St. John’s Antigua- The Antigua Hotels & Tourist Association (AHTA) Wednesday expressed “great concern” over the scarcity of lobster on the island even as it pushes for talks with authorities in a bid to remedy the problem.

AHTA General Manager, Neil Forrester said the membership of the association have been making their concerns on the matter know to management.

“Some of them (AHTA members) have been reporting for two or three weeks that there is a shortage of lobster and some of them have resulted in taking it off their menu,” Forrester said.

Forrester told OBSERVER Media that “the lobster dinner is one of the highlights” of people coming to Antigua on vacation “and they look forward to eating our local lobster then they get here.”

Last week other stakeholders in the fisheries sector said Chinese business people were involved in the practice of purchasing large quantities of lobster for export.

That practice does not only affect tourism. Fisheries experts warn that over-fishing poses a threat to the entire seafood industry.

The AHTA said it would be approaching authorities “to see how we can resolve this.”

“We do recognise everyone has to live and it’s an open market, but depriving the tourism market, which is our lifeblood, of lobster is not a way forward,” he said.