Dawnfresh Seafoods expected to cut 70 of its 325 jobs when it transfers some frozen scampi processing to the Far East to save an estimated £1M a year, after a 60% rise in scampi costs in the last two years.
However, the environmental campaign group Friends of the Earth (FOE) Scotland called the move by the Uddingston, Scotland firm “crazy”. “Langoustine has always been a quality Scottish product; to move the processing is bizarre,” said the FOE chief executive Duncan McLaren. “It’s bad news for the environment and bad news for the economy - it doesn’t stack up.”
Andy Stapley, md of Dawnfresh, said: “The dramatic rise in raw material costs, which shows no signs of abating, has impacted significantly on our financial performance. It is a sad fact of the current global economy that in many cases it is far cheaper to carry out part of the manufacturing process of UK produce overseas than it is to complete the whole job in the UK.”
The Scottish Seafood Processors Federation warned that ex-employees could struggle to find new jobs: “It might not be so easy to pick up jobs in a similar field because the company is located outside of the main fish processing area in north-east Scotland.” It was also unconvinced that the move would save Dawnfresh money.
However, the federation said: “If the factory is thinking it’s a case of send the product abroad or close doors completely, then you can’t condemn them.”
The factory will move to a single shift operation. The day shift, part of which is involved in chilled food manufacture, will be largely unaffected and all breading operations will continue to be carried out in Uddingston.