International & Trade Archives - Page 3 of 253

Squid games: The next Brexit battleground

November 12, 2024 — Partial to a serving of lemon-drizzled fried calamari rings while kicking back in a Mediterranean seaside bar? They’re about to be served with a hefty dollop of politics.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is facing pressure to win concessions from the European Union over hefty post-Brexit trading tariffs placed on squid and other food items entering the continent from the Falkland Islands.

Behind the scenes, the British overseas territory has been furiously lobbying the new U.K. Labour government to ensure trade barriers on squid imports are included in upcoming “reset” talks with Brussels.

Starmer has promised to do “everything we can” to reduce trade tariffs, while describing the relationship with the Falklands as “personal” (his uncle had a brush with death during the 1982 war with Argentina over the territory.)

But politicians and officials in the Falklands administration are concerned they could be overlooked if Brussels uses the islands’ demands as a bargaining chip to win concessions in other areas British voters may find unpalatable.

After all, the Falkland Islands (population: 3,662) are nearly 8,000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean from Britain and of fading importance to many in the U.K.

Read the full article at Politico

Canadian research finds China’s rural areas and smaller cities will drive future growth in seafood demand

November 12, 2024 — Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, a Canadian government agency tasked with promoting food exports, is projecting long-term growth in seafood demand from China driven by improved logistics and the build out of e-commerce capabilities that will make it easier to achieve market penetration in China’s smaller cities and rural areas.

A recent report published by the agency points to the fact that annual per-capita seafood consumption is as low as 10 kilograms per year in some inland regions of China, while as high as 65 kilograms in coastal regions like Fujian and Guangdong.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Cooke to purchase Copeinca, Peru’s largest anchoveta-fishing firm

November 8, 2024 — New Brunswick, Canada-based aquaculture firm Cooke Inc. has announced it will purchase Peruvian fishmeal and fish oil producer Corporación Pesquera Inca (Copeinca).

Under a binding share purchase agreement, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cooke will indirectly acquire all the outstanding shares of Copeinca, Peru’s largest fishing company and one of the world’s largest fishmeal and fish oil producers.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Pew pushing ICCAT to adopt harvest strategy for North Atlantic swordfish

November 7, 2024 — The Pew Charitable Trusts is pushing the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) to adopt a new harvest strategy in a shift to how it would manage North Atlantic swordfish.

ICCAT is holding one of its annual meetings from 11 to 18 November and is considering a long-term harvest strategy which would set new rules for how it tackles setting the North Atlantic swordfish quota. A harvest strategy, also known as a management procedure, helps regional fishery management organizations (RFMOs) like ICCAT set how it will manage catch limits and other rules for years or even decades to come, which can help reduce contentious annual negotiations.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Cooke Enters Into Agreement for the Acquisition of Copeinca

November 7, 2024 — The following was released by Cooke Inc.:

Cooke Inc. (“Cooke”) and PF Cayman New Holdco Limited have executed a binding share purchase agreement under which a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cooke will indirectly acquire all the outstanding shares of Corporación Pesquera Inca S.A.C. (“Copeinca”) of Peru — one of the world’s largest fishmeal and fish oil producers and exporters.

Copeinca was established in 1994 and has grown to become Peru’s largest fishing company with 2,770 employees, 45 vessels and 8 processing plants that span the north and center coastline of Peru. Copeinca holds the largest anchoveta (Enaraulis ringens) quota in Peru at 15.9% and processes approximately 21% of the country’s total catch for annual production of approximately 200,000 MT of fishmeal and 23,000 MT of fish oil.

Upon completion of the acquisition, Cooke will strengthen its growing marine ingredients business and diversify its geographic and species portfolio.

“There is tremendous compatibility between Cooke and Copeinca, and we’re excited to welcome Copeinca’s dedicated employees to the Cooke family of companies,” said Glenn Cooke, CEO of Cooke. “High quality fishmeal and fish oil are essential animal and human nutritional ingredients. They ensure a safe and wholesome feed supply for the growth and care of animals in several farming groups, including aquaculture. We believe Copeinca will be a major contributor in furthering Cooke’s growth as a leader strengthening global food security.”

Copeinca holds numerous industry certifications that reflect its commitment to food security, health and safety, and environmental sustainability including MarinTrust, Friend of the Sea, ISO 14001, ABE, BASC, GMP+, and HACCP.

“Copeinca and Cooke share a people centric culture focused on building up working waterfronts in rural coastal communities through sustainable fish harvesting and responsible processing. Cooke’s strategic agility and vertically integrated operations will enable Copeinca to remain competitive in an evolving global export market,” said Jose Miguel Tirado, CEO of Copeinca. “Our Peruvian company is thrilled to join the Cooke family of companies. Peru and Canada have a very strong and growing trade and investment relationship thanks to active collaboration between governments under the Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement.

Cooke entered the marine ingredients sector in 2017 with its acquisition of US-based Omega Protein Corporation, a nutritional product company and a leading integrated provider of specialty oils and specialty protein products.

Peru is the second largest export market for Canada in Central and South America, and Canada is the fourth most important export market for Peru in the world.

The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in November.

Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. acted as lead financial advisor to Copeinca, together with Antarctica Advisors International Corp.

About the Cooke family of companies:
Cooke Aquaculture Inc. was established in 1985 by the Cooke family in New Brunswick, Canada. From humble beginnings of one farm site and 5,000 salmon, Cooke Inc. is the largest private family-owned seafood company in the world employing 13,000 people worldwide. The Cooke family of companies operate global aquaculture and wild fishery divisions in 14 countries providing a sustainable seafood source reaching tables all over the world. Cooke’s core purpose is to ‘cultivate the ocean with care, nourish the world, provide for our families, and build stronger communities.

Study maps owners of world’s high-seas ships often tied to illegal fishing

November 1, 2024 — For decades, the owners of refrigerated container ships, or reefers, often associated with illegal fishing, have remained in the shadows. Now, a new study has traced 324 companies as the owners of 569 reefer vessels active between 2017 and 2022, identifying the people and countries behind these ships for the first time.

Reefers are used as floating storage for fishing fleets across the world’s high seas. These ships stay out at sea for several months, allowing catches to be off-loaded far from ports. The setup cuts fuel use by keeping fishing boats out longer, but experts warn it also enables the fishing industry to sidestep regulations, with reports linking reefers to not only illegal fishing but also severe human rights abuses, including forced labor.

“A vessel is just a piece of steel,” the study’s lead author Frida Bengtsson, a researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, told Mongabay by phone. “These are companies and people making decisions. Knowing who owns the ships is a starting point for addressing concerns.”

Read the full article at Mongabay

China’s Pacific fleet reportedly using squid ship as hospital to evade scrutiny

October 24, 2024 — Lack of transparency is a constant in the Chinese fleet dedicated to squid fishing in South American waters. Turning off their satellite-tracking systems, duplicating their identities within satellite-based monitoring systems, and transshiping their catch onto other vessels without informing the authorities: These are some of the strategies Chinese fishing vessels use to circumvent the law, according to organizations that monitor the fleet’s activities.

This is particularly worrying because several of the vessels that make up this huge fleet have a history of illegal fishing and forced labor.

What happens on board these vessels that operate in shadows?

In an attempt to answer this question, at least partially, Artisonal, a civil society organization based in Chorrillos, Peru, that’s dedicated to monitoring fishing fleets, followed the course of the Zhe Pu Yuan 98. The fishing vessel operates as a makeshift hospital attending to sick crew members from sister ships in the same fleet.

In the last three years, 37 crew members in critical condition and one who died were transferred from Chinese vessels to the Port of Callao on the central coast of Peru. The Zhe Pu Yuan 98 alone transferred 15 of the crew members in critical condition, according to the Artisonal report, which is based on disembarkation records.

A hospital at sea

“The vessel Zhe Pu Yuan 98 was repeatedly entering the Peruvian port, which was rather unusual,” said Eloy Aroni, director of Artisonal. Moreover, all of its entries were so-called forced arrivals, a protocol used when a ship needs to enter a port in an emergency. All this raised the organization’s suspicions.

According to Aroni, in July 2020 a team from The Outlaw Ocean Project, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit journalism group, confirmed that the Zhe Pu Yuan 98 was being used as a floating hospital for the Chinese fleet of squid vessels operating on the high seas.

“The ship was modified to provide medical assistance to fishermen who operate in the South Pacific. A small operation room was established, and a doctor was brought on board to attend to the sick or injured crew members,” Artisonal wrote in a summary of the report.

However, according to The Outlaw Ocean Project, when the patients’ conditions became critical and the only doctor on board was no longer able to assist them, the patient was transferred to port to be taken to a hospital on land.

Read the full article at Mongabay

Cooke waterborne feed trial among 67 projects awarded USD 18 million by Marine Fund Scotland

October 17, 2024 — Cooke Scotland is one of 67 different projects sharing GBP 14 million (USD 18 million, EUR 16 million) in grants from the Scottish government geared toward marine industries and coastal and island communities.

Marine Fund Scotland supports eligible individuals, businesses, organizations, and communities by funding projects that help support Scotland’s “Blue Economy” policy, which was revealed in 2022. Scotland First Minister John Swinney announced the latest round of funding during an event in Shetland, unveiling how the fund will provide assistance for everything from the needs of individual fishermen to widespread marketing efforts for Scottish seafood.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

WTO taking yet another swing at passing fisheries subsidy deal

October 15, 2024 — The World Trade Organization is once again pushing to get approval of a fishery subsidies draft agreement in advance of its December general council meeting, according to sources at the organization’s headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.

The WTO has been trying to expand on its smaller 2022 deal by adding clauses that further limit subsidies leading to overcapacity and overfishing in global fishing fleets. A draft text circulated in July allowed for carve-outs and phase-in periods for poorer countries without distant-water fleets.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Can Japan sustain the rebound of its ‘phantom fish’?

October 7, 2024 — Around the room are different pieces of equipment used in Yoichi over a century ago. Black and white photos of the fish meal fertilizer process line the walls. He points to a poster showing the herring catch in Hokkaido from 1870 to the 1950s.

“So in the high peak, there were close to 1 million tons of herring being caught, like 970,000 tons,” he says. “But you know, herring catch declined over the years and in the mid-1950s the herring fishery collapsed.”

In recent years, the fishermen have tried to manage the fishery themselves, to avoid another collapse in the future. Hatcheries aided in the recovery, but some co-ops and processors are taking the charge to conserve the herring population seriously, with strict fishing management. Ikuo Wada, who leads the Ishikari Fishing Co-Op in Hokkaido, says the shorter fishing period and wider nets made a big difference. And they’ve even secured a sustainability certification from the Japanese government.

But Kouta Fukuhara, a dried herring processor I spoke with in Yoichi, is skeptical.

“The current structure of Japanese fishing is not sustainable. Let me compare with Alaska. Alaska Department of Fish and Game regulates all kinds of commercial fishing — when it starts, how much fish to be caught… In Japan, we don’t have a such a legal structure,” Fukuhara says. “And the fishermen catch a lot of herring, bring it back and take the fish to the market. And the market is saturated with herring. Too much herring in the market, and the price goes down and they don’t make much money.”

Read the full article at KCAW