Scampi move by Whitby boost for Northern Ireland processor

Northern Ireland's Kilkeel Seafoods will benefit from a decision by parent Whitby Seafoods in North Yorkshire to bring back scampi processing operations from Vietnam to the UK.

The move, a response to the growing demand from retailers and consumers for the provenance and traceability that local sourcing ensures, involves Kilkeel Seafoods investing &pound933,000 in its peeling and shelling operations, an investment that will provide 33 new jobs in Northern Ireland.

The company, based at Kilkeel Harbour, Northern Ireland's biggest fishing port, is expanding processing operations for wholetail scampi for Whitby Seafoods for breaded and other products for retailers and for foodservice.

Daniel Whittle, managing director of Kilkeel Seafoods, says: "The decision to expand scampi shelling and processing operations in Kilkeel is the outcome of a strategic decision by the group to concentrate resources on supplying existing and potential customers, both retail and foodservice, with scampi sourced from UK and Irish trawlers and processed within our operations, especially those based at Kilkeel.

"It's a tremendous endorsement of the consistently high quality of our products and also of the scampi from the North Channel and Irish Sea provided by our network of experienced suppliers."

Kilkeel Seafoods currently employs 140 people. The company was formed in 2011 when Whitby acquired Rockall Seafoods, another local scampi producer.

This followed Whitby's earlier acquisition of Middleton Seafoods, in 1997, and made the new company the biggest sheller and processor of wholetail scampi in the UK. Whitby employs 140 people in North Yorkshire.