months of any year.
Only a small minority of shrimp landed during a year is harvested between January and April, with the first four months of each year accounting for anywhere between 7 and 14 per cent of total annual landings.
Shrimp landings for the first third of the year are uniformly above historical averages in every part of the Gulf of Mexico and totalledin the following way:
- Louisiana: 4.8 million pounds;
- Texas: slightly below 4.5 million pounds;
- West Coast of Florida: 2.8 million pounds;
- Alabama: 3.2 million pounds;
- Mississippi: 418 thousand pounds.
Although the volume of shrimp reported as landed has been unusually high, the dockside prices reported by NOAA have shown improvements compared to April 2016 across count sizes, with large increases reported in the Northern Gulf.
For that region, ex-vessel prices for U15 count shrimp increased from USD 8.42 per pound in April 2016 to USD 9.37 per pound in April 2017; ex-vessel prices for 26-30 count shrimp jumped from USD 3.16 per pound in April 2016 to USD 4.50 per pound in April 2017; and ex-vessel prices for 41-50 count shrimp more than doubled from USD 1.12 per pound in April 2016 to USD 2.55 per pound in April 2017.
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