Global revenues from wild seafood products

• Main Author: van der Meer, Liesbeth
• Language: English
• Published: University of British Columbia 2012
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/42874

The present study quantifies the revenues generated by marine seafood in the retail and restaurant sectors. Also, since one third of total marine catch is used to produce fishmeal, revenues generated by this commodity were calculated based on the percentage of meat products that originated from fishmeal inclusion in compound-feed formulas. In total, wild seafood products generated revenues of US $318 billion in the year 2005. To arrive at this estimate I first developed a global database of seafood retail revenues, which is used to analyze fish retail values per tonne at the regional and global level. This database includes 192 maritime and non-maritime countries. The findings are that in 2005, revenues, from wild marine seafood in the retail sector alone reached US $210 billion. Revenue from seafood restaurants were calculated based on estimations of country GDP expenditures in the hotel and restaurant sector. By analyzing the data on 30 countries (US and EU countries) where primary data on restaurants and hotel were reported separately, I estimate that on average, in the US and the EU countries where data is available, 43 percent of revenues from hotels and restaurants are attributable to restaurant sales. Wild seafood restaurant sales represented 17-25% of global restaurant sales generating revenues of US $94 billion. Finally, in order to estimate the revenues from the fishmeal sector, calculations were made based on farmed fish and animal meats, which include fishmeal in their compound feed preparation. Revenues derived from animal and fish meats were calculated based on their FCR (food conversion ratios) and inclusion rates of fishmeal for each species. I estimate that US$14 billion were generated by the inclusion of fishmeal in meat products.