The days of the National Fisheries Institute trying to be everything to everybody in the seafood industry may be numbered.

A report containing a wide-ranging proposal to restructure significant portions of NFI is now before the group’s board members, who will meet on Oct. 12 to vote on the changes.

Among the more significant recommendations are: a reduction by almost half in the size of the NFI board of directors from 96 to 50; elimination of the 8 regional governing bodies; strengthening of NFI’s executive committee; restructuring of NFI’s membership fees; a reduction in the number of NFI committees, and commitment to a strategy that focuses on: “encouraging fish and seafood consumption; advocating for government policies that drive consumption and benefit the fish and seafood industry; and fostering cooperation among NFI members on common value or supply chain challenges.”

Falling membership and flat revenues throughout much of the past decade have plagued the 58-year-old NFI. In January, the trade group hired John Connelly as its new president. Connelly, a 13-year veteran of the association world, was most recently vice president, member relations and corporate secretary with the American Chemistry Council, a trade association representing more than 200 members of the chemical industry.

He has since traveled the country meeting with NFI members and non-members to hear their thoughts on revamping a trade association struggling to keep pace with large-scale changes in the global seafood industry.

“I give John high marks,” says Larry Cope, NFI’s chairman of the board and CEO of Clear Springs Foods in Buhl, Idaho. “He has truly demonstrated that he is, indeed, a leader.”

The crux of what Connelly heard is summed up by a couple sentences in the executive summary of the report, released last week, explaining the restructuring: “Many of [NFI’s] structures and systems, however, are based on a 1970s model of association management. NFI needs to refine its strategy, re-energize a culture of winning, revise its decision-making governance, refocus its resources, and rebuild its operations.”

Clearly, NFI greatest challenge is figuring out who its membership truly is, says the report, which candidly states: “This task will remain NFI leadership’s most daunting challenge in the years ahead.”

The two largest segments of the group’s membership are processors and importers/exporters. The report recommends that NFI answer the question: “Who are NFI’s core members?” and that it be willing to shed members who don’t agree with the direction of the organization.

“NFI must be willing to let a member resign if the core NFI membership commits to a course of action with which that company disagrees. The lack of willingness to do so will paralyze NFI into inaction. In many ways, NFI will be a stronger association with a core set of members committed to the same action than an association with a fragmented membership unwilling to make choices.”

In all the report makes 14 recommendations for restructuring NFI, and while its mission statements and goals place a premium on boosting seafood consumption, Cope says the new plan does not include a generic marketing component.

NFI seeks to modernize itself