Bridging the Gap: How Lobster Food File is transforming Atlantic Canada’s lobster industry
From the Springboard Content Lab
Lobster is Canada’s most lucrative seafood fishery in Canada, with exports valued in the billions.
Renowned for its world-class quality and taste, lobster is exported to around the world, with the largest markets in the US and China. It employs almost tens of thousands supporting coastal communities and livelihoods in rural Atlantic Canada.
But the lobster industry faces challenges from climate change, lobster quality, usage of waste, sustainability, use of plastics, product marketing and data management.
Springboard and ACOA launch lobster project
With this in mind, Springboard Atlantic and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) launched the Lobster Food File project to bring the practical insights of industry together with cutting-edge research to tackle challenges in the lobster industry.
The Lobster Food File curated four Ocean to Plate events across the Atlantic provinces to showcase research expertise from members and to connect industry with researchers to form research projects.
“It was a concerted effort to bring the whole industry together. And we were able to identify that all of them are facing very similar problems. Through this we have bridged a gap, showing that we can work together.”
Katrin Sommerfeld,
who headed up the Lobster Food File project
ACOA, Springboard members and NSERC funded project
ACOA provided over $100,000 to the project with Springboard member institutions contributing an additional $17,500 with $5,000 from NSERC. Twelve projects were funded, and the following are examples of outcomes:
- Making Sustainable Lobster Sausages – Researchers at NSCC teamed up with lobster processing companies to develop recipes for lobster sausage products. These products add to revenues of companies using lobster by-products that would otherwise go to waste. Industry Partners included Tangier Lobster Co., Victoria Co-operatives Fisheries and R.I. Smith Lobster Co. Limited.
- Finding the better lobster bait – Fishery organizations collaborated with researchers at Memorial and StFX to study bait alternatives to herring and mackerel, species which are under pressure. Researchers studied alternative lobster baits to help industry make the best decisions on bait quality, cost and sustainability. Lobster harvester partners were Gulf Nova Scotia Bonafide Fishermen’s Association, Maritime Fishermen’s Union, North Bay Fishermen’s Co-op.
- Lobster processing robot – A robot was developed by researchers at Universite de Moncton to automate lobster processing to speed up the work and alleviate labour shortages. The robot uses cameras to scan the lobster and mechanical arms and hands to shell the lobster and remove the meat. Researchers wrote algorithms to equip the robot with hand-eye coordination to do the processing.
- Analysis of lobster fisheries data to inform commercialization directions –This project developed an open-source statistical analysis and visualization software with customized coding scripts and methods to improve data collection, visualization and analysis to address questions regarding lobster quality and sustainability. For example, trends in by-catch (non-target catch) may provide an indicator of habitat quality and/or habitat changes, and changes in mature female size lobster can affect the long-term viability of the lobster fishery.
Springboard Atlantic is a network of 19 colleges and universities specializing in research commercialization and industry-led research in Atlantic Canada. It is supported by the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency , Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada and member institutions.