Haida Wild Explores Red Sea Urchin Processing
Campbell River, B.C. – An exciting opportunity was presented to seven Haida Wild staff to go to Quadra Island to learn how to process Red Sea Urchin at Walcan Seafood Ltd. for a two-week period in the middle of November. Walcan currently has 30-40 employees working on Red Sea Urchin in their plant. This training opportunity was a part of Haida Wild management’s due diligence on the opportunity to extend the production season by processing Haida Gwaii Red Sea Urchin. The harvesting season typically happens from February to April annually. The timing of the fishery would diversify Haida Wild’s portfolio of products and provide a longer season of operation with much needed additional work as the Red Sea Urchin processing is labour intensive. Haida Wild expects to employ 25-30 staff once production is at full capacity. “It was good to see how other plants run compared to ours,” remarked one of the participants.
“Haida Wild continues to actively work to develop the capacity of our employees, create plant efficiencies and looking at ways to extend the season,” said Yaahl Iwaans Brad Setso, Haida Wild General Manager. “Sending some of our crew to Quadra Island to work in the Walcan plant for two weeks was excellent on-the-job training and exposure to how other plants function. We are continuing to look into the opportunity to process urchin and developing our relationship to Walcan.” Haida Wild is part of the Haida Enterprise Corporation (HaiCo) which manages, grows and governs the business enterprises of the Haida Nation with the goal of developing a sustainable economy on Haida Gwaii with two specific goals: Generate revenue to attain financial independence; and, Improve the quality of life for the collective benefit of the Haida people. The Haida Enterprise Corporation was incorporated under the BC Business Corporations Act on July 20, 2009.
