The new £5.6 million Humber Seafood Institute is designed to deliver professional support and research facilities to companies involved in fishing and the seafood sector.

Guest of honour for the event, attended by over 100 national and international visitors, including the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, was top TV celebrity chef Antony Worrall Thompson, who put on a special live cookery demonstration.

The guests were witness to the former Saturday Kitchen star's culinary skills as he showed how to cook underutilised species of fish - a cause close to his heart.

The new facility will be managed by the Grimsby Institute of Further and Higher Education, which has a long association with the seafood industry through the Humber Institute of Food and Fisheries.

Grimsby MP, Austin Mitchell, a leading advocate of the UK fishing industry, performed the official opening ceremony.

It is also close to the proposed site for the new international Humber Seafood Exchange, which will be built in the next two years.

The project has the backing of Young's and Wynne Griffiths, chairman of the umbrella Foodvest Group, who has agreed to chair the new Institute.

Professor Mike Dillon, vice principal of research and enterprise at the Grimsby Institute, promised that the new facility would be responsive to the industry's needs.

He told guests, which included senior fishing figures from Iceland, Norway and Indonesia: "The Humber region is the core of seafood processing in the UK.

"We will deliver expert support and state-of-the-art facilities to meet the complex demands of the seafood sector.

"The New Institute will engage in collaborative research with industry companies and leaders to optimise new market and trade opportunities."

Backed by the regional development agency Yorkshire Forward and the European Regional Development Fund, the Humber Seafood Institute will offer a range of specialist technical expertise, along with new product development kitchens, refrigeration research, laboratories and a fully equipped seafood processing hall.

It also provides managed work space for fishing companies and the Seafish Industry Authority's new regional base, which has recently moved from Hull.

But it will be of particular benefit to small and medium sized firms who otherwise could not have afforded such specialist services.

It will be promoted nationally and overseas as Britain's top leading edge seafood innovation centre, providing a wide range of practical and technical support.

www.fishupdate.com is published by Special Publications. Special Publications also publish FISHupdate magazine, Fish Farmer, the Fish Industry Yearbook, the Scottish Seafood Processors Federation Diary, the Fish Farmer Handbook and a range of wallplanners.

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