British prawns go to China to be shelled

Market Kitchen had a piece last night where presenters and guests got to nominate environmentally unfriendly foodstuffs for their recycle bin. When Arthur Potts Dawson nominated bottled water I thought it was going to be a dull piece, but then Matt Tebbutt nominated Dawnfresh prawns. I couldn’t believe my ears and had to look for details, and T helped me find this piece in the Times about it:

Dawnfresh, a Scottish seafood company that supplies supermarkets and other large retailers, cut 70 jobs last year after deciding to ship its scampi more than 5,000 miles to China to be shelled by hand, then shipped back to the River Clyde in Scotland and breaded for sale in Britain.

The company said it was forced to make the move by commercial pressures. “This seems a bizarre thing to do but the reality is that the numbers don’t stack up any other way,” said Andrew Stapley, a director. “We are not the first in the industry to have had to do this. Sadly, it’s cheaper to process overseas than in the UK and companies like us are having to do this to remain competitive.”

Is that not one of the most ridiculous and disgusting thing you’ve ever heard?