The Find Your Seafood Week is a social media campaign that runs from August 22-28 and
increases the visibility of domestic seafood harvesters and businesses that participate in direct marketing. The initiative was inspired last year, after the pandemic exposed the importance of community supported fisheries (CSFs) in building resilient local and regional seafood systems. While global supply chains faltered, the direct-to-consumer businesses, like Alaska Fresh, within the Local Catch Network saw an uptick in community support. Alaska Fresh has been a proud member of the Local Catch Network since 2021.
“We know that consumers want to eat more local and sustainable seafood; now it’s up to us to help them find it.” says Emily De Sousa. “Find Your Seafood Week is one way that fishers,
seafood organizations and advocates are collaborating to raise awareness about the role of
community-based fisheries and to strengthen relationships between fishermen and their
communities.”
CSFs is one way that fishers can sell directly to their community members. Alaska Fresh connects fishermen out of Cordova, Alaska to the Lower 48 by selling their harvest from Copper River sockeye salmon to Prince William Sound halibut to smoked Prince William Sound pink salmon to smoked Copper River coho salmon. Meet our fishermen!
Why is it important to #knowyourfisherman and source from #communitysupportedfisheries?
Economic impact: 60 million people worldwide are directly employed by fisheries and aquaculture as well as those who are involved in processing, distribution, and sales and depend on seafood for nutrition (Food Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, 2020). Small-scale fisheries contribute significantly to global and local food security, employment both directly and indirectly related to fisheries, and to viable livelihoods (Chuenpagedee, 2019).
Preservation of coastal communities: According to some estimates, small-scale fisheries constitute at least one quarter of the world’s catches. Small-scale fisheries values include, among other things, community cohesion, social safety net, and resource stewardship ( Springer, 2018).
Support supply chain health: In the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic there was a rapid increase in demand for local and directly sourced seafood in the United States and Canada, at a time when many other segments of the broader food system were disrupted (Garnett et al., 2020; Love et al., 2021).
Join the movement!
From mid-March until the end of June 2020, the searches for terms like “direct seafood” (+88%), “seafood delivery” (+209%), and “local fish” (+4%) all increased and then started to return to normal during the summer (Stoll et al., 2021).
Are you eating seafood this week? Tag #findyourseafoodweek on social platforms or follow along to learn more about Community Supported Fisheries and local seafood.