Florida Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program

Marion Clark

Coordinator & Asst. Dean

1979

Commercial fisheries, always a primary focus of the Florida Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program, continues as a primary area of assistance during the past year. Activities to assist commercial fishermen in 1979 included workshops in product marketing, fishing gear, electronic navigation (LORAN C), tax management, business, seafood utilization, and promotion of a new industry, the soft shell crab.

Florida Sea Grant fisheries research during the past year has been both economic and biological in nature with economic analysis of commercial fishing and seafood marketing continuing into a sixth year. Economic studies included collection of production costs and returns data from Florida Keys lobster fishermen analysis of dockside prices for Florida blue crabs with annual data for both east and west coast fisheries, and a cyclical and seasonal effort-yield function developed for the Florida west coast blue crab fishery.

Under contract to the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council, a fishery management plan was completed for Gulf of Mexico reef fish which incorporated the production and marketing research with legal, social and institutional factors in determining needed management regulation. Both the Gulf of Mexico Council and South Atlantic Fishery Management Councils looked to the marine agents to help provide a liaison with local recreational and commercial fishermen. The Florida Marine Advisory Program has followed developments that affect fishermen trying to keep them advised of proposed and newly passed regulations.

Educational programs, publicity material, and demonstration projects also were used in a continuing effort to improve the quality of handling of Florida seafood products. By working with seafood retailers and commercial fishermen, the Marine Advisory Program made progress in developing new markets for seafood products, including international outlets, and in promoting use of underutilized species and new industries such as the soft shell crab.

Sea Grant funds were made available for conduct of a market survey to assess consumer attitudes and perception of a new seafood product form, Florida Smokies. These are skinless and boneless fish fillets which are flavored by a cold smoking process with the resulting product having higher moisture content and greater yield than traditional smoked fish.

Work was also done on developing seafood patties from underutilized species in combination with other ingredients. The information has been made available to several seafood processors for their application.

Members of the Florida Marine Advisory Program served on advisory boards of the Public Health Service to insure workability of programs, emphasizing benefits to fishermen, and also worked with the Federal Intermediate Credit Back to help fishermen secure loans from the Production Credit Association.

New energy technology has become a high priority program element of our program. activities during 1979 have included working with fuel allocation officials to insure working with fuel allocation officials to insure a voice for the marine industry and the commercial fishermen in allocation of energy sources. The availability of fuel to the coastal population in Florida will have an important impact on the success of this industry and the economy of the State.

This is a brief summary of our program activities and priorities during 1979. My staff and I look forward to a continued association with SFA and invite all of you to call on us when we can be of assistance.