Though still early for predictions, a combination of market and supply issues may reduce local income from chum salmon, the species that drives the value of the commercial fishery in Haines.
Fishermen say they fear a smaller harvest and lower prices for the fish they catch next year.
Chum account for about 80 percent of all fish caught by Lynn Canal gillnetters and more than half the fleet’s income. Prices paid by processors slid this year to 60 cents per pound from 85 cents in 2012.
Eric Prestegard is executive director of Douglas Island Pink and Chum (DIPAC), a hatchery that produces most of the chum salmon caught in Lynn Canal. Prestegard told his board of directors at a recent meeting that next year’s return of fish to Lynn Canal is projected to be around 1 million, compared to a harvest of 1.3 million fish in 2014.
Fish that return to fresh water after four and five years make up the bulk of the hatchery chum returns. Last summer’s return of DIPAC’s four-year-old fish fell short of expectations, resulting in a return of 2.5 million fish compared to a 3.3 million pre-season projection.
Four- and five-year olds are the main year-classes for chum. Missing one of those years makes a big difference in total return, Prestegard said in an interview.
The size of DIPAC’s chum returns jumped after a change in 2006 to release larger fish into the wild. Whether the recent drop in fish is a blip or a permanent downturn, only time will tell, Prestegard said.
Factors ranging from water temperature to predation can influence the size of salmon returns, Prestegard said. “Salmon are cyclic as all get out. We’ve been very fortunate and had a number of very good years, but there’s a little voice inside me that says that can’t go on forever.”
Factors that could work to reduce chum prices next season include a weakening of the Japanese yen against the U.S. dollar, which makes chum roe prices more expensive in the world’s biggest roe market, said Andy Wink, a fisheries analyst for Juneau’s McDowell Group.
“The yen has lost one third of its value since 2012. That makes it really hard to hang on to price,” Wink said in an interview.
The Japanese tsunami of 2011 destroyed inventories and production capability, increasing the value of Alaska chum salmon at a time when the yen was strong. Now, the Japanese salmon industry is recovering, and Alaska’s product is relatively expensive, Wink said. “That situation is unwinding itself now.”
Tom Sunderland, vice-president of marketing for Ocean Beauty, noted that Ukraine’s currency has fallen in value 50 percent. “Most of our roe markets are having hard economic times. That’s really bad news.”
The effect of a Russian trade embargo on seafood imports from the United States is less clear. After Japan, Russia is the second-largest importer of Alaska salmon roe.
“The (embargo) takes a big buyer off the market for lower-quality roe products,” which will have a secondary effect on prices, Wink said.
But Ocean Beauty’s Sunderland said Russia’s decision to take its own pink salmon off the world market also creates demand from nations, including China, that buy pinks.
Wink of the McDowell Group said a possible glut of pink salmon would also tend to erode the value of chums, particularly for chum flesh.
A large driver in the bump in chum prices to Alaska fishermen in the last 10 years is sale of pale chum and pink salmon flesh as “portions” to China, which processes the fish into fish patties and other products, Wink said.
A bumper catch of pink salmon – which tends to occur in Alaska on odd-numbered years like 2015 – might diminish portion demand for chum, Wink said. “If we hit as many pinks as we did in 2013, we’re going to have less demand for chum flesh.”
The increasing popularity of smoked fish and the marketing of chum as “keta” salmon in the United States have helped boost prices for Alaska chum, but those markets could also take a hit with a bumper harvest of pinks, Wink said.
Industry websites point to two other factors: Russia’s embargo of Norwegian salmon, putting more fish on the world market, and Russia’s recent initiatives to become less dependent on U.S. fish imports by pursuing aquaculture.
Experts like Sunderland and Wink are quick to point out it’s still early to say for sure what factors will be in place by the time next summer rolls around. A single change in one part of the market can change two factors somewhere else, Sunderland said.
Local gillnetter Norman Hughes cited the resurgence of Chile as a farmed chum producer as yet another concern and a reason he might put off for another year buying a new engine for his boat. Hughes said fishermen have done as much as they can do to improve the flesh quality.
“There’s always a reason (processors) can’t pay you more. The only savior on this is that people are eating more fish. If the Russians are boycotting our fish, hopefully we’re boycotting their fish imports to the U.S.,” Hughes said.
A drop in chum prices wouldn’t be unprecedented. Competition from farmed salmon caused an Alaskan “salmon crisis” in 2002, an ordeal that at times left local fishermen with no way to sell chum salmon.
Increased marketing by the state, new product development and improved handling of fish helped restore demand.