Canadian lobster exports have biggest year ever, topping $3.2B last year
The worth of Canadian lobster exports topped $3.2 billion final 12 months — the very best ever and greater than $700 million increased than pre-pandemic ranges, based on new commerce information.
Hovering gross sales of Canadian frozen and processed lobster in america throughout 2021 accounted for many of the enhance.
“We had a really sturdy bounce again from the pandemic as folks ate premium protein that they purchased in grocery shops. They wished wholesome meals, they wished protected meals and so they wished a deal with. So that they purchased lobster,” mentioned Geoff Irvine, government director of the Lobster Council of Canada, an trade commerce group.
For comparability’s sake, Statistics Canada valued lobster in 2019 at $2.5 billion.
Two years later, the worth of reside lobster exported to the largest markets — United States and China — remained comparatively flat.
U.S. gross sales of frozen and processed lobster
Reside exports to the U.S. had been $522 million in 2021, in comparison with $517 million in 2019.
Reside exports to China had been $454 million in 2021, down barely from $457 million in 2019.
The large change was in frozen and processed lobster gross sales to america, which had been up $240 million and $300 million, respectively, from 2019.
Irvine mentioned that frozen merchandise have usually all the time had barely extra export worth general than reside.
Final 12 months the ratio was 61:39.
“I feel a few of that was pandemic-related in that individuals purchased frozen merchandise at retail and in very massive volumes for a lot of completely different causes,” mentioned Irvine. “And reside lobster is usually a meals service product, so there have been much less folks going out to eating places.
“It will be fascinating to see if it continues as a pattern. However there was fairly a exceptional differentiation final 12 months.”
Lobster inhabitants well being: inventory evaluation
There’s extra excellent news for Canada’s most lucrative fishery.
The lobster inhabitants off southern Nova Scotia stays wholesome and is growing at a sooner price than landings, based on a 2021 inventory evaluation from Canadian scientists.
Lobster Fishing Space 34, or LFA 34, as it’s described by the Division of Fisheries and Oceans, accounts for 20 per cent of all lobster landed in Canada and 10 per cent of North American landings.
“The inventory is taken into account to be within the wholesome zone … overfishing will not be occurring,” Fisheries and Oceans famous in its newest LFA 34 inventory evaluation.
Trawl surveys point out the three-year common of harvestable lobster is anyplace from 220 per cent to 459 per cent above ranges thought of wholesome.
“I feel it is according to most LFAs by way of the entire of japanese Canada,” mentioned Irvine. “Landings are usually superb, and every little thing that I hear after I sit in on the advisory committee conferences is that recruitment seems superb.
“It bodes effectively for the longer term for the lobster sector.”
‘We have got a really sturdy lobster market’
For the previous 5 years, the 979 licensed industrial fishermen in LFA 34 — together with 35 “communal-commercial” licenses held by First Nations — catch a mean of 23,424 metric tonnes yearly.
Regardless that landings peaked in 2016, the worth of the catch continues to soar because of excessive costs.
In late February, lobster was fetching a record-high value of $16 a pound on the wharf.
Knowledge offered to CBC Information by Fisheries and Oceans confirmed the worth of lobster harvested on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia and the Bay of Fundy in 2021 was $898 million.
Greater than $204 million of that got here in a single month — December — when the season opened from Halifax to Digby.
“We have got a really sturdy lobster market on the market. It would not shock me,” Irvine mentioned.
