To sum up the shrimp industry in 2009 is easy: too much shrimp, not enough consumers.
With companies hurting for buyers, and prices at their lowest point in at least a decade, what can be done to revive shrimp consumption in the United States, where the economic downturn continues to keep people out of restaurants – and not ordering shrimp on those rare occasions when people do dine out?
With competition among foreign shrimp suppliers already fierce, and margins at razor-thin levels, the large catch of the domestic Gulf of Mexico shrimp fleet is adding to the overcapacity woes, as warehouses already full of Gulf shrimp caught last season but still unsold don’t have space – or customers – to take the newly caught product.
Production
