Climate winners: adapting to species shifts in the new england supply chain

A summary of EWTE’s 2024 research paper characterizing adaptation strategies among New England seafood suppliers and barriers and opportunities to incorporating emerging climate-ready seafood.

Objective

To assess climate resilience strategies among New England seafood suppliers, or more specifically their willingness to incorporate climate winner species, and locate sets of characteristics that may explain it. Creating recommendations for businesses and policymakers to leverage when planning for climate resilience.

Research questions

  1. What varieties of adaptive strategies may New England suppliers pursue in the event of species shifts?

  2. To what degree are New England suppliers ready to incorporate climate winner species in the event of species shifts?

  3. Are there certain characteristics which may define readiness to take advantage of species shifts?

  4. How can suppliers be better prepared to deal with future climate-induced species shifts?


Abstract

Climate change is driving shifts in marine species’ distributions, affecting resource availability for fishery supply chains worldwide. While research and governance have been in step with fishing impacts, consequences to the downstream supply chain are not generally considered. For seafood suppliers to adapt to these changes, a climate-informed perspective, featuring economic, social, and management contexts, is essential. In this study we identify how and to what extent New England seafood supply chains are capable of navigating anticipated shifts in species distributions. Our focus was the degree to which suppliers would consider incorporating “climate winners”: species that are predicted to become more abundant in New England waters. Using indicators derived from climate resilience and adaptive fisheries frameworks and other business characteristics, the interviews characterized supply chain adaptability to species shifts for New England seafood suppliers. The results revealed four distinct business typologies with corresponding characteristics and strategies along a spectrum of adaptability. They offer actionable industry and policy recommendations for managing species shifts in the supply chain.

Methods

DATA COLLECTION

  • Semi-structured interviews with 27 seafood supply chain businesses September 2021-2022

    • Sampling requirements: 

      • Must be a New England-based business w/ at least one role in the middle of the supply chain (wholesaler, processor, or other distributor)

    • Sampling method: 

      • Snowball with some selective sampling to maintain diversity (small co-ops to large vertically integrated businesses) 

  • Interview question themes 

    • Business origin story/background

    • Number and location of suppliers and buyers

    • Market demographics 

    • Number of species sold, sample of portfolio including species name, origin, and relative importance to portfolio in terms of revenue (low, medium, high)

    • History of responses to supply chain shifts (shift type, how they adapted, whether they could adapt)

    • Business strengths and weaknesses

    • Willingness to incorporate the 6 climate winner species (on Likert scale)

      • Scenario 1: no change in portfolio, new climate winner species come into the area

      • Scenario 2: landings of two randomly selected “high importance” species reduced by 75% in terms of local landings 

      • assumption that management is not an issue (aka fishermen are allowed to catch the new species)

    • Business-specific and external barriers to being adaptable to species shifts 



DATA ANALYSIS 

Key findings

Businesses were overall willing to incorporate climate winner species; however, the extent to which this was true varied according to business typology. Two typologies, despite their difference in business size and structure, species portfolio, and business strategy, appeared to be most prepared to incorporate climate winners: “Climate-Winner Adaptable” and “Multi-strategy”

  • Most common barriers reported include limited consumer tastes and preferences, inflexible management

  • Several businesses had higher perceived readiness to incorporate climate winner species by dint of their flexibility, shared recognition of value of underutilized species. Common among the businesses are focus on local product, direct sourcing from fishermen, community involvement, flexible processing infrastructure, retail outlets, high species variety and knowledge.

Key Recommendations