The Seafood Dilemma
The Seafood Dilemma
Fish has been a mainstay on our menu, featured primarily in our favorite Fish and Chips. It has also been an important feature of the American diet, especially for those who look to fish as a healthy alternative to meat. However, there has been abundant evidence that many fish choices are no longer sustainable. Atlantic cod, haddock, and hake, the quintessential fish for Fish and Chips, has been overfished in many areas to perilous extent. According to one report by NOAA, the Georges Bank stock is at 10% of its target level and the Gulf of Maine stock is currently at 58% of its target level. This has been the case since the 1950’s. Unfortunately, the traditional main ingredient in Fish and Chips is just one example of dangerously low fish stock. At The Ship Inn, we have moved to Bassa, a type of catfish, for most of our Fish and Chips, and select primarily from a narrow range of sustainable options for our fish specials (escolar, mahi, wahoo). In many cases, it is a real challenge to find sustainable options that fit the desired price point of our customers and the matter sometimes becomes a choice of the lesser of two evils.
Fishing methods have been so intensive that that species are having considerable difficulty maintaining their population. Furthermore, modern fishing methods also tend to be destructive to untargeted fish caught in the nets called by-catch. By-catch can easily be 30% of what is caught at any time and it is often just discarded. Marine habitats fall casualty to intensive fishing. One type of trawling, for example, scrapes the sea floor, effectively obliterating habitats. Its efficiency has created low prices for fish in the short term, but as we have learned from the example of cod, long term supplies have been depleted. Furthermore, overfishing effects are not local. We live in a global fishing market. Refrigerated ships and air transport make the Mediterranean, or reaches of the Pacific “just around the corner” in terms of supply. So even though the following article by Reuters targets a European fishery, it is worthy of note here in the USA.
The fishing method, we would argue, is just as critical to your choice of fish as flavor or abundance. Without your choice being based in part on sustainability of methods, this year’s abundant fish will become next year’s overfished species. Yes, certain fishing methods are more costly, but they encourage resilience of a species. Seafood Watch from www.montereybayaquarium.org or www.fishchoice.com are helpful resources to navigate the complexities of fish selection. There are even apps for your phone. We have recently decided to increase our variety of seafood in response to customer request. We hope that customers will, in turn, support sustainable methods despite the higher price point. The following newspaper article illustrates the issue at hand:
Mediterranean fishermen break rules, fish die out: report(Reuters) – Some of the most prized fish on the menus of prestigious European restaurants are faced with extinction because too many are being caught, according to a report issued Tuesday. Among those that could disappear from Mediterranean and nearby waters in the coming years, it said, are bluefin tuna, sea bass, dusky grouper and hake — around all of which leading chefs plan favored dishes. The report, by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), also predicted a glum future for non-commercial fish like shark and non-edible ray and at least 12 species of bony fish which are shunned by consumers. These, as well as dolphins, whales, turtles and birds which have no commercial value were swept up in trawling nets and illegal driftnets, putting their species’ survival at risk. The report said bluefin tuna in waters off European and North African coasts had seen an estimated 50 percent decline in reproduction capacity over the past 40 years due to intensive overfishing. Based on latest research by IUCN scientists, the report was the first detailed assessment by the organization — which links governments, environmental and nature groups and academic institutions — of the native marine fish for an entire sea. Although some national and European Union quotas are in place for bluefin tuna in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic, it said, these were being widely ignored and catches were frequently under-reported. Overall, more than 40 fish species found in the waters between southern Europe and northern Africa could disappear within the next few years unless governments acted to enforce regulations, reduce quotas and create new marine reserves, according to the Swiss-based organization. The report, to be included in the IUCN’s running “Red List” of threatened species (www.iucnredlist.org), was released following another study showing that fast-warming oceans could be pushing many fish to extinction. The study, by Australian scientists and published in the journal Nature Climate Change, said the warming of sea-surface temperatures and the resulting increased acidity slowed fish growth rates and damaged coral reefs where they breed. This could be especially serious for many commercial fish which do not move much, one author of the study said.
