Challenges and opportunities: impacts of COVID-19 on Norwegian seafood exports

Abstract

A rapidly growing literature shows that COVID-19 and the measures to contain the spread of the virus can have significant market impacts for seafood. These can be interruptions of production, or reductions in demand directly or indirectly due to supply chain challenges. In this paper we investigate the potential impacts of COVID-19 on seafood exports from Norway, the world's second largest seafood exporter, using highly detailed data from 2016 through May 2021. These data allow us to assess upstream impacts in the seafood supply chain close to the producer level in aggregate and by main sector, impacts on the largest products, and the extent to which export firm structure and export markets served have changed. We find very few impacts in aggregate as well as for individual products, suggesting that the markets and supply chains used by Norwegian seafood exports were sufficiently robust and flexible to accommodate the shocks created by COVID-19. Given Norway's size as a seafood exporter, the impact of COVID-19 has likely been moderate upstreams for a number of seafood sectors around the world, especially those in wealthy nations, with opportunities balancing out challenges, and that the supply chains have been highly resilient.

Assessing the economic effects of the covid-19 pandemic on Swedish shrimp fishers

“…The question of how Swedish shrimp fishers were impacted is complex since boiled shrimp are consumed both at restaurants as well as bought for private consumption at home. Reduced consumption in restaurants may be offset by increased private consumption at home [3] , [2] . Our primary question is whether covid-19 has caused an actual price change in Swedish shrimp over the course of the pandemic.…”

“…Regarding other studies related to ours, [12] found that small-scale fleets were more negatively impacted compared to large scale fleets in Europe. [3] , [2] found that the impact of Covid-19 on Norwegian seafood export, which is dominated by aquaculture salmon, was limited, and held that the markets and supply chains used by Norwegian seafood exports were sufficiently robust and flexible to accommodate the shocks created by COVID-19. [3] , [2] found that the price effects on the large vessel groundfish fleet in Norway with no significant effects of Covid-19 on the cod price.…”

“… [3] , [2] found that the impact of Covid-19 on Norwegian seafood export, which is dominated by aquaculture salmon, was limited, and held that the markets and supply chains used by Norwegian seafood exports were sufficiently robust and flexible to accommodate the shocks created by COVID-19. [3] , [2] found that the price effects on the large vessel groundfish fleet in Norway with no significant effects of Covid-19 on the cod price. Janssen, et al, [23] studied the first lockdown period, when infrastructures like restaurants were halted in Denmark Germany and Slovenia, finding both a reduction in shopping time for food, and a shift from fresh food to frozen, like frozen fish, and non-perishables.…”