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Cuxhaven (dpa) - After the lousy business year 2019 and the Corona crisis 2020, the shrimp fishermen on the German North Sea coast are hoping for better sales for the upcoming season.
After the start of the season at the beginning of March, the first cutters are back on the North Sea.
"The prices are also adequate, but the catch is still not right," said the managing director of the producer association of the German shrimp fishermen, Dirk Sander, of the German press agency.
After a cold winter, the situation remains tense for many of the around 100 companies located between Sylt and Ditzum in East Frisia.
"Many companies are starting again this year with a deep minus," said Sander.
Some had hoped to make up for their losses through fishing trips in winter, during which the cutters actually lay in the ports - but only a few succeeded.
“It wasn't possible for a long time because of the wind, and then the frost came.
It was all over, ”said Sander.
Nevertheless: Most of the companies made it through the winter, bankruptcies are not known.
The companies in Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein agree that only a third year of crisis should not follow.
Then there would be a whole series of bankruptcies, Sander is sure.
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Since the North Sea is still comparatively cold, the cutter drivers currently have to go far out to fish.
"Now we hope that it will get warmer again quickly, so that the crabs will move closer to land again," said Sander.
In addition, the crabs grow faster at higher temperatures.
Producer prices have recently stabilized at a low level.
They are currently on average six euros per kilogram of North Sea crabs.
In the previous year it was only three to five euros.
The Corona year 2020 was already the second bad year in a row for the shrimp fishermen.
According to earlier information, the largest producer group calculated the catch in 2020 at around 7,000 tonnes of crabs.
This roughly corresponded to the result of the already bad previous year 2019. In the record year of 2018, the crab fishermen of the producer group had more than doubled their nets.
The association put the turnover at around 25 million euros in 2020.
In 2018 it was more than 60 million.
In 2020, large traders in the Netherlands, for example, bought fewer shrimps because they could not be further processed.
In the peeling centers in Morocco, where the crabs are peeled by hand, capacities have been reduced due to corona.
As a result, many shrimp fishermen had to stay ashore for weeks.
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"Everyone is hoping that it will be a normal year again," said Hilke Looden, fisheries advisor at the Lower Saxony Chamber of Agriculture.
The situation in Morocco has improved.
Shifts are now being worked there.
The deep-freeze warehouses, where traders stored many shrimp after the record year 2018, are now largely empty again.
"The conditions are good," said Looden with a view to the season.
Now it is important for the shrimp fishermen that nature also plays along.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210412-99-168134 / 2
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