Crustaceans

Crustaceans are Canada's highest-profile seafood exports and each carries its own grading language. Lobster is graded by size band and by hard or soft shell, and only hard shell travels well. Snow crab is sold as cooked frozen sections and picked meat, graded by size band. Northern shrimp is sold on count size, cooked and peeled or shell-on.

Glaze is the parameter to interrogate across all three: it is water, and a price that does not state the glaze percentage is not comparable to one that does.

These are quota-managed wild fisheries with volume that genuinely varies year to year. Buyers building continuous programmes should contract early in a season and not assume spot availability, and should treat live lobster as a specialist logistics product.