Largest US Fishery Donates Seafood to Support Hunger Relief

Oct. 21, 2008 - PRLog -- Seattle, WA – The Seattle commercial fishing community is providing 250 delicious and nutritious seafood meals to the homeless and unemployed at The Millionair Club in downtown Seattle.  A team of volunteers along with Congressman Jim McDermott (D-WA) are serving lunches including fish donated by Trident Seafoods through the efforts of the At-sea Processors Association’s (APA’s) Community Catch program.

Community Catch was established nearly eight years ago by APA member fishing companies to support hunger relief efforts.  APA’s six member companies, all based in western Washington, harvest seafood from the sustainable and well-managed Alaska pollock fishery – the largest fishery in the U.S. and one of the largest in the world.  Each year, these companies join together and, working with local non-profit SeaShare, donate 250,000 lbs of fish - one million seafood meals - to local and national food assistance programs.  The donated Alaska pollock being served at the Millionair Club is high-quality seafood that otherwise would have been sold in the marketplace.  

With both homelessness and hunger on the rise due to the ailing economy, this year’s donation is particularly significant.  “APA and its member company Trident Seafoods are honored to support the Millionair Club’s extraordinary efforts to provide essential services to those in need in the community,” said Stephanie Madsen, Executive Director of APA.  “We hope this event sponsored by local fishing companies will remind our neighbors of the critical need in these hard economic times to support local hunger relief programs.”

John van Amerongen with Trident Seafoods added, “The Seattle-based fishing industry has been very fortunate to have strong, sustainable fish stocks in Alaska and the North Pacific and we’re happy to be able to partner with SeaShare and the Millionair Club to put some great seafood on the table and help our neighbors in need.”

The Millionair Club serves hot, nourishing meals twice a day, averaging more than 10,000 meals each month.   On Wednesday, Millionair Club clients receive a lunch of stuffed Alaska pollock, vegetable garden medley soup, mashed potatoes, salad, bread and beverages.  

“We are very thankful to APA for providing this delicious and nutritious meal.  This year we have seen almost a 30% increase in requests for our services, both meals and day labor and a drop in the number of jobs available,” explained the Millionair Club’s Deborah Crawley.  “A special meal like this is really something that the working homeless can look forward to in a year that is proving to be one of the most difficult that we have seen in years.  APA is making a difference in the lives of the working homeless.”

APA and the Millionair Club are pleased that Congressman Jim McDermott joined the effort at the Millionair Club.  “I feel a special kinship with our fishing community because as a young man I was a merchant seaman on the Robert C. Stanley, an ore carrier that plied the Great Lakes out of Gary, Indiana.  As such, I am especially proud to join the Seattle commercial fishing community and its commitment to share the harvest with the less fortunate among us,” Congressman McDermott said.  “We are living in difficult times and we have to pull together as a community and country.  Last June, I succeeded in extending unemployment benefits, and I have introduced another bill to extend UI benefits again, because the economic crisis, as we know, is far from over and decent, hard-working people deserve a helping hand.  I also strongly support H.R. 3976 to extend tax deductions for all businesses that donate food to homeless shelters and food banks.  APA’s member companies do heroic work in donating a million seafood meals a year through America’s Second Harvest, and I want the federal government to support this incredible humanitarian effort.”




About the At-sea Processors Association (APA) - APA represents U.S. catcher/processor vessels that participate primarily in the sustainably managed Alaska pollock and west coast Pacific whiting fisheries.  Both fisheries are among the largest food fisheries in the world.  Processing our catch at sea allows us to produce the highest quality seafood products.  Visit www.atsea.org for more information.  

About Trident Seafoods - Trident Seafoods is a vertically integrated harvester, processor and marketer of seafood from Alaska, the Pacific Northwest and around the world. Founded in 1973, Trident is a privately held, American owned corporation operating offshore processors and shore-side plants throughout Alaska and the Pacific Northwest. Visit www.tridentseafoods.com.

About the Millionair Club – The Millionair Club Charity offers hope, hot meals and an honest day’s work to the homeless and unemployed in Seattle.  The program’s goal is to help hard-working individuals escape poverty and get back on the road to independence. The Millionair Club has served more than 9.5 million meals to hungry workers and dispatched some 730,000 men and women to jobs.  Visit www.millionairclub.org for more information.

About SeaShare - SeaShare, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the critical supply of fish products for hungry people throughout the United States. For more information about SeaShare visit www.seashare.org.