Red Lobster, the largest seafood restaurant chain in the United States, won't have to worry about any supply interruptions related to pollock, after replacing the fish with one it says is higher quality and more popular with guests.
The company "transitioned out of pollock" at the end of last year, Nicole Bott, senior director of communications and external affairs, told IntraFish.
She also said the company is not sourcing pollock or any fish from Russia right now.
"We are not currently buying any product from Russia or of Russian origin," Bott said. "We will be complying with any and all existing and new sanctions laws related to Russia."
Russia's invasion of Ukraine last week has led to a swift global backlash and a range of economic sanctions against the country and its leaders.
There is growing concern sanctions could extend to cover a wide array of US and EU seafood imports and exports, a move that would have a jarring effect on pollock and other whitefish supply chains.
Since the invasion, several US seafood associations, lawmakers and lobbyists have been voicing their support for a ban on Russian seafood imports into the United States, including most recently Boston-based Legal Seafoods, another notable seafood chain.
Such a move could have consequences for retail brands of breaded fish products and for certain menu items of some of the nation's leading restaurant chains.
The rhetoric puts several key companies and brands under the spotlight, including Conagra-owned Mrs. Paul's and Van de Kamp's, two of the largest retail brands of frozen, breaded whitefish fillets and fish sticks in the United States.
Captain D's, the second-largest seafood restaurant chain in the United States, according to research firm Statista, also sources Russian pollock for some of its menu items.
Goodbye to pollock
Thai Union-owned Red Lobster, which operates nearly 700 restaurants in the United States and has more than 40 franchised outlets overseas, began removing pollock from its seafood supply chain in mid-2021 and fully transitioned out of the item on Dec. 6, said Bott.
"We transitioned out of pollock to flounder because the flounder was a better quality product that historically received better guest scores than what we were seeing on pollock," said Bott in explaining the decision.
The move is proving to be fortuitous for the restaurant chain. A global shortage of pollock in recent years has driven up prices. In addition, the war in Ukraine threatens to further disrupt the supply picture.
Russia and the United States are the largest suppliers of the whitefish. If sanctions are put into place on Russian seafood imports into the United States or the European Union, the supply chain could be thrown into chaos, with severe upward pressure on already high prices.
The United States in December approved researchers' recommendations of a 1.1 million-metric-ton total allowable catch (TAC) for the Eastern Bering Sea Alaska pollock fishery in 2022, a 19 percent reduction from this year's quota.
Russia’s Ministry of Agriculture set the total allowable catch (TAC) for the 2022 pollock season -- across all fishing zones in what's known as the Far East Fishing Basin -- at 1.927 million metric tons, down slightly from last year, when the quota was set at 1.996 million metric tons.
