PrimeFish: improving the competitiveness of the European seafood sector
Economists, market specialists, seafood industry experts, consumer analysts and key stakeholders from 12 countries met in Reykjavik to initiate PRIMEFISH. They aim to improve the competitiveness in the fisheries and aquaculture sectors, ensuring the long-term economic viability of seafood products The PRIMEFISH Project, led by MATIS, has received 5 million euros funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement 635761); during the next four years, it aims to collect and analyze accurate information on European seafood. To achieve its goals, PRIMEFISH consortium will work closely with over forty representatives’ organizations from the fisheries and aquaculture sector. These organizations, producers and processors, will play an important role as the Industry Reference Group (IRG). In addition, consumers will also play an active part in Primefish. The results will be innovative knowledge and tools to enhance the competitive performance of seafood producers on the European market. In particular, the main outcome of the project will be a decision support Framework for improving decision making, production planning and launching of new products, as well as spotting possible 'boom and bust' price cycles. This framework will provide a friendly web tool for operators to predict market behavior and to better understand consumer preferences. To strengthen the industry involvement and to ensure practical implications of the project, PrimeFish has a Strategic Advisory Board with leading stakeholders from the fisheries, aquaculture and food sectors. Interview with Mr. Guðmundur Stefánsson, the PRIMEFISH Coordinator What kind of experts compose the PRIMEFISH consortium? PRIMEFISH has a great number of experts in economics, marketing, food sciences and value chain analysts, specialized in fisheries and aquaculture sectors. Why are researches from Vietnam and Canada also involved? Nowadays, the 65% of seafood consumption comes from out of European Union. So, we decided to include in our Consortium experts from Canada and Vietnam to analyse trade from third countries to Europe. What is the common objective that joined the main European research centres, universities and international experts in the PRIMEFISH consortium? The fisheries and aquaculture sectors do not always achieve their expected results. The PRIMEFISH consortium and these sectors have common objectives. So, in PRIMEFISH, we want to improve their results with our findings. In your opinion, which are the main challenges for the sectors? There are excellent companies and producers in the European fisheries and aquaculture sectors, but, sometimes they are not well connected with the markets and consumers. Better connections will allow us to achieve a large part of our goals. PRIMEFISH also aims to minimize and mitigate the impact of the boom and bust cycles in the seafood prices. This is a very ambitious goal of the project, giving to stakeholders predicting capacity and early warnings to reduce these cycles. If we are able to manage them adequately, we will contribute to increase the stability in the market. Another great challenge is to produce for our own market, enhancing local production for local consumption. The project will attempt to give premium attributes to seafood products and to provide companies with the necessary tools for distinguishing themselves in the market, improving the labelling, traceability and certification schemes. Summarizing, the overall goal is the exploitation of competitive advantages to make the difference in the seafood market, minimizing the negative impacts of sudden fluctuations of the prices. Comparing ourselves with the best of the world. This is a way of strengthening the competitiveness of the companies, driving them towards excellence. More info on the www.primefish.eu (coming soon!) or at info@primefish.eu. H2020 No. 635761.
Countries
Canada, Germany, Denmark, Spain, France, Iceland, Italy, Norway, United Kingdom, Viet Nam