Nova Scotia may be known for its stormy coasts, but its finances are weather-beaten as well. With some of the highest taxes and unemployment rates in the country, Nova Scotia needs to find ways to avoid a turbulent economic future.

Recently being awarded a massive federal shipbuilding contract worth $25 billion will certainly give the province some breathing room. Another industry that looks so last century, fish processing, also is reassuringly vital: High Liner Foods Inc., the Lunenburg, N.S.-based seafood processor, has announced a 12% jump in revenue in its most recent fiscal quarter. Much of the $162 million in sales produced in that quarter, and $6.7 million in after-tax profit, came from sales in the U.S. (High Liner had acquired Viking Seafoods LLC, a Malden, Mass.-based firm, late last year.)

High Liner also recently announced it is acquiring the U.S. subsidiary and Asian procurement operations of Icelandic Group HF, one of the largest suppliers of value-added seafood to the U.S. food-service market. The $230-million deal, says High Liner CEO Henry Demone, will make his company “the leading value-added seafood supplier in North America.”

High Liner is not alone in leaving its fin print in the global marketplace. Halifax-based Clearwater Seafoods Ltd. has reported a 44% hike in second-quarter earnings over the same period last year. Many smaller seafood companies also are faring well. For example, nine years after a local couple launched Sober Island Oysters and Pristine Cuisine Catering, they have more than a million oysters in the water.

Sometimes, being old has its advantages. Firms such as High Liner and Clearwater are big international names in the industry, using many decades of experience to run global operations from their Nova Scotia base. They’ve learned to weather economic tides of change and they have the resources to survive economic storms that might well topple competitors from other countries.

Related, newer companies are being buoyed by the industry’s strength. Halifax has one of the highest concentrations of PhDs in marine science in the world, and Nova Scotia is home to the largest concentration of oceans researchers in Canada.

This is all to the good, as pulp and paper mills, once the backbone of the local economy, are closing all over the province. World demand for newsprint is drying up, and skyrocketing bills for electricity are eating up the remaining profits. Since September, three large mills have closed, announced they are looking for buyers or laid off large numbers of employees.

Coal is the culprit, according to Premier Darrell Dexter: in the past six years, the cost of coal has increased by 75%. “We have to do something now to reduce the province’s dependence on fossil fuels,” he said at the formal unveiling of new, high-tech S97 wind turbines. Fifteen of the S97s — which generate more energy at lower wind speeds than less advanced models — will power the Amherst Wind Farm Project and, it is hoped, put some more wind in Nova Scotia’s economic sails.  IE