Cooke set to reopen plant in Machiasport

While the New Brunswick government was announcing on June 27 a $3 million loan to Cooke Aquaculture, which will help in the firm's ongoing creation of 230 new jobs in the province, the company released publicly its decision to reopen the Machiasport processing plant in Maine by early next year, which will lead to the creation of approximately 80 new jobs in the state. The plant's reopening will also mark the return of primary processing of salmon in Maine, after a series of plant closures.

In August 2006, Glenn Cooke, CEO of Cooke Aquaculture, had stated the company's commitment to reopening a processing plant in Maine, either in Machiasport or Eastport. The decision on which plant would be opened has been up in the air since then. David Morang, Cobscook Bay area manager of Phoenix Salmon in Eastport, which is owned by Cooke Aquaculture, is disappointed that the Eastport plant won't be reopened, but he adds, "We will be processing fish in the state of Maine again. That's a good thing."

Morang says he understands why the company made the decision to go with the Machiasport facility. He points out, "The Machiasport plant is a newer plant. It's had a lot of updates and been modernized." The Eastport processing facility, which was built in 1978 as a freezer plant for the Mearl Corp. and most recently had been operated by Heritage Salmon, would require "major updates," including a wastewater line connecting to the city's sewer system. Reportedly, the estimate on the cost of installing a wastewater line from the plant and a station to pump the effluent up to the sewer system was $750,000. The Machiasport plant, which was built in the 1990s and was operated by Atlantic Salmon of Maine until 2004, has a treatment system built into it.

"Aquaculture is strong in the state of Maine," Morang observes, pointing out that Cooke Aquaculture will be stocking approximately three million fish in Cobscook Bay next spring and that salmon being raised in the bay have not had any outbreaks of the deadly infectious salmon anemia disease since they were stocked at the salmon farms in 2006. Following the removal of all salmon from Cobscook Bay in early 2002 to control the ISA outbreaks, requirements for fallowing and three-year stocking cycles for farm sites were implemented. Cooke presently has six active sites in the Cobscook Bay area and employs 35 people for its fish farms in the Eastport area. The Eastport plant formerly employed about 40 people just for processing.

Sebastian Belle, executive director of the Maine Aquaculture Association, comments, "The company deserves a great deal of credit for reopening a processing plant and following through on the commitment they made." However, he notes that with the new bay management system and three-year rotation cycles for stocking salmon, the company will need more lease sites, particularly farther down the coast from Cobscook Bay, in order to balance its production from year to year. "It's up to us to help them with getting more lease sites so they can increase production."

Belle says the decision to reopen the plant is not only a good sign for the aquaculture industry in the state but for working waterfronts. With almost all of the processing plants in the state in the Portland area, "to have a major processing plant Downeast is a huge advantage," Belle says. "It wouldn't surprise me if there's interest to use it for other species."

Preliminary work to get the Machiasport plant running will begin this fall, and early in 2009 approximately 30 to 40 workers will be hired at the processing facility. Within a year from then the plant will be in full production with 60 to 70 workers, and additional workers for harvest vessel crews will bring the number up to 80, according to Nell Halse, director of communications for Cooke Aquaculture.

Halse says company officials favored the Machiasport site because it has more modern infrastructure, including wastewater treatment and good harbor access, and because it is more centrally located for processing fish from farms in the Cobscook Bay and Machias Bay areas.

Cooke Aquaculture acquired Atlantic Salmon of Maine in 2004 and the East Coast operations of both Heritage Salmon and Marine Harvest C the former Stolt Sea Farm C in 2005. With those acquisitions, the company has been making capital investments to harmonize the standards for its equipment at its processing plants, sea cages and hatcheries. Much of the investment has been at Cooke's facilities in St. George and Black's Harbour. Halse adds that the company invested significant funding into its hatcheries in Oak Bay, N.B., and Bingham, Maine, in order to achieve certification for the Seafood Trust's Eco-label. The province decided to partner with the company in providing the $3-million forgivable loan because it wants to secure those jobs in New Brunswick, Halse says.

A total of 198 new employees have already been hired in the province, and the remaining 32 will be hired by the end of 2008. While new jobs have been created in every division, the remaining ones to be filled are on the processing side.

"Our government is proud to invest in the jobs created by the expansion of Cooke Aquaculture and its efforts to expand its aquaculture and fish processing capacity," said New Brunswick Premier Shawn Graham at a June 27 news conference in St. George. "I am confident that continuing to build strategic partnerships such as this one will help New Brunswick achieve its goal of self-sufficiency by 2026."

The premier was joined at the news conference by Michael Cooke, chief operating officer of Cooke Aquaculture; Fisheries Minister Rick Doucet; and St. George Mayor Sharon Tucker.

"We are a local family company with deep roots in New Brunswick," said Michael Cooke. "Even though we have expanded beyond Atlantic Canada's borders to be competitive globally, we remain committed to this region, to these communities and to its people. This commitment is backed by our company's ongoing capital investments in our Charlotte County operations, and it is further supported by the government, which recognizes the important role our sector can play in the province's future."

Cooke Aquaculture is an independent, family-owned company based in Charlotte County and has operations in Atlantic Canada, Maine and Chile, and employs 1,400 people.