Newsletter Home     Wild Watch     Harvest Update     Featured Articles     Featured Recipe     Order Materials Navigate the Retail Waters with the New Alaska Seafood Brand Toolkit The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) is proud to announce the new Alaska Seafood Brand Toolkit - a powerful resource that will make it easy for retailers to build Alaska seafood promotions. It's packed with species information and copy, health and nutrition facts, easy cooking tips - even sample photography and sustainability information. All of this and more is contained on a series of three CD-ROMs, housed in a convenient desktop recipe-style box. It's a snap to copy and paste text from the Microsoft Word documents contained on the discs right into your layouts, including detailed product specs. The Alaska seafood logo and COOK IT FROZEN!® logo guidelines and usage agreements are also provided. To order your Alaska Seafood Brand Toolkit, please contact ASMI at 800-806-2497, retail@alaskaseafood.org, or online at www.alaskaseafood.org. Sustainability - Always In-Season According to a research study by the Perishables Group, salmon is the number one fin fish in terms of retail sales for 2008, at $720 per store per week (an increase of 2.5% from 2007). Recent news coverage of depleted salmon runs in California, Oregon and Washington may have left retailers and consumers thinking that all wild-caught salmon in North America are at risk. Not so! Alaska's successful fisheries management practices allow wild and sustainable Alaska salmon runs to return healthy and abundant, year after year. In fact, the 2009 salmon harvest is forecast to be 28.7 million fish over the 2008 harvest, and is predicted to be the 11th largest salmon harvest since 1960. Alaska's harvest represents 90-95% of the wild-caught salmon harvested in North America, and millions of wild Alaska salmon will be harvested this summer, mid-May through October (although troll-caught Alaska king salmon are harvested year round), with each of the five salmon species in abundance. Alaska celebrates its 50th anniversary of statehood this year, marking half a century of sustainable fisheries management. Recognizing the value and abundance of natural resources available in Alaska, the writers of the Alaska constitution mandated that "fish... be utilized, developed and maintained on the sustained yield principle." To this day, Alaska remains the only state that has sustainability required by its constitution. Alaska is recognized as a model for the world. In fact, a number of respected publications such as The Economist and Nature magazine have suggested that many of the world's fisheries should implement a management model based on science and strict rules and regulations, just like those that have been employed in Alaska for decades. Let's take a look at some of the facts: Alaska's efforts to protect fish stocks and ensure sustainability have led to highly productive and consistently healthy harvests. This commitment to sustainability, enforced by the Alaska state constitution, has demonstrated the effectiveness of strict, science-based, precautionary fisheries management. Upon statehood in 1959, Alaska experienced one of the lowest salmon runs since the turn of the century, at just 25 million fish. After ratification of the constitution and implementation of sustainability practices, the runs consistently improved over time. In 2007 Alaska experienced the fourth largest sustainable salmon harvest in a century, with over 212 million fish. No Alaska salmon or groundfish are classified as overfished, according to the latest "Report on the Status of the U.S. Fisheries," published every year by the National Marine Fisheries Service. According to a report in Nature magazine, nations around the world should adopt the voluntary Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries, developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations in 1995. The article states: "The code provides a detailed consensus for the scientific, sustainable, responsible and equitable exploitation of fishery resources." Long before the FAO code was even established, Alaska has held itself accountable to these same strict standards. Alaska's conformance to the FAO code is illustrated in the Sustainability Standards Comparison Chart, demonstrating that Alaska meets and exceeds all of the criteria. In fact, Alaska pioneered some of these requirements such as in-season management, and other states in the U.S. are just now beginning to pattern themselves after Alaska in rights-based fisheries management techniques (such as individual fishing quotas). A special report printed in the January issue of The Economist suggests that nations should implement a system of policies that include: quotas for all commercial species (each with a total allowable catch), strict enforcement of the rules and open access to all relevant information about landings, punishment for those who break the rules, and reliance on science. Alaska has implemented each of these measures, and the article points to Alaska as one of "the few places that enjoy a good reputation for looking after their fisheries." The media has begun to give more attention to sustainability as well, and consumers are concerned. As a result, sustainability has become a buzzword in the seafood industry with the proliferation of many different certification schemes. It is clear that consumers want ethically sourced seafood, but they expect retailers to provide this for them without the added confusion of different eco-labels. As the salmon season approaches, it is important for retailers to be equipped with information and resources to help educate customers on sustainable wild Alaska salmon. The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) offers a host of sustainability materials explaining Alaska's long-held dedication to sustainability. Materials for retail staff training include the Sustainability Brochure, the Standards Comparison Fact Sheet, and the Alaska Seafood Traceability Fact Sheet. There are also materials for distributing to consumers, such as the Alaska Seafood Pocket Guide, to help them make better-informed seafood purchases. Salmon POS materials are available as well, including a poster, in-ice signs, and recipe leaflets. Alaska's dedication to sustainable seafood and precautionary management has become a model for the world for successful fisheries management. Go to www.alaskaseafood.org/sustainability for more information. Sources: IntraFish.no/global, "Consumers Won't Pay Extra for Responsibly Sourced Seafood," March 12, 2009; Nature, "Commentary: Not Honouring the Code," February 2009; The Economist, "Troubled Waters: A Special Report on the Sea," January 3, 2009; Northern Economics, 2009; Perishables Group, 2008; "Report on the Status of the U.S. Fisheries," NMFS