Last month, right in the middle of Alimentaria in Barcelona, another milestone was reached in the European fresh fish trade.
For the first time, a Spanish fish processing company could participate and purchase in a French auction which was taking place at the same time 1250 km away, using his personal computer and the Internet.
This marked the official launch of La Turballe auction into the Spanish buyers market, using the auctioning system of PEFA.COM. Mr. Gralepois, Director of La Turballe auction said this "marked a historic and positive point in the long history of fishermen in the region".
La Turballe is the largest fishing port on the Atlantic Coast of France for Anchovies. It is known for the quality and freshness of its products which can be delivered to Spain the same day of landing. La Turballe is the first auction in France using a Pefa auction system. This tool replaced an older one, as the emerging trend is for auctions to renew older local based auction clocks with a Pefa.com Internet based package. "After this morning's experience in Alimentaria, I decided immediately to get the Pefa remote facility installed on our computer in the office", said Mr. Jean Michel Quintin of Frigorifics Ros, who attended the La Turballe auction from Alimentaria.
Apart from offering fishing ports an individual auction selling system which can be clustered and/or having it's own remote buyers, Pefa.com is operating its "Auction Network", Europe's largest real-time electronic fish auction platform. Already on-line with Pefa.com are:
* Stellendam, Colijnsplaat and Scheveningen in Holland
* Zeebrugge in Belgium
* Ardglass, Kilkeel and Portavogie in North Ireland
* Troon and Lochinver in Scotland
* Lowestoft in England and Milford Haven in Wales and, most recently,
* Thyboron in Denmark.
The total quantity of fish traded over the Auction Network in 2001 was over 35.300 tons and the current level each month is around 5000 tons.
All this fresh fish is available to the remote buyers in the Network.
The auctions of Cuxhaven, Germany and Cattolica, Italy have joined the Network and are coming online during the coming months. Other major fishing centres throughout Europe have signed letters of intent to join the Pefa.com network in the near future. "We are very proud of our new auction customer in France, which will allow Spanish companies to buy their fish in the auction of La Turballe from their own offices", said Karl Johannesson, Sales and Marketing Manager of Pefa.
All information, including a detailed fact sheet on each auction in the Auction Network and daily Market prices, are available on the company's website. www.pefa.com
