New container will transport live lobster to foreign markets by sea

It's a new way to move live lobster, and the shipping company behind it is touting it as a potential game changer in the industry.

Shipping giant CMA-CGM, in cooperation with a small company in the south of France, has designed a type of container it calls Aquaviva to transport live lobsters by sea.

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Eric Legros,vice president of refrigeration, saidWednesday CMA-CGM hasdone trial shipments and the crustaceans arrived in "extremely good condition" and had a mortality rate of less than one per cent.

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"By earlynext year, we will have our fleet completed and we will be able to ship regularly live animals from Canada to the world," Legros said in an interview in Halifax, where one of the new shipping containers was on display.

Sea transport now viable

He said up until now, the only options for shipping lobsters overseas were frozen by sea or live on ice blocks by air.

In Aquaviva, lobsters are individually placed in Styrofoam blocks with chilled seawater circulating around them.

The company says the container mimics the dark and narrow hiding spaces that lobsters like in the ocean, allowing them to hibernate while being shipped. The water in the closed circuit unit has to be maintained at an ideal temperature for the entire trip.

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Legros said they hope this new shipping method will help expand exports of Canadian lobster to Europe and especially Asia. Lobster exports from Nova Scotia are worth $385 million annually.

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"The Asian market, the consumers are looking for live animals and definitely that will help us to grow this market," he said.

Legros said he knows the federal and local levels of government are interested in branding Canadian lobster and believes the Aquaviva container will help increase the quality of crustaceans delivered around the world.

Next up, he said the shipping company has its eye on transporting other live species.

"Maybe some good newswill come soon from oysters and mussels," Legros said.