Dartmouth lands retail seafood plant
Government loans $10.3m for fish processing facility
The federal and Nova Scotia governments announced in a joint news release Friday that 12150484 Canada Inc., a subsidiary of St. John's, N.L.based Ocean Choice International Inc., would receive a loan totaling $10,339,504 for a new technically advanced seafood processing plant in Dartmouth.
“Our new retail packing plant will introduce production capacity for marketready retail and food-service products for our suite of species, including scallops that are harvested off the coast of Nova Scotia,” Ocean Choice CEO Martin Sullivan said in a government news release.
Ocean Choice is a vertically integrated family-owned and operated international seafood company with extensive harvesting and processing assets, according to the release. The company sells a diversified range of seafood to more than 400 customers in 30 countries.
The company harvests seafood with a fleet of five offshore vessels, processes its catch at five processing facilities and markets seafood with sales offices around the globe.
“This investment in valueadded processing will help our seafood sector continue to meet increasing market demands for sustainably sourced, high-quality fish and seafood,” Nova Scotia Fisheries and Aquaculture Minister Keith Colwell said in the release.
“Our fish and seafood sector continues to provide quality career options for Nova Scotians and economic opportunities in our coastal communities.”
The new plant is expected to create year-round employment for 30 to 50 people in Nova Scotia, according to the government.
“This investment in the Halifax region makes strategic sense for Ocean Choice,” Sullivan said.
“It will create increased value, which we will reinvest in our existing processing facilities and vessels.”
The new facility will also allow OCI to penetrate further down the value chain with consumer-ready products, he said.
In an email, Sullivan said: “The cold storage and distribution centre will be operational within the coming weeks while the retail portion of the facility will not be up and running until sometime in 2022. Ocean Choice has leased facilities . . . it is converting to meet the company's needs. This facility will provide the opportunity to significantly expand production capability to add additional species and products in the future."
According to the release, the Dartmouth retail packing and cold-storage distribution centre will allow Ocean Choice International to conduct secondary processing, which will add to the value of the product and allow OCI to pursue new markets in North America, Europe and Asia.
“It will bring us closer to global markets, including overnight delivery to central Canada and northeast U.S.A., and it will allow us to produce more value-added products in Atlantic Canada,” Sullivan said.
The seafood company appears to be in growth mode. On June 29, OCI received permission from town council to build a $20-million cold storage facility in Long Pond Harbour, Conception Bay South, N.L.
The funding for the Dartmouth facility will include $8 million from the $400-million Atlantic Fisheries Fund, which is jointly financed by the federal and provincial governments, and $2,339,504 from the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency's Regional Economic Growth Through Innovation program.
“Canada's fish and seafood sector is a vital part of the economy, with Nova Scotia leading the way. This project . . . will help our fisheries be at the forefront in adopting new state-of-the-art technology and equipment,” Bernadette Jordan, MP for South Shore-st. Margarets and minister of fisheries, oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, said in the release.
Dartmouth-cole Harbour MP Darren Fisher said in the release that the announcement means high-quality, year-round jobs in Dartmouth.
“And it means that this company will be able to adopt some of the most advanced processing and packaging equipment available, including green technologies.”