'Everybody's just restless:' Maine's iconic lobster fishery braces for trade wars, upheaval

Boston Globe

14-05-2025

As President Trump wages an unprecedented protectionist campaign to impose or tease steep tariffs on nearly every trading partner, an industry that thrives on the free flow of global trade — and disposable cash in Americans' wallets — could suffer disproportionately.
'I'm extremely worried,' said Dave Cousens, a former president of the Maine Lobstermen's Association who has fished for lobster off midcoast Maine for 50 years. 'I think there's going to be a lot of people who don't survive.'
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The anxiety begins on the north side of the Gulf of Maine, in Canada, which Trump has antagonized through tariffs and saber-rattling taunts of '51st State.' Canada is a lynchpin of the industry's supply chain, with lobsters caught by Maine boats crossing the international border up to four times for processing.
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Then there's the fact that Maine's fishery is sustained by tens of millions of dollars of lobster purchased every year by China, the European Union, and other places that are facing fresh US tariffs and mulling retaliatory tariffs in turn.
With fears of a trade war-fueled recession or economic downturn looming, the domestic market may prove no buffer. The quintessential luxury purchase, lobster would likely
rank among the first splurges for Americans to cut out when tightening their belts.
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The pain is already hitting, said Cousens. The price for spring season hard-shell lobster, which is shipped live across the world, is dropping to a point where many lobstermen are struggling or failing to break even.
With Chinese and Canadian markets closing off to Maine lobster, and a souring economic mood domestically, 'no one wants to buy lobster right now,' he said.
Looming over the current situation is the confounding uncertainty of what's to come. Trade deals with dozens of countries are reportedly in the works, yet their timelines are unclear. Some tariffs are on, then off again,
such as the truce Trump just struck with China on Monday, leaving markets to fluctuate according to the president's whims.
As the peak of Maine's lobster season inches closer, the industry and its advocates are frustrated by their inability to plan for what comes next.
'Everybody's just restless,' said George Edwards, a Maine native and official with the International Association of Machinists, which represents the workers of the Maine Lobstering Union Local 207. 'We're not sure what the tariffs are going to do. Every day it changes.'
That restlessness radiates outward to, for example, Brooks Trap Mill, a family business that has been making and selling lobster traps and supplies in Maine for 70 years.
'As far as tariffs go, we just don't know what to expect,' said chief executive, Mark Brooks. 'It really makes it tough to plan for the future.'
In Washington, where Maine's congressional delegation has long advocated for the lobster fishery, lawmakers are riding the same roller coaster.
'It's just a nightmare. It really is,' said US Representative Chellie Pingree, the Democrat from Maine's 1st District, which spans the coastline from Kittery to Camden. 'There's a lot of fragility in the market.'
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White House spokesman Kush Desai said a 'top priority of President Trump's America First agenda is making sure that US seafood producers, including Maine's lobstermen, can compete fairly in global markets.' He added the administration is cutting regulations and 'pushing back against unfair trade practices" to 'level the playing field for American businesses and workers.'
In addition to the 5,600 independent lobstermen who make up the heart of the fishery, as many as 35,000 total jobs are supported by the lobster business in Maine, according to a Colby College analysis. Overall, lobster fuels more than $1 billion in economic activity in the state every year, according to the Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative.
Recent years have seen emerging challenges for the fishery. During the Biden administration, lobstermen fought against federal regulation meant to protect endangered right whales because they worried it would be ruinous. They succeeded, but looking ahead, there's the threat of rapidly warming seas, which has pushed lobsters north in the Gulf of Maine and could drive them further still into Canada — which would
decimate the Maine fishery as it has in Connecticut.
Trade-related disruptions aren't new, either. In his first term, Trump put tariffs on a variety of Chinese imports, resulting in retaliatory measures from Beijing. The impact for the US lobster industry was stark. The year before the tariffs hit, the United States exported $183 million worth of lobster to China; the year after, that haul was nearly halved, to $93 million.
Trump's initial proposed 25 percent tariffs on Canadian imports sparked panic in Maine, because of how much this integrated supply chain straddles the border. Much of Maine's lobster catch is processed at Canadian facilities and then sent back across the Gulf of Maine, so a 25 percent tariff, levied more than once, would have been ruinous. In 2024, Maine exported $250 million in seafood to Canada, by far its biggest buyer.
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Trump has mostly walked back those tariffs and may focus on renegotiating the trade deal among the United States, Canada, and Mexico he brokered in his first term. But even without tariffs in place, many Canadians are boycotting US goods to protest Trump's talk of annexation and cancelling trips to states they used to frequently visit, such as Maine.
With respect to trade with Canada, the lobster industry is hardly out of the woods, given how frequently Trump changes his mind, said Eric Miller, a Washington consultant who advises American and Canadian
businesses. Trump 'may well decide to take a different tack on' trade with Canada, he said.
The situation with China, the largest single buyer of Maine lobster outside Canada, has been even more turbulent. Trump's massive escalation in April set the proposed US tariff on Chinese imports at a staggering 145 percent, with China retaliating with an 84 percent levy. On Monday, the two sides announced a 90-day pause, with Chinese tariffs on US goods landing at 10 percent, for now.
'If we were to have substantial tariffs with China during our busy season, it would be a nightmare,' warned Pingree. 'It would make Maine lobsters kind of un-saleable.'
Maine lobstermen might get lucky if those tariffs remained consistent, while China's existing high tariffs on Canadian lobster might benefit the US position. Still, American producers will likely look to other markets, such as the European Union, but the dynamic across the Atlantic is tense, too, with aggressive moves so far on both sides.
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'If you have a situation where the trade war with Europe reaches catastrophic proportions again, that will be really, really challenging for the industry,' Miller said.
An added challenge is how tariffs could increase overhead for lobstermen. A typical lobster operation might need to replace a few hundred traps per season, at a cost of roughly $150 each. Brooks Trap Mill assembles its traps in the United States but sources some of its steel from abroad, which is now subject to a universal 25 percent tariff. Any price increases could substantially eat into already thin
margins for lobstermen and trap makers alike.
The impact of this upheaval could be uneven within the fishery, said Nick Battista, chief policy officer at the Island Institute, which advocates for Maine's coastal industries and environment.
Some lobstermen are going to be 'relatively well situated to handle bumps and downturns in the fishery,' he said. 'There's also a number of people who invested in boats and fishing businesses, who are significantly leveraged in terms of debt they've taken on . . . that's where we'll start seeing challenges, cracks, in the industry in the coming years.'
While financial markets have rebounded since the thaw in US-China trade tensions, analysts and industry leaders still fear a recession is imminent — and even just the prospect of one could cool discretionary spending.
That's bad news for the lobstermen, said Miller. 'Where that translates is, people focus on core consumption and less on buying lobster rolls,' he said. 'That's just the reality of it.'
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Worried tougher times are ahead, Cousens, the midcoast lobsterman, wondered why the administration was pursuing these policies at all.
'It's stupid, self-inflicted [expletive] if you ask me,' he said. 'There's no need for it.'
Sam Brodey can be reached at