🦐 2025 Aquatic Foods Conference & Shrimp Processing School: Two Days of Seafood Innovation, Policy, and Processing Power

Laitram Machinery
Jun 20
3 min read

Dates: June 12–13, 2025

2025 Aquatic Foods Conference & Shrimp Processing School: Two Days of Seafood Innovation, Policy, and Processing Power — Aquatic Foods Conference 2025

Location: Laitram Machinery Headquarters, Harahan, LA

The 2025 Aquatic Foods Conference brought together regulators, researchers, processors, and shrimp and crawfish processors for two impactful days focused on the future of seafood safety, traceability, and processing innovation. Held at Laitram Machinery, the event was a blend of informative and hands-on sessions, uniting policy, science, and automation under one roof.

The Acuatic Foods Conference leverages resources and collaborates with knowledge transfer among industry, institutions, universities, and government agencies in fisheries and aquaculture.

Watch a short video for the shrimp school

🔍 Day 1: Policy, Science, and Traceability

Morning Briefings from Federal & State Agencies

After opening remarks from Dr. Evelyn Watts and Dr. Michael Ciaramella and breakfast, attendees received a rapid-fire update from key regulatory bodies:

FDA (Karen Swaijan) discussed seafood inspection enforcement and consumer safety.
USDA (Dr. Amanda Claudet) offered insight into equivalency and import/export compliance.
NOAA (Whitney Johnson) highlighted the importance of safety oversight in the seafood trade and labeling.
New York Dept. of Agriculture (Eugene Evans) shared smoked seafood best practices.
Louisiana Dept. of Health (Brian Warren) closed with regional perspectives on sanitation and regulation.

A robust Q&A session followed, providing participants with direct access to the agencies shaping the seafood industry.

FSMA 204: The Traceability Challenge

Dr. Michael Ciaramella of Cornell University delivered a clear overview of FSMA 204 compliance and its growing impact. A panel of industry leaders joined him:

Joe Meherg (ReposiTrack) on digital traceability tools
Monica Vincent-Walker (Associated Grocers) on retail and supply chain risk
Doug Guillory (Riceland Crawfish) with real-world processor insight

The discussion focused on how traceability affects everyone—from wild-caught harvesters to big-box retailers.

Afternoon Research: From Cell-Based Seafood to Waste Valorization

The technical session highlighted cutting-edge seafood science:

Texture engineering for cell-based seafood (Dr. Razieh Farzad, UF)
Extension readiness for alternative proteins (Rose Omidvar, UF)
Mackerel muscle adhesion and scaffold materials (Julia Tvedt, UF)
Seafood waste to Black Soldier Fly feed (Shristi Upadhyaya, LSU)
Shelf-life, storage, and consumer response to catfish products (LSU team)

Evening Wrap-Up

A brief business meeting touched on AFC’s 2026 plans (New York!), board updates, and student support. The day closed with a social dinner at Mulate’s—blending great food with great conversations.

🦐Day 2: Innovation in Shrimp Processing

From Market Trends, Vision technology to fully automated Shrimp Processing.

Day 2 kicked off with a warm welcome from Karen Quaas and James Lapeyre, who shared market trends and Laitram’s perspective on the evolving seafood landscape.

Chuck Ledet followed with a session on new Vision and AI technologies,

showing how precision vision grading, inspection, and even automatic deheading are now a reality, becoming smarter and saving processors significant money and efficiency.

Automating Shrimp Peeling, Deveeining & Inspection

Byron Falgout gave an inside look at Laitram’s automation for peeling, inspecting and deveining—showing how technology reduces labor, boosts yield, and improves quality.

Rotating Demos: See It, Touch It, Understand It

Attendees were split into three rotating groups for immersive demonstrations:

Laitram Machinery Production Facility Tour
The first exclusive demo of the Shrimp Deheader
Shrimp Peeling and Deveining Processing Plant Tour, showing Laitram tech in action

Each stop offered a unique perspective—from assembly lines to field-ready production.

Cooking, Chilling & Wrap-Up

The afternoon session, led by Michael Sclafini, focused on best practices for shrimp cooking and chilling, emphasizing process consistency, food safety, and CoolSteam technology.

The day ended with closing comments and interesting final discussions with James Lapeyre and Philip Leblanc.

Final Takeaways

The 2025 Aquatic Foods Conference wasn’t just a meeting—it was a bridge between science, regulation, and practical seafood processing technology. Over two full days, attendees walked away with: