Give the Fisherman a Break

After years of poor prices for Lobster and the hit a perceived luxury has taken due to the downturn in the economy the price paid the fisherman at the dock for the crustacean finally rose to about $4.25 from a low of $2.75 last year. Now if you’ve had a lobster served you at a restaurant you recognize that at these prices someone made a killing before that meal landed on your plate and it wasn’t the guy who pulled up the lobster pot. The price of fuel for transporting live lobster by air has certainly gone up but all the middlemen between you and the guy in the southwester and boots each took their cut. In general the price of food reflects not what the producer was paid to catch or raise it but the cut taken by the buyers, processors, warehouses, and wholesalers before it gets to you. Each step results in a mark-up and a delay in the time it takes a product to reach the consumer and reduces the freshness of live or unprocessed goods. Imagine then the irony when lobster processors now complain that the price of lobster is too high.

The price of fish has made fishing a way of life rather than a living. The price of fish at the dock does not cover the costs involved in landing it. One goes to sea in the hopes of getting enough weeks employment to draw UI the remainder of the year. It is difficult to feel sympathy for the fish processing conglomerates when they whine that a break even price for fish might cut into their profits.