Hundreds of pounds of bloodied wahoo parts are stored in a chilled area set at nose-cold freezing 2º Celsius. At -20º Celsius, in another area, are steel racks stacked 15 levels high with shark on one side and sword fish on the other. Peter Matthews, a big, burly man wearing a thick coat and wool head cap, works in the finished product storage area. His sheer size made him seem more comfortable than most in the teeth-chattering cold room. Brrrrrrrr!!!! Three men, wearing white grey overalls and white knee-high boots, shovel chipped ice from a large sea blue storage bin. A female employee, wearing a skull cap and a blue mask over her nose and mouth, is busy packaging salted trout for the local market. Donny Rogers, manager of sales and distribution, and Tamayo Hutton, operations manager, at Trinidad Seafoods Ltd (TSL), are on a walkabout through the processing plant at the Freeport Warehousing Complex, Mission Road, Freeport. Among the other companies on the compound are CW Interiors, FT Farfan Ltd, Lighthouse Ltd and Western Scientific Company Ltd.
Over their civilian clothing, Rogers and Hutton wear white coats and head caps. This visitor had to take off all her jewelry to accompany them as part of a health and hygiene precaution. Rogers very early on said health, safety and the environment (HSE) were so important to the 125-employee-strong TSL that its HSE manager was also a registered nurse. The company is also aiming for ISO 22000 status, a standard for safe food supply chains. TSL imports 90 per cent of its seafood from Guyana (Banga Mary, a sweet, freshwater fish; white fish fillets and shrimp); Panama (marlin, sword fish); and Belize, (farm-reared shrimp). He also imports fish from Suriname. It's processed fish are sold locally in supermarkets, to restaurants, hotels, caterers and is exported throughout Caricom, which accounts for up to 40 per cent of total sales.
As the Business Guardian team was leaving TSL last Thursday, Richard Ferguson, of Richard's infamous bake and shark booth at Maracas Bay, was sitting in his off-white light duty truck, waiting for his order of 1,200 pounds of shark that he buys twice weekly from TSL. Earlier, in the reception area, a caterer placed his order for shark tenderloin. TSL initiated this interview mainly to address statements made in an April 7 article by government officials regarding health concerns about fish coming from Japan and possible health concerns from the Fukushima nuclear plant, triggered by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
Rogers spoke of the negative publicity the article might have had for the local seafood processing industry. "We don't have anything from Japan," Rogers said, in the company of Hutton, and chief executive officer, David Lanser. "We import from mainland China, some types of farm-raised fish, salmon. Our imports from China are very low. Most products, be it finished or raw, come from the region: Central and South America and the United States," Rogers said.
Company's early days
TSL boss David Lanser comes from a fishing family. In his younger days, Lanser used to fish Down the Islands with his father, John, who has since "migrated" onto longline fishing. "I have some experience fishing at sea in small pirogues," said Lanser, whose older brothers, Michael and Mark, and their father now own eight longliner (between 50 feet and 70 feet long) vessels. "My father used to fish for recreation. Then he had a fishing company. He was in the shrimp business, operating out of National Fisheries. They (referring to his brothers as well) migrated in the 1990s to long lining. We buy the bycatch and they ship their tuna to markets in Miami, mainly," Lanser said. Lanser said a big problem for his company is customers being supplied with the type of fish they want. "From November to now, it's usually a dry season for fish. Traditionally, it's a tough time, but this year was particularly bad, even from countries we buy from, we're out of product. We have to be able to introduce options to customers, give them an alternative. I think we've been pretty strong in that area."
Operations manager Hutton steps in here to say TSL looks for new ways to process fish as opposed to the traditional styles of frying, stewing and currying. "Baked and broiled are two under-developed potentials," Hutton said. Rogers added his bit. "In growing up, baked fish wasn't done in a traditional East Indian family. Lanser said another problem a company his fish processing company encounters is being undercut in the local seafood processing market by those who operate in less-than-ideal conditions. "It is hard to compete with them and keep our standards," Lanser said. Sales manager Rogers, in drawing attention to the fact that there was no "fishy" smell pervading the atmosphere, said the company has teamed up with a duck farm in Couva, which buys the fish remains, and converts it into fish silage, using additives. He said the duck feed has a 17 per cent protein content, with the farmer using sodium hydroxide to dissolve fish bones, for easier, safer consumption. On the subject of standards, Lanser said TSL sells customers "true weight." Operations manager Hutton explained that in selling shrimp, it's glazed with a coating of ice to preserve its freshness, with the ice adding to the weight sold. "We're not selling water, we're selling fish," Hutton said. "We put pressure on our suppliers that what they supply is 100 per cent net weight."
Overfishing
Lanser laments the lack of management of the local fishing industry is contributing to its decline.
"In the early 1990s, a lot of the nets being imported were monofilament nets, which are very destructive. The mesh size is very small, so it catches a lot of small fish." He spoke, too, about the issues of marine pollution, destruction of fishing habitat from such industrial activities as seismic studies and oil exploration. Poor management of the fishing industry essentially means anyone can buy a boat and a net and fish anywhere, at any time, pull in catch of any size, and any volume they want. "In Grenada, there are seasons when you can catch lobster. If you're caught fishing when the season is closed, you're fined. Supply is sometimes our biggest problem." He suggested a fishing quota system be introduced for particular periods of time to allow fish species to regenerate, and allow the fish industry to flourish. "Being an island, we should be able to have a certain level of food security, especially seafood security, and export and earn foreign exchange for the country," Lanser said.