If
2014 welcomes the arrival of the next strong El Niño event, then the seafood industry
will most likely experience the following impacts this coming winter and well into 2015:
1. Aquaculture
feed prices may increase due to lower catches of Peruvian anchovies starting in
late
2014 and this may put upward pressure on
farmed seafood prices for those cultured species that
depend upon feed
made from fishmeal and fish oil.
2. Dry weather in
late 2014 and continuing into 2015 for China and S.E. Asia may cause a decrease
in
farmed shrimp production
causing prices to increase.
3. Ecuador may see
some increased farmed shrimp production due to warmer weather and increased
rainfall.
4. This year’s winter
Southern California Market Squid fishery may dwindle.
These specific examples are only just a few out of a large
basket of many possible disruptive and positive consequences that the seafood
industry could face during a strong El Niño event. However, strong El Niño events can also severely impact the world’s
entire agricultural and livestock production cycles, which then may shift food
protein demand more towards seafood. Consequently,
this could result in a net positive economic benefit for our seafood industry. El Niño events customarily produce differing
degrees of both positive and negatives consequences to our global food
production systems.
El Niño events happen approximately every 2-7 years and
scientists are becoming more accurate in predicting their arrivals, strengths,
and durations. Unfortunately, accurately
predicting all the possible consequences to our seafood industry from an El
Niño event is much more difficult due to a myriad of complex climatic and
economic variables.
Adaptability and resiliency have always been the
hallmarks of our seafood industry. These
very traits were forged over time by the unpredictability of natural events and
conditions. The seafood industry has certainly weathered past El Niño events
and will do so again. El Niño events
will never deter us from supplying the consumer with the world’s most healthy
and sustainable protein because we will always find a way to do so!
