Saving Seafood

New FDA seafood consumption guidelines criticized by NFI

January 19, 2017 — U.S. seafood leaders and suppliers are expressing concern about new governmental guidelines issued Wednesday, 18 January regarding seafood consumption among pregnant women, parents and other consumers.

The new final advice document from the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency is meant to help women who are pregnant or may become pregnant – as well as breastfeeding mothers and parents of young children – decide which fish are healthy to eat. To that end, the agencies divided 62 types of seafood into three categories: “Best choices” (eat two to three servings a week), “Good choices” (eat one serving a week) and “Fish to avoid.”

Fish on the “Best choices” list account for more than 90 percent of the fish consumed in the U.S., according to the agencies. Best choices include salmon, pollock, anchovy, herring, Atlantic mackerel, lobster, scallop, shrimp, tilapia, catfish and canned light (skipjack) tuna. Good choices, which should be eaten once a week, include Chilean sea bass, halibut, carp, rockfish, snapper, Yellowfin tuna and albacore tuna.

Fish that should be avoided – because they contain the highest mercury levels – include King mackerel, orange roughy, marlin, shark, swordfish, bigeye tuna and tilefish from the Gulf of Mexico, according to the FDA and EPA.

However, the National Fisheries Institute (NFI) issued a statement criticizing the guidelines, calling them “confusing.”

The new advice “runs the risk of confusing moms and nutrition professionals alike,” the NFI said. “With lists, categories and an unclear message that includes suggestions on how often to eat buffalofish, weakfish and sheepshead, the advice has nutrition professionals scratching their heads.”

“Clear, concise direction that encourages pregnant women to eat more fish for optimal baby brain and eye development is a science-based message that’s needed. I don’t see that message in this document,” said Rima Kleiner, registered dietitian with the NFI. “FDA numbers show that pregnant women eat less than two ounces of fish per week as it is. The FDA’s clinical goal, originally, was to increase that number. That message is lost in this advice.”

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Something’s fishy in LA’s sushi supply, study says

January 12, 2017 — Almost half of the fish ordered at Los Angeles sushi restaurants and bought at high-end grocery stores is mislabeled, with some of the offerings coming from endangered species, according to a study by researchers at UCLA and Loyola Marymount University.

The study, whose findings were announced Wednesday, checked the DNA of fish ordered at 26 L.A. sushi restaurants from 2012 through 2015 and found that 47 percent of the sushi was mislabeled.

“The good news is that sushi represented as tuna was almost always tuna. Salmon was mislabeled only about 1 in 10 times. But out of 43 orders of halibut and 32 orders of red snapper, DNA tests showed the researchers were always served a different kind of fish,” stated a UCLA press release. “A one-year sampling of high-end grocery stores found similar mislabeling rates, suggesting the bait-and-switch may occur earlier in the supply chain than the point of sale to consumers.”

Paul Barber, a UCLA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and senior author of the study that appeared Wednesday in the journal Conservation Biology, said the apparent fraud goes beyond having the wrong fish on your plate; it also undermines environmental regulations limiting overfishing, introduces unexpected health risks and interferes with consumers’ decisions.

“Half of what we’re buying isn’t what we think it is,” Barber said. “Fish fraud could be accidental, but I suspect that in some cases the mislabeling is very much intentional, though it’s hard to know where in the supply chain it begins. I suspected we would find some mislabeling, but I didn’t think it would be as high as we found in some species.”

Read the full story at KPCC

MASSACHUSETTS: Seafood being added to state Farm to School Project

January 3, 2017 — BOSTON — The state Division of Marine Fisheries’ Massachusetts Seafood Marketing Program has partnered with the nonprofit Massachusetts Farm to School Project to promote the consumption of local seafood in schools.

“The Massachusetts commercial fishing and seafood industries provide delicious food and employment for thousands of people in the Commonwealth,” said Gov. Charlie Baker in a news release. “This is a great connection to make and we look forward to the partnership between Massachusetts fishermen and farm-to-school programs to provide the Commonwealth’s children with fresh, nutritious seafood products that support cognitive development.”

Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Matthew Beaton, in the release, said “Increasing sales of local seafood to schools will not only help find new markets for Massachusetts fishermen, but will also address the critical issue of access to healthy food, and introduce future consumers to the benefits of incorporating seafood into their diet.”

During the two-year partnership, the partners will promote seafood as part of Massachusetts Farm to School’s Massachusetts Harvest of the Month campaign, hold a series of local seafood cooking demonstrations for institutional food service providers, and have already offered a seafood focus track at the Massachusetts Farm & Sea to Cafeteria Conference in November 2016.

“This partnership helps DMF better increase awareness and preference of Massachusetts seafood to support the Commonwealth’s seafood industry and communities by reaching schools, universities, and hospital food service staff, educators, and families though Massachusetts Farm to School’s network,” said DMF Director David Pierce.

The Baker-Polito Administration launched the Massachusetts Seafood Marketing Program in August 2016 to increase awareness and demand for local seafood products and support Massachusetts’ fishing and seafood industries.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

US issuing new rules to curb illegal fishing, seafood fraud

January 3, 2017 — PORTLAND, Maine — The Obama administration is issuing new rules it says will crack down on illegal fishing and seafood fraud by preventing unverifiable fish products from entering the U.S. market.

The new protections are called the Seafood Import Monitoring Program, and they are designed to stop illegally fished and intentionally misidentified seafood from getting into stores and restaurants by way of imported fish.

The rules will require seafood importers to report information and maintain records about the harvest and chain of custody of fish, officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said.

The program will start by focusing on “priority species” that are especially vulnerable to illegal fishing, such as popular food fish like tuna, swordfish, Atlantic cod and grouper. The government hopes eventually to broaden the program out to include all fish species, NOAA officials said.

“It sends an important message to the international seafood community that if you are open and transparent about the seafood you catch and sell across the supply chain, then the U.S. markets are open for your business,” said Catherine Novelli, a State Department undersecretary.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Seattle Times

Fish caught by slaves may be tainting your cat food

January 3, 2017 — Crack open a can of seafood-flavored cat food and whiff that fishy broth. Now try to guess where those gloopy bits of meat originate.

It’s a futile task. Oftentimes, no one knows quite how they got there, or who hauled those fish aboard which boat. Not even the multinational corporations who sell it on supermarket shelves.

Sure, pet food conglomerates can tell you which factories ground up the fish. They know who mixes in the additives, like tricalcium phosphate, and then dumps it into a can.

But the men who actually yanked it out of the sea? They’re usually anonymous, obscured by a murky supply chain.

That’s unfortunate. Because much of the pet food sold in the West is supplied by a Southeast Asian seafood industry, centered in Thailand, that is infamous for its use of forced labor.

For years, this industry has been scandalized by reports of human trafficking and even outright slavery. The victims are men from Myanmar and Cambodia, duped by human traffickers.

Here’s how the scam works. Traffickers promise desperate men a job on a factory or farm in Thailand — a relatively prosperous country compared to its poverty-stricken neighbors.

But there is no legit job. The victims are instead forced onto squalid trawlers. Once the boats leave port, they enter a lawless sea, and the men are forced to toil without pay — sometimes for years on end.

Read the full story at PRI

Bering Sea groundfish looks strong as warming Gulf sees cuts

December 12, 2016 — Bering Sea fish stocks are booming but it’s a mixed bag for groundfish in the Gulf of Alaska.

Fishery managers will set 2017 catches this week (Dec.7-12) for pollock, cod and other fisheries that comprise Alaska’s largest fish hauls that are taken from three to 200 miles from shore.

More than 80 percent of Alaska’s seafood poundage come from those federally-managed waters, and by all accounts the Bering Sea fish stocks are in great shape.

“For the Bering Sea, just about every catch is up,” said Diana Stram, Bering Sea groundfish plan coordinator for the North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

There are 22 different species under the Council’s purview, along with non-targeted species like sharks, octopus and squid. For the nation’s largest food fishery — Bering Sea pollock — the stock is so robust, catches could safely double to nearly three million metric tons, or more than six billion pounds!

But the catch will remain nearer to this year’s harvest of half that, Stram said, due to a strict cap applied to all fish removals across the board.

“That means the sum of all the catches in the Bering Sea cannot exceed two million metric tons,” she explained.

Read the full story at the Alaska Journal of Commerce

The White House Just Made It Easier To Know The Fish You’re Eating Is Actually Fish

December 9, 2016 — The Obama administration took a massive step in the fight against seafood fraud and illegal fishing on Thursday, introducing a rule that will help Americans know the fish they’re eating is truly what they paid for.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will oversee the Seafood Import Monitoring Program, which will require about 25 percent of imported seafood to be traced from the boat or farm it comes from to the U.S. border. The rule is meant to curb the mislabeling of fish before it enters the U.S. (about 90 percent of fish we consume is imported) and cut down on overfishing. Businesses will have until the beginning of 2018 to comply.

“Today’s announcement is a groundbreaking step towards more transparency and traceability in the seafood supply chain,”said Beth Lowell, a senior campaign director for the environmental group Oceana, in a statement. “For the first time ever, some imported seafood will now be held to the same standards as domestically caught fish, helping to level the playing field for American fishermen and reducing the risk facing U.S. consumers.”

Read the full story at the Huffington Post

Accord on eco-labelling boosts sustainable fishing

December 2, 2016 — Finding ethically-sourced fish is about to become easier for leading retailers and restaurants that have pledged to offer customers sustainable seafood.

The world’s largest seafood eco-labelling scheme is operated by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) whose blue logo is a common sight in supermarkets across the world. The scheme will soon become part of the Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative, a benchmark backed by leading retailers, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and NGOs. The global benchmark, launched last year, has already recognised schemes that operate in Alaska and Iceland and is expected to give its stamp of approval to the MSC next year.

Eco-labelling and certification are widely regarded as key tools in encouraging the adoption of sustainable practices across a global seafood trade that is estimated to be worth $150bn a year.

Demand from retailers and restaurants has pushed suppliers in the fisheries sector to certify increased volumes of supplies as sustainably sourced.

Sustainable seafood now accounts for 14 per cent of global production compared with just 0.5 per cent in 2005, according to the International Institute of Sustainable Development.

Yet eco-labelling is one of the most hotly debated issues among members of the food supply chain. For consumers, the myriad of labels and programmes has led to confusion. Many producers, meanwhile, complain they have struggled with the investment required to obtain the benefits of certification.

Read the full story at the Financial Times

Faster seafood DNA testing on the way

November 30, 2016 — A new, faster seafood DNA testing technology could be developed by late next year, thanks to research starting soon in the United States.

J. Aquiles Sanchez, a senior research scientist at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, U.S.A., will test and develop a “fast, cost-effective identification of edible fish and fish products to prevent species substitution and fraud,” according to the Seafood Industry Research Fund (SIRF), which is funding the project.

The research seeks to develop a rapid means of seafood species identification using Closed-Tube DNA Bar Coding. Compared to difficult and expensive DNA testing that the Food and Drug Administration uses currently, the closed-DNA system “represents a convenient alternative that can be used with both laboratory equipment and, importantly, handheld devices,” SIRF said in a statement.

“It is being developed for commercial use throughout the seafood supply chain. We know it will be less than the cost of laboratory DNA testing and results are much quicker than sending to a lab and waiting for those results. Speed is critical to the potential to use this technology to prevent mislabeling of fish species,” Russ Mentzer, chairman of SIRF, told SeafoodSource.

However, Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A.-based InstantLabs already offers rapid DNA tests for several seafood species, including Atlantic, sockeye and coho salmon, Atlantic blue crab and catfish.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Update to ISSF Participating Company Compliance Report Shows Improvement Across All Measures

November 21, 2016 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:

WASHINGTON — The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) has released its Update to ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report, which shows a conformance rate of 95.6 percent by 25 ISSF participating companies as of October 31, 2016, across all 20 measures then in effect. ISSF Participating Companies account for about 75% of the global canned tuna market.

The November 2016 Update is based on audits conducted June 2016–October 2016 on measures where some companies had “minor” or “major” nonconformance. Improvements noted since the June 2016 ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitment Compliance Report was published include:

  • 14 companies were found to be fully compliant with all 20 measures.
  • 19 companies were fully compliant in 17 or more conservation measures.
  • “Minor” non-conformance with measures dropped from 11.6% to 4.4%.
  • All 6 “major” non-conformances have been corrected, resulting in the first 0% “major” non-conformance rate since the report has been published.

The ISSF Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report is published annually to track ISSF participating companies’ progress in conforming with ISSF conservation measures like these:

In addition to these summary reports, third-party independent auditor MRAG Americas issues individual company reports that document in detail each company’s compliance with conservation measures. This year, for the first time since ISSF started tracking and reporting company compliance in 2013—and in response to requests for deeper information—ISSF now publishes the individual company compliance reports on its website.

“That many of the tuna industry’s key players are conforming to science-based conservation measures, opening their books to independent auditors, and reporting their findings publicly, would be accomplishment enough,” said ISSF Board Member Dr. Bill Fox, Vice President, Fisheries, WWF-US. “But efforts to improve participating company conformance within the audit year—increasing the conformance rate by seven points in just five months—raises the bar for the industry and the market as a whole. And it represents continuous improvement in action.”

ISSF continually expands and refines its science-based conservation measures, which now number more than 25. New measures passed by the ISSF Board of Directors in October 2016—some taking effect in 2016, and others in 2017 or later—cover non-entangling FADs, product traceability, and fishing capacity management.

More Information about ISSF Conservation Measures & Compliance

For long-term tuna sustainability, a growing number of tuna companies worldwide are choosing to participate with ISSF, follow responsible fishing practices, and implement science-based conservation measures. From bycatch mitigation to product traceability, ISSF participating companies have committed to conforming to a set of conservation measures and other commitments designed to drive positive change—and to do so transparently through third-party audits.

“We recognize that transparency underpins all of the initiatives we tackle, and all of the collaborative efforts we undertake,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson. “Transparency reinforces the understanding that we are not only committed to making a difference, but to clearly demonstrate ongoing improvement in meeting that commitment.”

As part of its commitment to transparency and accountability, ISSF engages third-party auditor MRAG Americas to audit ISSF Participating Companies—assessing their compliance with ISSF’s Conservation Measures and Commitments. MRAG Americas conducts independent auditing based on a rigorous audit protocol.