Fresh Halibut is typically what will hit the market first, with pricing expected to be high at the start of the season until around May when processors start freezing fish, resulting in little to no frozen Halibut offers on the market until then.

The total catch limit for the IPHC-managed fishery, extending from Alaska to California, has been reduced again for the 2024 season, decreasing by nearly 2 million pounds from the previous year. This reduction follows a more significant cut of 4.25 million pounds between the 2023 and 2022 seasons.

Utilizing historical catch data, the 2024 season could potentially yield a net weight harvest of about 25 million pounds which could be the lowest since 2020.

Regarding the stock status, fishery managers, including Kurt Iverson from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fisheries division, reported the lowest spawning biomass in 40 years for Pacific halibut.

On top of having fewer fish, population surveys indicate the fish are smaller than usual. For quite a number of years now, they have seen relatively low weight at age, so halibut are growing slower than they were 20 years ago.



These challenges are contributing factors to lower overall biomass and catch volumes, prompting expectations for conservative harvest levels for the foreseeable future as it’s impossible to tell when, or if, the fishery will have strong recruitment again.

Our recommendation is to not hesitate in securing your Pacific Halibut requirements as product becomes available especially if pricing is sitting around pre-pandemic levels.

Pricing throughout 2023 dropped considerably from 2022 across the board for commodity, value added, Alaskan and Russian raw materials.

With potentially around 5 million pounds less Pacific halibut for the market than other recent years, we may see some upward price pressure depending on the dynamics of the fresh and frozen supply.

On the Russian side, we are hearing supply is becoming constrained as harvesting and processing resources, including labor, are being redirected to support war efforts.



It’s important to note that Russian halibut is still allowed into the USA.

Russia’s total allowable catch for their 2024 Pacific halibut season is around 4 million pounds.

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