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Protein from fish has been particularly hard to obtain for food banks in the Midwest. SeaShare has worked wtih America's Second Harvest, Hunger Solutions Minnesota, and Stoller Fisheries to increase the availability of fish in Minnesota and Iowa. Through a Kraft Foods grant we were able to purchase equipment that enables Stoller Fisheries to reclaim large volumes of meat from their gefilte fish production. Hunger Solutions Minnesota worked with local nutritionists and chefs to develop recipes and educational material for their clients. This is a unique opportunity to use an under-developed resource to help feed hungry people in the nation's breadbasket.
The network asked us to provide more oven-ready, retail-type products. SeaShare has responded by working with Ocean Beauty Seafoods to produce high-protein patties from wild Alaska salmon. Kraft Foods and Ocean Beauty both provided funding to purchase equipment that was installed in a plant in Southeast Alaska. Ocean Beauty then donated 580,000 pounds of salmon meat last summer, that was blended with spices and other ingredients and then frozen. Alaska Marine Lines donated southbound freight to Seattle, where the patties are packed into family-size packages and shipped out to food banks across the country. These patties (96% salmon, no fillers!) represent a great example of the kind of partnerships that our industry can develop.
Over the last three years SeaShare has worked with the Federation of Virginia Food Banks to develop seafood donations in the Chesapeake Bay region. Seafood grants from Kraft Foods have been used to develop partnerships between fishermen, processors, trucking companies, and cold storage operators. The Federation has also worked with the Conservation Fund's Freshwater Institute in Shepherdstown, WV, to process and donate fish from their aquaculture program. And they recently published a guide to Aquaculture-Food Bank Partnerships, describing their innovative production and delivery of healthy protein products to the food bank network.
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