Pete Bevington

12 November, 2005

SHETLAND’S huge seafood industry, which provides one third of private sector jobs in the isles, is pulling together to fight off adversity.

White fish and pelagic fish catchers, shell and finfish farmers, processors and agents are joining forces to create a single Shetland Seafood Industry Group to try and raise their profile and boost their performance.

The group is being formed with ten individuals representing different sectors of the wider industry who want to shake off the impression that they are merely lurching from one crisis to the next in an irreversible decline.

The move comes after an in depth survey commissioned by Shetland Islands Council and carried out by Hazel Curtis, chief economist with the Seafish Industry Authority.

Ms Curtis interviewed businesses and customers both in Shetland and on the UK mainland to paint a picture of the state of industry and where its strengths and weaknesses lie, before proposing a plan of action.

When it came to Shetland’s reputation outside the isles, Ms Curtis said: “It appears that Shetland products benefit from the recognition of higher quality over other sources of product in the UK…(but) consumer awareness of Shetland is extremely low and so Shetland branding would have little association with seafood.”

Rather than focus on promoting Shetland directly to consumers, she suggested targeting supermarket chains. “It is vital there is more consultation with businesses further down the distribution chain, such as UK multiple retailers and food service distributors.”

Ms Curtis said “a high profile minority of businesses” already had a well defined strategy and image, and knew how to make the most of their market. Others suffered from “an overall lack of broad business management skills, particularly in marketing, finance and strategy.”

She found a huge difference between the various sectors. Herring and mackerel were highly profitable but focussed almost exclusively on exporting huge volumes of raw material, while white fish played a big part in the local economy but produced limited exports.

Shetland salmon had managed to gain some distinction for its quality, and made up a large portion of Scottish production, while shellfish farmers did not produce significant quantities on a global scale, though what was produced was highly regarded.

The new Shetland Seafood Industry Group includes three representatives each from aquaculture, fish catching and fish processing along with one from fish agents LHD Ltd.

SIC development officer Jennifer Anderson, who is co-ordinating this seafood development project, said: “We have some great strengths here in terms of diversity and infrastructure, but there are also a number of weaknesses which need to be addressed.

“Once seafood leaves Shetland we don’t seem to be aware of what happens to it, and if we are looking at adding value one approach might be to try and understand the market better and see how we can add value to what we are already producing.”

She said there was a lot of good work already being carried out, but it did not seem to “hang together” and suggested there was a need for Shetland seafood businesses to work more closely together.

“We have gone though this flat period where there’s been a lot of external shocks and there’s feeling the industry is quite beleaguered. But actually we have a fantastic seafood industry, and perhaps we just need to work a bit more collectively so we can withstand those knocks that the industry will inevitably take in the future.”