With restaurants closed and festivals canceled due to social distancing restrictions, Louisiana’s seafood industry is left with produce it would normally sell. Louisiana Direct Seafood, a marketing program developed by the LSU Ag Center and Louisiana Sea Grant, helps fisherman to sell directly to the public, which is a financial lifeline while their normal buyers are cutting back.
The program website allows fishermen to post available seafood, information about special popup seafood markets and more. There also are links to fishermen and the site allows users to search by seafood, from alligator, crabs, oysters and shrimp to individual species of fish. Frozen seafood can be shipped as well.
“Our focus right now is on shrimp,” executive director of the Louisiana Sea Grant College Program Robert Twilley said in a press release. “With inshore shrimp season opening in May-June and the freezers being full, the product has nowhere to go unless we can help connect the dots and use our established networks to create new supply chains. We’re talking about 48 million pounds of shrimp; that’s the yearly catch and it has to come out of the water, onto the docks, and somehow find its way to people’s plates.”
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