Flight cutbacks may boost lobster ferry traffic

By John DeMings

FOR THE SOU’WESTER

NovaNewsNow.com

Lobster sales to Europe may have to take a roundabout route this winter.

Denny Morrow, executive director of the Nova Scotia Fish Packers Association, says a shortage of appropriately sized airplanes flying from Halifax means lobster for Europe will wind up flying from airports in Boston and New York. “This year we have seen fewer wide-bodied aircraft flying out of Halifax, and those planes are needed for shipping lobster,” Morrow said Nov. 4 at a Cornwallis Park rally called to reinvigorate efforts to save the Digby-Saint John ferry service.

The reduction in the number of wide-bodied airplanes emphasizes the importance of the ferry for southwestern Nova Scotia’s fishing industry, especially the lobster segment, said Morrow. He noted that $70 million worth of lobster was shipped from the province in just the last two months of 2007.

Peter Spurway, spokesman for Halifax’s Stanfield International Airport, agrees there are fewer widebody airplanes using the airport.

Iceland Air, for example, operated a pure freighter plane until June when rising fuel costs eliminated that service.

And Air Canada, which carried some fish products on its passenger flights, has reduced the frequency of flights into Heathrow in London, also because of fuel costs. “Fuel costs are dropping but you know it’s easier to stop than start (service),” Said Spurway.

Morrow said there are also problems with the ferry service from Digby, particularly in summer when tourist traffic reduces the availability of space for commercial trucks.

In summer, a lot of trucks have been turned away from the ferry at Digby because of a lack of room, he said. Some shippers no longer figure on using the ferry, driving around the Bay of Fundy rather than sit in Digby for hours for a ferry that they might not get on.

Bay Ferries official Robert Cottreau replied afterwards that the company tries to cater to the commercial truckers, but agrees with Morrow’s point that a new, fuel-efficient vessel is needed.

Morrow said ferry users and the operator Bay Ferries Ltd. got a reprieve with the recent drop in oil prices, but they will soon go back up again. “It’s not going to be easy to solve the ferry issue.”

Morrow points to technological developments that could offer advantages to the area, such as production of fuel from algae, but said, “If we rip out our infrastructure, we won’t be able to take advantage of technological changes when they come.”

Twenty-eight per cent of the province’s fishery products are shipped to Boston through Digby using the ‘Princess of Acadia’ ferry. “Fresh fish to Boston, that’s where we compete,” said Cottreau. China and Taiwan and other distant producers are unable to provide the American city with freshly caught fish.