Downeast seafood company advances plan to process Jonah crab
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A Downeast seafood startup was awarded a $1.25 million interest-free loan to invest in infrastructure needed to buy, process and sell Jonah crab — which is typically thrown back by lobster fishermen.
Bold Coast Seafood, in the Hancock County coastal village of Prospect Harbor, received the loan from Maine Technology Institute’s Maine Technology Asset Fund.
The award required a $2.25 million match, which will come from revenue generated by Bold Coast’s lobster processing business.
The loan will go toward equipment and the match will go toward salaries for additional employees and toward research on Jonah crab in collaboration with Steven Jury, an animal physiologist at Saint Joseph’s College in Standish.
Jonah crab is a native species that is legally harvested in lobster traps but largely thrown back into the ocean alive because, up to this point, Maine had lacked processing capacity.
