Seattle, Washington, U.S.A.-based Trident Seafood was awarded USD 22.4 million (EUR 21.4 million) of a United States government contract for Alaska pollock, worth nearly USD 26 million (EUR 25 million).
The U.S. Department of Agriculture awarded three contracts for 7.64 million pounds worth of pollock, totaling USD 25.9 million (EUR 24.7 million) for fiscal year 2022.
High Liner Foods, with its U.S. headquarters in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, U.S.A., will supply USD 2.7 milion (EUR 2.6 million) worth of pollock, while Braintree, Massachusetts, U.S.A.-based Channel Fish Processing will supply nearly USD 791,000 (EUR 756,000) worth.
The USDA paid USD 3.94 to USD 4.31 (EUR 3.76 to EUR 4.12) for fillets, USD 3.26 to USD 4.20 (EUR 3.11 to EUR 4.01) for pollock nuggets, and USD 2.86 to USD 3.40 (EUR 2.73 to EUR 3.25) for frozen fish sticks.
USDA’s payout of an average delivered price of USD 3.65 (EUR 3.45) per pound for Alaska pollock fish sticks in its May purchase is the highest delivered price ever for the product, Genuine Alaska Pollock Producers CEO Craig Morris told SeafoodSource at the time.
While they don’t set a record, the new contracts are “historically very strong prices and this purchase firmly places fiscal year 2022 (which ends 30 September) as the second-highest on both a volume and value basis only lagging behind 2019,” Morris said.
In 2019, the U.S. government “was doing a number of things to help lessen the impact on industries affected by implementation of retaliatory tariffs with the onset of the trade war with China,” Morris said.
Even though it is paying “strong” prices, wild Alaska pollock “provides a great value to USDA for such a sustainable, nutritious, and delicious domestically-produced protein,” Morris added.
Trident also won the vast majority of the USDA's pollock contract awarded in May at USD 9.7 milion (EUR 9.3 million), while Seattle-based American Seafoods won USD 274,000 (EUR 262,000) worth.
