UNE Marine Sciences attends the world’s largest seafood show

University of New England Marine Sciences students and faculty attended Seafood Expo and Processing North America. With 23,000 attendees packing the Boston Convention center, it was the largest seafood show ever held in the world, with more than 1,300 exhibitors from 56 countries.

The UNE trip was funded by the UNE Center for Excellence in the Marine Sciences. Barry Costa-Pierce, Ph.D., Henry L. & Grace Doherty Professor of Marine Sciences, director of the University of New England Department of Marine Sciences and Center for Excellence in the Marine Sciences, attended a partnership planning meeting convened by Barton Seaver of Harvard University who also serves as the advisor in Sustainable Seafoods for UNE.

“I had such a wonderful time at the Boston seafood expo,” said UNE Marine Science student Mary Hollandbeck ‘18. “It was a great opportunity to learn more about the seafood industry.”

The group was able to see new and innovative products such as frozen live half shell oysters in a retail box, gluten free halibut burgers, a candied smoked salmon ice cream from Alaska, chocolate and coconut seaweed snacks and smoked salmon with whisky. They also learned about a traceability system geared for fish, rising prices of farmed salmon and the growing interest in dogfish, an abundant, delicious, underutilized species studied by UNE scientists and students. Another highlight was the virtual reality “tour” of offshore aquaculture cages – a new way to help people visualize aquaculture without having to set foot on a boat.

To learn more about the University of New England’s Department of Marine Sciences visit www.une.edu/cas/marine

To learn more about the University of New England’s Center for Excellence in Marine Sciences, visit www.une.edu/research/msc

To apply, visit www.une.edu/admissions