Keith Decker, president and COO of High Liner Foods USA in Danvers, Mass., talks to SeafoodSource about the company’s sustainability initiatives, the challenges of sourcing seafood and the safety record at its Portsmouth, N.H. processing plant, which was recently cited for safety violations.
This is part two of a two-part interview; click here to view part one.
Hedlund: Late last year, High Liner appointed Bill DiMento as its corporate director of sustainability. Has the company stepped up its sustainability initiatives, and what’s your involvement in the effort?
Decker: We were already [involved in sustainability initiatives] as an organization [when DiMento was hired]. It just wasn’t formalized in a process of reporting it to the industry or our customers or consumers. Typically what happens is me and my counterpart in Canada, Mario Marino [president and COO of High Liner’s Canadian operations], get together every summer and sit down with Henry Demone [president and CEO of High Liner]. We basically suggest areas we feel we have to focus on as an organization, whether it’s being driven by our customers or consumers. With the amount of interest [in sustainable seafood] — started by Walmart and [followed by] Sobeys, Loblaw and a lot of the other Canadian retailers — it was important for us to start reporting on what we were working on and take a more active role with our customers in helping them craft their sustainability strategies.
Our goal is to continue to improve the fisheries that we’re working in and to improve our supply chain, whether it’s energy, water, packaging or fuel. We’re constantly working in those areas to reduce our carbon footprint and [minimize] our impact on the environment.
Are consumers concerned about sustainable seafood?
I’m still not necessarily convinced that the consumer is driving [the sustainable seafood movement]. A lot of studies have shown that while [sustainable seafood] may be nice to have, consumers won’t necessarily pay any extra for sustainability or carbon footprint or any of the other buzzwords that are out there. But at the end of the day, our belief — my belief — is that it’s the right thing to do. As an organization, we have to lead by example.
Is there a seafood species that’s particularly difficult to source this year because of lower supplies and higher prices?
The area that’s the most difficult is probably farmed salmon, because of the disease problems in Chile and trying to offset such a massive amount of production in other countries. Price points are very high. It is coming off of menus. You also see a lot of customers trying to turn to wild salmon, and the difficulty with that is timing seasonal fisheries with annual programs and annual pricing. It’s very challenging. So we spend a lot of time chasing down salmon in various forms for our customers. And the price points continue to climb. Now we’re seeing frozen fillets north of USD 7 [a pound]. It makes it really inaccessible for a lot of [buyers].
We’re seeing a lot of interest in smaller price points such as pink and chum salmon, whether out of Russia or Alaska. There’s interest in sockeye as well, but sockeye prices, when filleted and portioned, are approaching Chilean salmon prices or Norwegian salmon prices. It’s going to be problematic for a couple of years until the Chilean salmon problem has been successfully offset.
In late May, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited High Liner for safety violations relating to the refrigeration system at its Portsmouth, N.H., processing plant and proposed USD 214,500 in fines. Can you comment on the facility’s safety record?
We’ve been working with OSHA since last November on a detailed review of our facility. We take safety very seriously; it’s something we work on a consistent basis. We believe we have a very good safety record at our Portsmouth facility. Over the last 12 months, we spent USD 7 million putting in a new state-of-the-art processing line there. It’s something that we’re working on. Safety is always first and foremost in our mind.
Do you expect U.S. seafood consumption to rise in the near future?
The volumes are definitely going to be there for increased consumption. The question is, as the rest of the world comes out the recession, will seafood prices increase and have a dampening effect upon the United States? Seafood is not an inexpensive protein. And right now one of the things holding down prices is the weakness of the euro and the British pound. And as seafood consumption in other countries such as China and India increase, a lot of pressure will be put on seafood pricing. So the question really comes down to whether aquaculture production can outpace [the global demand for seafood].
