A rapidly growing literature shows that COVID-19 and the measures to contain the spread of the virus can have significant market impacts for seafood. These can be interruptions of production, or ...reductions in demand directly or indirectly due to supply chain challenges. In this paper we investigate the potential impacts of COVID-19 on seafood exports from Norway, the world's second largest seafood exporter, using highly detailed data from 2016 through May 2021. These data allow us to assess upstream impacts in the seafood supply chain close to the producer level in aggregate and by main sector, impacts on the largest products, and the extent to which export firm structure and export markets served have changed. We find very few impacts in aggregate as well as for individual products, suggesting that the markets and supply chains used by Norwegian seafood exports were sufficiently robust and flexible to accommodate the shocks created by COVID-19. Given Norway's size as a seafood exporter, the impact of COVID-19 has likely been moderate upstreams for a number of seafood sectors around the world, especially those in wealthy nations, with opportunities balancing out challenges, and that the supply chains have been highly resilient.
Seasonality is a natural feature of wild caught fisheries that introduces variation in food supply, and which often is amplified by fisheries management systems. Seasonal timing of landings patterns ...and linkages to consumption patterns can have a potentially strong impact on income for coastal communities as well as import patterns. This study characterizes the relationship between seasonality in seafood production and consumption in the United States by analyzing monthly domestic fisheries landings and imports and retail sales of farmed and wild seafood from 2017 to 2019. Analyses were conducted for total seafood sales, by product form, by species group, and by region of the United States. The data reveal strong seasonal increases in consumption around December and March. Seasonal increases in consumption in Spring and Summer occurred in parallel with domestic fishing production. Domestic landings vary by region, but most regions have peak fishing seasons between May and October. Alaska has the largest commercial fishery in the United States and seasonal peaks in Alaska (July/August, February/March) strongly influence seasonality in national landings. Misalignment between domestic production and consumption in some seasons and species groups creates opportunities for imports to supplement demand and lost opportunities for domestic producers.
