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The economic impact the seafood industry in Alabama is somewhere in the
neighborhood of 445 million dollars
about 10,000 jobs just here in coastal Alabama, not to mention the
restaurants and other things upstate. So, it has a huge impact on the state, and
Gov. Bentley set up this seafood marketing commission last
year to help the industry all aspects of it
increase the sales of Alabama seafood and uh... highlight the great products
that we have here in Alabama. I see the industry kicking back off and booming again
here in 2012.
It seems like that uh... the fishermen are out, that they're catching um...
the product. They're bringing it in. The plants are processing it, And, the consumers are
buying it. We don't have much coastline but we have a lot of processing capacity.
Our company
processes shrimp
uh... we also bring in oysters mostly from outside Alabama, but also
some from Alabama and we process them here,
as well as crab meat, We don't process here but we sell a good bit of
crab meat that's processed over in Bayou La Batre.
Which, ah, incidentally, Alabama usually is 1 and 2 with crab meat and
oysters nationwide in terms of our processing
capacity. We have a lot of hard workin'
men and women who work in the industry that work hard to provide the seafood.
People buying that good local product not only
helps the economy of Alabama, but, you know, it supports those local fishermen and
the jobs that they do to provide that food for us here in Alabama.
We sell the crabmeat, which is picked in Bayou La Batre. We sell oysters, which are shucked in Bayou La Batre.
We got our local shrimp. We've got
ah...different types of fish.
Then, we've got frozen products. That is gumbo that's made locally by a local family.
We're probably selling
seven or eight different families' products in this one shop.
And, all the tons and tons of seafood that come through this bayou
that was caught out here.
Alabama wild seafood
is not only uh... critical for us to keep our culture
going, but it's
critical for us
for our way of life.