Analysis
NAICS 311710 is the 2022 national industry for seafood product preparation and packaging, part of 31171 (Seafood Product Preparation and Packaging). Census lists 27 example activities under it in the official index.
County Business Patterns counts 516 US establishments in this code in 2023, employing 29,132 people at an average annual payroll of $60,776 per employee (34th percentile of national industries). 29% of the establishments have fewer than five employees, which is close to the national mix.
Its index entries, the activities Census uses to assign businesses to this code, include cannery, seafood, canning, fish, crustacea, and mollusks, chowders, seafood, manufacturing and cod liver oil extraction, crude, processing, among 27 in all.
Its goods appear in 173 statistical lines of the US tariff schedule, mostly under headings 1604 (prepared or preserved fish; caviar and caviar substitutes…), 0305 (fish, dried, salted or in brine; smoked fish, whether or…) and 1605 (crustaceans, molluscs and other aquatic invertebrates…). That link is how import data is matched to domestic producers, for example in trade-remedy cases.
Between 2018 and 2023 the number of establishments fell 7% and employment fell 6%. The 2018 count used NAICS 2017, so part of a large move can come from codes being redefined rather than from businesses opening or closing.
Official definition
This industry comprises establishments primarily engaged in one or more of the following: (1) canning seafood (including soup); (2) smoking, salting, and drying seafood; (3) eviscerating fresh fish by removing heads, fins, scales, bones, and entrails; (4) shucking and packing fresh shellfish; (5) processing marine fats and oils; and (6) freezing seafood. Establishments known as "floating factory ships" that are engaged in the gathering and processing of seafood into canned seafood products are included in this industry.
Source: US Census Bureau, NAICS 2022 Manual.
Index entries (27)
- Cannery, seafood
- Canning, fish, crustacea, and mollusks
- Chowders, seafood, manufacturing
- Cod liver oil extraction, crude, processing
- Curing fish and seafood
- Dinners, frozen seafood, manufacturing
- Drying fish and seafood
- Fish and marine animal oils processing
- Fish egg bait canning
- Fish freezing (e.g., blocks, fillets, ready-to-serve products)
- Fish manufacturing
- Fish meal processing
- Fish, curing, drying, pickling, salting, and smoking
- Floating factory ships, seafood processing
- Freezing fish (e.g., blocks, fillets, ready-to-serve products)
- Picking crab meat
- Seafood and seafood products canning
- Seafood and seafood products curing
- Seafood and seafood products manufacturing
- Seafood dinners, frozen, manufacturing
- Seaweed processing (e.g., dulse)
- Shellfish and shellfish products canning
- Shellfish and shellfish products manufacturing
- Shellfish curing
- Shucking and packing fresh shellfish
- Soups, seafood, manufacturing
- Surimi manufacturing