Report: Processor closures and revenue concentration raise port vulnerability despite higher 2025 landings
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Summary
Presenters told the Council that coastwide landings rose in 2025 but processor closures in several ports and increasing groundfish revenue concentration are reducing fisheries diversity and local resilience in some communities, with Crescent City and Fort Bragg singled out for vulnerability.
Council presenters said total coastwide landings rose in 2025, yet the distribution of those gains and recent processor closures create vulnerabilities for certain ports and coastal communities.
Amanda Phillips of the Northwest Fisheries Science Center said coastwide commercial landings were up 26% in 2025 from 2024, driven by Pacific whiting and market squid, but that coastwide fisheries diversification declined to its lowest level since 1991. Amanda listed four processor closures in 2024 — Bellingham, Newport, Crescent City and Eureka — and said those closures removed processing capacity and, in some cases, entire fisheries from local participation networks.
The consequence is higher revenue concentration in fewer ports and fewer fisheries per vessel. Amanda warned groundfish revenue concentration reached its highest observed level since 1982 (measured for 2024), leaving some ports at elevated risk if nearby ports do not absorb processing or if new processors do not enter.
Panel discussion: presenters said the current connectivity metrics are calculated at the IO pack (port grouping) level and do not yet capture species-level redistribution; work is underway to break revenue concentration down by species in future analyses. The presenters emphasized that 2025 data will be important to determine whether 2024 closures produced lasting losses or mere redistribution of landings to nearby ports.
