Aquaculture announcement coming

The National Marine Fisheries Service is inviting reporters to a Thursday teleconference to learn about "new aquaculture efforts in Alaska."

Officials from NMFS and state agencies are expected to be there.

Ready for more marine protected areas?

The White House yesterday issued this fact sheet on a raft of new executive actions on oceans.

Editing out that 'fishy' taste

On Tuesday, we posted a link to a National Marine Fisheries Service feature titled 10 Myths about Marine Aquaculture.

Some folks with the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute, as well as the Alaska office of NMFS, didn't care for the feature. They requested, and got, changes to item No. 1 on the list of "myths."

Here is the original version:

1 Farmed fish and shellfish doesn't taste as good.

Taste is a matter of personal preference. In 2011, people in the U.S. ate over one billion pounds of shrimp and the majority of that is farmed — people must like it! In a recent survey, farmed salmon was preferred over wild salmon by Washington, DC area chefs. Most wild and farmed salmon are different species so you would expect them to taste different just as turkey does not taste like chicken. Some people prefer the fishier taste of wild salmon and many prefer the milder taste of farmed. Luckily, both are very good for you!

And here is the edited version now on the NMFS site:

1 Farmed fish and shellfish doesn't taste as good.

Taste is a matter of personal preference. In 2011, people in the U.S. ate over one billion pounds of shrimp and the majority of that is farmed — people must like it! Most wild and farmed fish are different species so you would expect them to taste different just as turkey does not taste like chicken. Some people prefer the taste of wild fish and many prefer the taste of farmed. Luckily, both are very good for you!

Feds list 10 aquaculture 'myths'

Click here.

Where will wild fish stand in 2030?

Frank Asche, a prominent fisheries economist from Norway, will give a presentation tomorrow in Anchorage on global seafood markets and the rising tide of aquaculture. Click here for details.

Legislature lavishes aquaculture industry with cash

Alaska is a state flush with billions of dollars in surplus oil revenue.

So it’s not unusual to see our legislators spend a good chunk of that money every year on capital projects — everything from road improvements to research equipment to artificial turf for high school football fields.

Deckboss reviewed the new capital budget the Legislature passed April 15 and couldn’t help but notice the sizeable sums awarded to the state’s hatchery operators, as well as shellfish growers.

Hatcheries are a huge factor in Alaska’s “wild” salmon harvests. The hatcheries pump millions of baby fish into the ocean, many to return as adult salmon that sustain commercial fleets and processors.

Legislators tend to notice industries employing thousands of people, so it’s no surprise to see some serious hatchery love in the capital budget.

It also helps to have a persuasive lobbyist in Juneau.

The Cordova-based Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corp., one of the state’s biggest hatchery operators, employed two lobbyists this year for a combined $75,000, state records show.

Another hatchery operator, Juneau-based Armstrong-Keta Inc., employed a lobbyist for $30,000, and the Ketchikan-based Southern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association paid its lobbyist $15,000.

Anyway, here is a list of aquaculture items compiled from the capital budget bill, which is headed to the governor for his signature — and for possible line item vetoes.

• Southern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association — hatchery equipment and deferred maintenance, $455,000

• Crystal Lake Hatchery — deferred maintenance, $650,000

• Metlakatla Indian Community — design and construction of chum hatchery, $500,000

• Metlakatla Indian Community — net pens and hatchery improvements, $150,000

• Prince Of Wales Hatchery Association — hatchery equipment replacements and upgrades, $475,000

• Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association — Hidden Falls Salmon Hatchery, $1,237,000

• Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association — Medvejie Hatchery maintenance and facility improvements, $900,000

• Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association — Haines/Skagway spawning channels, $620,000

• Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corp. — Cannery Creek Hatchery, $5,263,000

• Prince William Sound Aquaculture Corp. — Main Bay Hatchery, $864,000

• Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association — Trail Lakes Hatchery, $1,025,000

• Cook Inlet Aquaculture Association — Tutka Bay Hatchery, $699,000

• Alutiiq Pride Shellfish Hatchery, $460,000

• Kachemak Shellfish Mariculture Association — oyster remote setting facility, $60,000

• Kodiak Regional Aquaculture Association — Kitoi Bay Hatchery, $1,550,000

• Kodiak Regional Aquaculture Association — Pillar Creek Hatchery, $909,000

• Alaskan Shellfish Growers Association — shellfish industry technical assistance grants, $30,000

For a map of hatchery locations around the state, click here.

Farm-fresh barramundi, mate?

The July 18 issue of TIME magazine has a cover story titled "The future of fish: Can farming save the last wild food?"

The piece focuses on a "perfect" farmed species called barramundi, native to Australia, and makes two major points.

First, fish farming might help save wild fish, because without aquaculture the pressure to overfish would be greater.

Second, with a world population of nearly 7 billion and rising, we have no choice but to farm the sea just as we've long farmed the land.

Says the article: "It's not that commercial fishing will disappear; in fact, sustainable fisheries like Alaska's wild-salmon industry may even produce boutique foods, finally earning what they're worth."

Fishy investment opportunity

Ever thought about getting involved with the seafood business, but couldn't quite see yourself owning a boat, processing plant or aquaculture operation?

Well, here's a way to do it and never touch a fish.

Global X Funds, a New York-based provider of exchange traded funds or ETFs, has launched what it calls the first fishing industry ETF.

Here's the press release.

Don't look for familiar company names such as Trident, Icicle and Ocean Beauty in the new Global X Fishing Industry ETF, as these companies aren't publicly traded.

But some names with huge involvement in Alaska's seafood industry, such as Maruha Nichiro, will be among the fund's holdings.

Here's more reading from Investor's Business Daily.

Upcoming events

Here's a rundown of some significant meetings planned in Alaska in the coming days:

• The 2nd International Congress on Seafood Technology runs Monday through Thursday at the Hotel Captain Cook in Anchorage. Sponsors are the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the University of Alaska. Click here to see the agenda and find registration details. I see some pretty interesting talks on tap such as "developments in automation of processing equipment,"
"alternatives to antibiotics in aquaculture," and "surimi, state of the technology." Local university economist Gunnar Knapp will talk on "economics of value addition for fish and fishery products," and Fairbanks food technologist Peter Bechtel will talk on "utilization of Alaska fish processing byproducts."

• The North Pacific Fishery Management Council's Crab Plan Team meets Monday through Friday at the Hotel Alyeska in Girdwood. Here's the agenda. Fishery biologists and managers on the plan team review all the science related to the Bering Sea's lucrative stocks of king and Tanner crab. One tasty item I see on the agenda concerns a "discussion paper on crab bycatch in the groundfish fisheries."

• The National Marine Fisheries Service has been holding a series of "listening sessions" around the country to gather feedback on plans to develop a new ocean aquaculture policy. Anchorage is the last stop, with a listening session planned for 1 p.m. May 21 at the Hotel Captain Cook. Deckboss expects Alaskans will continue to shout a collective "no" to any aquaculture.

Outside Alaska, aquaculture efforts march on

Alaska evidently has it so good that it need not consider a serious expansion of its aquaculture industry.

Elsewhere, however, folks are thinking big.

Here's an excerpt from a daily investors newsletter I receive sketching out a fantastic plan involving fish, algae and oil production in the Gulf of Mexico.

Would we consider something like this in Alaska? Nope, don't think so.

Something Smells Fishy‏

Wells Fargo Daily Advantage

Aug. 25, 2009

Are we ready for cars that are powered by the oil squeezed out of fish which munch on algae? One company hopes so. LiveFuels is a firm hoping to cash in on the algae-based biofuel craze by developing new ways to process algae into liquid energy to power our cars, buses, and trucks. They also claim their methods will help reduce a problem in the ocean caused by fertilizer runoff.

Each spring, fertilizer runoff from farms across the Midwest flows down the Mississippi river and into the Gulf of Mexico. This creates the second-largest algae bloom in the world — the size of New Jersey. It is called a "dead zone" because the algae feeds on the fertilizer, which in turn feeds a booming bacteria population which sucks up so much oxygen in the ocean water that fish and plants either move away or perish. Scientists, environmentalists, and the seafood industry have been monitoring the negative impact of fertilizer runoff and the dead zones for years.

Instead of harvesting the oil directly from the algae in the harmful dead zones (a costly proposition), LiveFuels plans to enlist an army of traveling fish to gobble it up. (Think of it like a farmer renting out goats to "naturally" cut the grass along highways and airports.) More than 25,000 pounds of fish per acre would be released into the dead zones to feast on the algae. The fish would be contained in caged fish farms and, after plumping up, would be rounded up and the oils squeezed out of them. Lovely imagery, hey? But the process results in no carbon footprint, the phosphates from fish bones are used for (ironically) fertilizer, and protein for animal feed and oil for fuel is generated.

— Brian Bock

$4 million in Exxon Valdez payments coming

Federal Judge H. Russel Holland of Anchorage has approved an application from lawyers in the Exxon Valdez case to pay out another $4 million in punitive damages.

People in seven plaintiff categories will divide the money.

The categories are area businesses, personal injury claimants, personal property claimants, fish tenders, non-Native subsistence claimants, aquaculture associations and Native corporations.

Here's the list of claimants and the amounts they will receive, minus attorney fees.

Sorry, I'm not sure exactly when checks or direct deposits will go out. Shouldn't be long, though.