Supply Chain Critical for Fisheries Future

By Margaret Bauman, Alaska Journal of Commerce, Anchorage

Dec. 31–Fisheries continue to play a growing role in Alaska’s economy, with growing sophistication in small business supply chain networking that links fisheries, marketing and transportation.

Logistics facilitators like Robin Richardson, president of the Global Food Collaborative, say the future of success of wild Alaska seafood, and other Alaska eatables in the 21st century, is more networking and greater transparency in supply chain economics.

While larger seafood marketing entities, including the major seafood processors, have their own sophisticated networking skills, Richardson works to make smaller entities equally successful.

To that end Richardson has organized Global Food Alaska-2007, June 13-14 in Soldotna, to bring together commercial buyers, sellers, investors and associated services of Alaska’s food, beverage and bio products industry to meet and do business. Local, national and international commercial buyers, investors and vendors have been invited to come meet Alaskan companies producing food, beverage and natural food products.

The food supply chain is interdependent, relying on expertise in health and nutrition, economic and business development, supply chain, finance and sustainability, product quality and safety, all the while staying competitive in domestic and international markets, said Richardson, who holds a degree in global supply chain management, with a focus on food.

A former executive director of the World Trade Center Alaska, Richardson said she has learned in her extensive travels how the rest of the world does business “and it turned on a lot of lights,” she said.

“What I saw was transparency in investment in business,” she said. In Chile, for example, “everything was made easy for people who want to do business there. I came back and said, ‘What can I do to make Alaska more transparent to potential investors?’”

So she went back to school, earning a degree in global supply chain management from the University of Alaska Anchorage, and continues to study competitive markets every day.

Through the Global Food Collaborative, whose growing membership includes fishermen, transportation experts, a variety of other food producers and more, Richardson hopes to improve transparency in Alaska’s business operations and build more integrated relationships between producers and buyers.

“My dream,” Richardson said in an interview Dec. 21, “is that we (Alaskans) be in international headlines (saying) that we are providers to the world in food and nutrition, because we have the natural resources to do it.”

The best part of her work to date, she said, has been making the match between entrepreneurs, matches that save them time or make them money. The toughest part is educating Alaska on the potential of networking within the supply chain.

“We’re still in the harvest mode, not the food business,” she said.

Still, her efforts to bring together wild Alaska seafood producers and others in the food chain continued to pay off handsomely in 2006 for entrepreneurs like David Loutrel, an Anchorage attorney and commercial fisherman who is the president of Wild Salmon Direct. Loutrel’s company markets fresh and frozen sockeye and coho salmon harvested in the Kodiak area to domestic and overseas buyers.

Becoming a member of the Global Food Collaborative brought Loutrel in contact with members Movers Inc. and Panalpina, both with expertise in moving seafood shipments within and beyond Alaska, including packaging, labeling and more.

“Robin truly has a passion for assisting businesses for supplying food out of Alaska,” Loutrel said. “I’ve met other people who are moving fish, and Robin is willing to do research (for members). It’s been real beneficial.”

Even with all that good networking though, there can be snags. A $15,000 shipment of fresh fish Wild Salmon Direct sent to Ireland sat on the tarmac at Shannon, even though it was clearly labeled to be refrigerated upon arrival.

Loutrel also faces the challenge of shipping out of Kodiak. “This year, Northern Air Cargo did a pretty good job getting our fish into Anchorage,” he said. The glitch is that the carrier has no cold storage facilities at the Kodiak airport, so if a shipment gets bumped, someone has to come get it and take it back to cold storage, he said.

The Alaska Fisheries Development Foundation, also a member of the Global Food Collaborative, has been working in collaboration with the Alaska Economic Development Corp. on what the foundation describes as a “hub and spoke plan” to locate small buildings for perishable foods at airports in rural villages. The pilot project, with exact locations to be determined, is set for next spring. Funding will come from the state’s Sustainable Salmon Fund, which gets its money from the federal government.

These facilities could also be used for other foods, including fruits and vegetables, he said.

Richardson is also excited about members like R&J Seafoods, a family owned Kenai firm with 25 years experience in producing wild Alaska salmon. Nate Berga, general manager of R&J Seafoods, “marries health, nutrition, high-value, high-quality and technology” in his business, she said.

“He understands beyond the quality, he creates the human relationship with the buyer,” she said. “He doesn’t sell. He listens to what the buyer wants, he creates a product and an environment around it. When he sells seafood, he feels he has a responsibility for your (the buyer’s) health. He wants to be a leader in the health and nutrition movement with his products.”

For her part, Richardson offers Berga information and several contacts.

“It’s really satisfying,” she said. “I’ve done this most of my career. I connect people all the time, and I fully expect a business outcome.”

Another Global Foods Collaborative member, Lynden International, offers logistics support for projects requiring ocean or air transport, export crating and custom services. Lynden International, a division of Lynden Air Freight, has purchase-order line-item services to provide advanced in-transit visibility, improved control and reduced overall costs. “They have a qualified and experienced staff in products and equipment that support food and related industries,” Richardson said.

Greg Obeso, a Lynden account executive for seafood, “knows how to get (products) in and out,” she said. “If a company is looking at new technology, he knows the contacts worldwide and how to transport it,” an industry area with a huge void in Alaska, she said. “He doesn’t produce food, but supplies the technology. These people are really important.”

Growing up in Anchorage, Richardson said she has been moving toward her current career since she was a teenager listening to evening lectures by John McManamin Sr., then the owner of an Army-Navy supply store, who made solid investments in development of the Swanson River oil patch.

“He gave lectures at his home at night, and I was entranced,” she said. “I thought, I have to understand how the supply chain and industry work. He talked about the potential of seafood, and having Alaskans vested in these businesses and not letting it slip away (to outside interests).”

Today, for an annual fee of $500 a year, members of the Global Food Collaborative get the networking and research skills of Richardson, plus a growing audience of readers of her online newsletter. Readership has grown from about 2,300 to almost 11,000 people domestically, plus Europe, Asia, South Africa, Australia and more, she said.

Her advice to producers of wild Alaska seafood and others in the food chain is simple: listen to what the buyer wants.

“We should be bringing the buyers in, showing them our natural resources and saying, ‘What kinds of products do you want to buy? How can we partner with you to develop the products?’” she said.

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