But first, as a part of our “What’s Good Campaign” - which seeks to spotlight something “Good” happening in the seafood world as opposed to unfortunate news…

This week we wanted to put a spotlight on Team Seas.

Team Seas was a global campaign to raise $30 million dollars to remove 30 million pounds of trash from the oceans, rivers and beaches, (so every dollar raised would remove 1 pound of trash), and on January 1st, 2022 they reached their goal of 30 million within 2 months.

Team Seas is led by top YouTube personalities Jimmy Donaldson (aka MrBeast and Mark Rober with over 100 million combined subscribers.

We caught up with Team Seas for an update on what’s next and they told us they will continue to collect donations to go to their two partners, (the Ocean Conservancy and The Ocean Cleanup), and cleanups will go through this year and next year to remove the 30 million pounds funded by their goal.

There are currently no new campaigns slated at the moment (as we can imagine they will be quite busy cleaning up the ocean), but keep an eye on their social account for any updates and announcements.

And that’s what’s good this week in the world of seafood.



--- It's been a few weeks now since China has opened back up from Chinese New Year closures so here is the current situation.

Plants in Qingdao started production back up around February 19th, however progress is slow as a significant amount of workers did not return from Chinese New Year so it will take about a month to hire and train new workers.

Plants in Dalian have been closed since December, and at the time of reporting, they remain closed.

These plants still have no idea when they will be able to start production again, however in recent conversations with plant owners, they are hoping to be able to start back up in 2 weeks, but there are no guarantees.

Further to this, our sources tell us that Dalian plants won't need to buy any raw materials in the short term as 3 to 4 month's worth of raw materials that were stuck at port are going to be released to them soon.



(For a recap of what's happened in China over the last 4 months, please refer to the links below.)

Jan 3rd, 2022 - 2022 China Update: Dalian, Qingdao, Yantai, CNY, Lent, COVID-19

December 13th, 2021 - Prepare For Lent; China CNY Update: Dalian to Remain Closed, Qingdao Full Booked

November 22nd, 2021 - China Update: Covid-Zero Strategy puts Chinese New Year Production in Jeopardy





As containers were stuck at port in Dalian for over 3 months, they certainly didn't sit there for free.

Dalian plants will have to pay huge demurrage charges - some amounting from 4 million to over 15 million dollars, extra cost that will ultimately be passed down the supply chain, and at the wholesale level this could mean as much as $1 more per pound for some products.

For raw materials pricing, Pacific Cod currently stands out from the rest as raw materials for P. Cod are still extremely short in China.

One of the reasons for this is that lots of Cod went to the EU and North America for reprocessing.

Russian Pacific Cod pricing has skyrocketed to over $5500 per metric tonne USD (or $2.50/lb) up from $3500 (or $1.60/lb) last year.

For more pricing updates, refer to this Raw Materials Price Matrix.

Our Recommendation continues to be that you purchase whatever you can to fulfill your seafood programs, and to focus on buying products that are already in North America or on the water as the demand for seafood continues to rise amidst ongoing supply chain constraints.

Moving onto the 2022 Russia Total Salmon Forecast and preliminary numbers released were for 264,000 metric tonnes which is the lowest catch expectation in the past 12 years.

This number is still only preliminary and NOT final as the research institute may adjust Pink Salmon forecast to 190,000 from 132,000 metric tonnes which would result in a final forecast of 321,000.

Looking at historical catch data, it is interesting to note that over the past 11 years, the actual catch has almost always significantly exceeded the forecast value.

Catch totals for Pacific Salmon in Russia amounted to 539 thousand metric tonnes in 2021, 292.6 thousand in 2020, 499.2 thousand in 2019, and a bumper 676.2 thousand in 2018.



Alaska will release their Total Salmon forecast for the 2022 season in March or April, and for comparison Alaska harvested 389,416 metric tonnes in 2021 (from 233 million fish), and 234,753 in 2020 (from 118 million fish).

For Alaska, even-numbered years have historically produced less Pink Salmon than odd-numbered years.

Russia Pacific Salmon seasons are compared odd to odd year and even to even.

CHECK OUT OUR #SeaTheGood CAMPAIGN Which Seeks To Spotlight Something “Good” Happening In The Seafood World As Opposed To Unfortunate News. #SeaTheGood

--- If you are not already, be sure to subscribe to our 3-Minute Market Insight using the signup form below to keep tuned-in to all upcoming market insights.