Yukoners feeling bite of high fish prices

Retailers and consumers in Whitehorse are adjusting to aglobal rise in the cost of seafood.

The Consumer Price Index, tabled by Statistics Canada, says the cost of fish in Canada has increased by almostfive per cent this year alone three times the increase seen in other types of food.

"We are seeing definitely an increasein the price of seafood. From the fishing boats and also a few products we buy from distributors," says HarryReitze.

Reitze runs theHaines Packing Company.The company importsabout $500,000 worth of seafood across the US-Canada border every year to sell in its Whitehorse store.

Reitze estimates prices have risen between five and 10 per cent in the last two years.

For an importing company like Haines Packingone constant worry is the Canadian dollar.

"We've seen it close to par and we've seen it like it is now, which is really hard for business when you bring a $10 product into Canada and have to sell it at $13 just to break even," he says.

Whitehorserestaurantchanges menu

At least one restaurant is changing its menu because of the hike.

Restaurateur AntoinetteGreen-Oliphused to serve a sizzling halibut dish called the Halibut T&T, prepared in the fashion of Trinidad & Tobago.

"It was the signaturedish for quite a while but I had to take it off because it was so expensive. What I'd have to charge to make any kind of profit was something I knew my guests wouldn't want. So halibut is no longer on our menu," she says.

Meanwhile, Canada's Food Price Report, published by researchers at Dalhousie University in Halifax, predicts thatCanadians will see the price of all food increase again in 2017