John Garner, a veteran of more than 50 years in the seafood
industry, will join North Pacific Seafoods, Inc. on Oct. 6 as chief operating
officer, overseeing production and sales for the processing firm with five
shore-based plants in Alaska.
“John’s experience and industry knowledge will be great
assets to the ongoing success of North Pacific Seafoods,” said Masayuki Yano,
president and chief executive officer of the company. “We look forward to
strengthening and expanding our seafood operations in Alaska with John’s
involvement and leadership.”
Garner started in the seafood industry as a commercial
fisherman and was instrumental in work he performed as a commissioner of the
Alaska Commercial Fisheries Entry Commission and as a member of the Alaska
Board of Fisheries, the latter from 1983 to 1987.
Garner began commercial fishing in the 1960s, and fished the
summers of 1962-1968, and 1979-1987, in Southeast Alaska, Prince William Sound,
Bristol Bay, Togiak and Cook Inlet, everything from salmon to crab and herring.
From 1974 to 1979 he served as a hearing officer and then
commissioner of Alaska’s Commercial Fisheries Entry Commission.
From 1988 to 2001 he served as vice president of Norquest
Seafoods and then from 2004 to 2006 as the company’s president.
He joined Trident Seafoods Corp. as director of the
processing firm’s salmon group in 2007 after Trident’s purchase of Norquest
Seafoods.
A native of Ketchikan, Alaska, Garner holds a bachelor’s
degree from Seattle University and a law degree from the University of Washington.
Garner has also been on the board of SeaShare, a non-profit
based on Bainbridge Island, Washington that delivers seafood to America’s
Second Harvest Food Banks. He is currently the president of SeaShare.
North Pacific Seafoods (www.northpacificseafoods.com)
has production facilities in Kodiak, Pederson Point, Red Salmon, Sitka and
Togiak, Alaska. Its product line includes salmon, halibut, pollock, cod
rockfish, black cod, flatfish, shellfish, caviar and roe, and specialty
products.
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