Saving Seafood

Global ocean health relatively stable over past five years

July 5, 2017 — While global ocean health has remained relatively stable over the past five years, individual countries have seen changes, according to a study published July 5, 2017 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Benjamin Halpern from University of California Santa Barbara, USA and colleagues.

The Ocean Health Index has been used to assess ocean health on the local and regional scale, measuring factors such as biodiversity, coastal protection, and clean waters to help inform regional policies. In this study, Halpern and colleagues analyzed five years’ worth of Ocean Health Index data for 220 countries, seeking potential drivers and implications for the changes that they observed.

As expected, global ocean health has been fairly stable over the past five years, since the health of the world’s oceans cannot change rapidly over a relatively short time period. However, there were notable changes in individual countries. For example, the authors found declines in overall ocean health in many Arctic and sub-Arctic countries, possibly because the rapid loss of sea ice has resulted in reduced coastal protection. The researchers suggest that improvements in wild-caught fishery management, the creation of marine protected areas, and decreases in harvesting of fish and other natural products may have stabilized ocean health scores in other regions.

While the Ocean Health Index was capable of predicting short term changes in global ocean health, the authors suggest that investment in additional resources for measuring changes on a global scale would greatly help with management and protection of ocean health now and in the future.

Read the full story at Science Daily

Can Sustainability Commitments Get Slavery Out of Seafood?

June 30, 2017 — In 2015, more than 2,000 enslaved fishermen were rescued from brutal conditions in the seas around Indonesia. Some had been savagely beaten while others had been kept in cages. Slave labor was found off these fishing boats as well: In one scenario, seafood workers were forced to peel frozen shrimp for 16 hours a day.

Wracked by these and other stories in the Pulitzer Prize-winning series from the Associated Press chronicling slavery, abysmal working conditions, and restricted freedoms, the extent of the abuse was shocking given the seafood industry’s recent global focus on environmental sustainability. However, existing seafood labels—most notably, the blue Marine Steward Council label—focus almost exclusively on the management and environmental impact of fisheries. These traceability standards largely neglect workforce concerns.

Early actions from the complex web of seafood suppliers, distributors, and retailers to address human rights abuses were fragmented and ineffective at best. For example, a European Union threat to ban seafood imports from Thailand led Thai authorities to enact legislation to combat illegal fishing and prevent underage labor, and arrest more than 100 people on human rights violations. But watchdog groups continued to find abuses months later.

Over the last year, members of social responsibility and environmental non-governmental organizations met with leading academics and business leaders to hash out key elements necessary to achieve socially responsible seafood. The primary objectives—protecting human rights, ensuring equitable production, and improving food security for resource-dependent communities—were detailed at the beginning of June in the journal Science.

“It’s not enough to be slavery-free,” said Jack Kittinger, senior director of the Global Fisheries and Aquaculture Program at Conservation International and co-author of the paper. “There are other social issues—notably gender equity and livelihood security—that need to be tackled as well,” he added.

Read the full story at Civil Eats

New Launch: Sustainable Seafood Platform for Businesses

June 16, 2017 — The following was released by FishChoice, Inc:

FishChoice.com, one of the largest sustainable seafood platforms designed for businesses, has launched its new My FishChoice Sustainable Seafood Platform. The new platform allows registered members the ability track content from the website in personalized dashboards with the key feature being a new seafood sustainability assessment tool enabling businesses to better address sustainable seafood on their own.

“As part of our Smart Catch pilot program, we are using this tool to help chefs better understand the fish and seafood they are serving,” says Katherine Miller, Senior Director, Food Policy Advocacy for the James Beard Foundation. “This new tool manages and updates the sustainable seafood information for chefs and makes it easy for them to get additional information and make changes to their menus. Using this tool, chefs are empowered to make a greater positive impact on our seafood supply.”

The new assessment tool is the key feature of the new My FishChoice Sustainable Seafood platform that is now available at no-charge for interested businesses. The sustainability assessment’s online dashboard provides businesses with an up-to-date item-by-item sustainability analysis of their seafood products, several charts that show total and segmented sustainability details, and tracks changes in sustainability over time. According to Justin Boevers, Director of Operations at FishChoice, “Sustainable seafood information is becoming more complex and changing more frequently. Last year alone, we saw over 300 updates on sustainable seafood assessments. We want to increase the ability for businesses to address seafood sustainability on their own, and our new platform is a big step in that direction.”

Additional features of the My FishChoice Sustainable Seafood Platform include ‘My Suppliers,’ ‘My Products,’ and ‘My Sources’ dashboards that pull content from FishChoice.com’s 500+ Supplier Members, 4,400+ product listings, and 2,500+ sources of sustainable seafood assessments respectively. Future plans for the My FishChoice Sustainable Seafood Platform include business guidance on implementing sustainable seafood, development of sustainable seafood transparency reports, and the inclusion of opportunities to support seafood improvement projects and programs.   

About FishChoice

FishChoice, Inc. (FCI) is a registered 501(c)(3) founded in 2008 that is dedicated to helping businesses advance their seafood sustainability efforts on their own. FishChoice creates tools and provides resources that make it easier for businesses to buy and sell sustainable seafood. By collaborating with both the leading sustainable seafood programs and leaders in the seafood industry, FishChoice advances sustainability in the global seafood industry. For more information please visit http://www.fishchoice.com. 

U.S. Gulf and Atlantic Menhaden Fisheries Enter MSC Sustainability Assessment

June 15, 2017 — The following was released by the Marine Stewardship Council:

The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has announced that the U.S. Atlantic menhaden and U.S. Gulf of Mexico menhaden fisheries have entered the evaluation process in order to acquire the respected blue ecolabel for sustainable fishing. The assessments are being conducted by third-party independent auditors SAI Global at the request of Omega Protein.

Menhaden are caught commercially via the modern purse seine reduction method.  They are used in fishmeal and fish oil for human and animal nutrition, due to their high natural concentration of healthy omega-3 fatty acids. Menhaden are also valuable as bait for fishers targeting other commercially valuable species, such as lobster.

Atlantic menhaden (Brevoortia tyrannus) appear in estuaries and coastal waters from northern Florida to Nova Scotia. 

Gulf menhaden (Brevoortia patronus) have a similar biology to Atlantic menhaden. They have a Gulf-wide range, from the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, across the western and northern Gulf to eastern Florida. Adults are found in nearshore waters and lower bays, while juveniles are found in fresh and brackish estuaries and rivers.

The second largest US fishery

Between the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts, the U.S. menhaden fishery is the second largest in the country by weight, trailing only Alaska pollock.

Commercial landings of Atlantic menhaden peaked in the 1950s, while commercial landings of Gulf menhaden peaked in the early 1980s.

“The MSC blue ecolabel is the gold standard for sustainable fishing worldwide. We are extremely proud of the work we’ve done to conduct our fishing operations sustainably, and we’re excited to share this work with the auditors as they undertake this assessment to the MSC Standard,” said Ben Landry, the Director of Public Affairs for Omega Protein. “We are confident that the menhaden fishery will meet the MSC Standard, recognizing its advances in responsible harvesting methods as we continue to pursue the most sustainable fishing practices available.”

Eric Critchlow, MSC U.S. program director, said, “We welcome the U.S. Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic menhaden purse seine fisheries’ decision to enter MSC assessment. This is an important milestone for the MSC and for fishing in the United States.”

MSC’s Standard for Sustainable Fishing

The MSC Fisheries Standard is designed to assess the sustainability of fishery practices and management methods. The standards used to evaluate fisheries have been developed in deliberation with scientists, industry, and conservation groups, and reflect the most up-to-date fisheries science and management practices.

The MSC Standard is based on three core principles that every fishery must meet in order to be MSC certified:

  1. Sustainable fish stocks: Fishing activity must be at a level which ensures it can continue indefinitely.
  2. Minimizing environmental impact: Fishing operations must be managed to maintain the structure, productivity, function, and diversity of the ecosystem.
  3. Effective Management: The fishery must comply with relevant laws and have a management system that is responsive to changing circumstances.

The assessment is being carried out by the certification body SAI Global Assurance Services and has an expected completion date of December 2017. The MSC assessment process is open for public input. Those interested in the menhaden fishery can participate by contacting Jean Ragg at Jean.Ragg@saiglobal.com.

About Omega Protein

Omega Protein Corporation (NYSE: OME) a century old nutritional product company that develops, produces and delivers healthy products throughout the world to improve the nutritional integrity of foods, dietary supplements and animal feeds. Omega Protein’s mission is to help people lead healthier lives with better nutrition through sustainably sourced ingredients such as highly-refined specialty oils, specialty proteins products and nutraceuticals. 

The Company operates seven manufacturing facilities located in the United States, Canada and Europe. The Company also uses over 30 vessels to harvest menhaden, a fish abundantly found off of the coasts of the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. Its website is www.omegaprotein.com.

About the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) 

The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is an international non-profit organization. Its vision is for the world’s oceans to be teeming with life, and seafood supplies safeguarded for this and future generations. The MSC certification program recognizes and rewards sustainable fishing practices and is helping create a more sustainable seafood market.

The blue MSC label on a seafood product means that:

  • It comes from a wild-catch fishery which has been independently certified to the MSC’s science-based standard for environmentally sustainable fishing.
  • It’s fully traceable to a sustainable source.

More than 300 fisheries in over 35 countries are certified to the MSC’s Standard. These fisheries have a combined annual seafood production of almost 10 million metric tons, representing close to 12% of annual global marine harvest. More than 25,000 seafood products worldwide carry the blue MSC label. msc.org

JUSTIN FOX: Maine Is Drowning in Lobsters

May 26, 2017 — In his famous 1968 essay “The Tragedy of the Commons,” biologist Garrett Hardin singled out ocean fishing as a prime example of self-interested individuals short-sightedly depleting shared resources: “Professing to believe in the inexhaustible resources of the oceans,’ they bring species after species of fish and whales closer to extinction.”

The whales have actually been doing a lot better lately. Fish in general, not so much.

Then there’s the Maine lobster. As University of Maine anthropologist James M. Acheson put it in his 2003 book “Capturing the Commons: Devising Institutions to Manage the Maine Lobster Industry”:

“Since the late 1980s, catches have been at record-high levels despite decades of intense exploitation. We have never produced so many lobsters. Even more interesting to managers is the fact that catch levels remained relatively stable from 1947 to the late 1980s. While scientists do not agree on the reason for these high catches, there is a growing consensus that they are due, in some measure, to the long history of effective regulations that the lobster industry has played a key role in developing.”

Two of the most prominent and straightforward regulations are that lobsters must be thrown back in the water not only if they are too small but also if they are too big (because mature lobsters produce the most offspring), and that egg-bearing females must not only be thrown back but also marked (by notches cut in their tails) as off-limits for life. Acheson calls this “parametric management” — the rules “control ‘how’ fishing is done,” not how many lobsters are caught — and concludes that “Although this approach is not supported by fisheries scientists in general, it appears to work well in the lobster fishery.”

Read the full opinion piece at Bloomberg

MASSACHUSETTS: West Tisbury School students learn about sustainable seafood

May 25, 2017 — West Tisbury School students enjoyed clam chowder and a lobster boil for lunch on a recent Friday, part of their “local catch of the day” program, and learned from local experts how choosing sustainable seafood supports New England fishermen.

The event on May 19 at the West Tisbury School gave students the opportunity to learn firsthand what the ocean has to offer. It was part of a celebration of Island Grown Schools’ “harvest of the month.” The organization brings garden-based learning and locally sourced food to Island schoolchildren, and seafood was the local harvest for the month of May.

Jared Auerbach, the founder of Boston-based regional seafood purveyor Red’s Best, which supplies seafood to the school, shared with students the importance of eating locally-sourced and sustainably-harvested fish.

“Let mother nature dictate what you’re going to eat,” Mr. Auerbach said.

Read the full story at The Martha’s Vineyard Times

How To Choose The Safest, Healthiest And Most Sustainable Seafood

May 24, 2017 — Picking out fish should be a simple enough task, right? Unfortunately, it’s not as easy as grabbing a fresh-looking cut or some frozen shrimp and never giving it a second thought. These days we wonder: Does it have mercury? How much? What is its country of origin? Is it being overfished? And a new concern: Am I even getting the right fish?

Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Loyola Marymount University recently performed DNA tests on sushi from 26 Los Angeles restaurants and found that 47 percent of it was mislabeled. Yellowfin tuna ended up being bigeye tuna, and red snapper and halibut orders were mislabeled 100 percent of the time, with most halibut turning out to be flounder. A one-year sampling of seafood from grocery stores showed similar rates of mislabeling, which suggests that the fish swap could be occurring earlier in the selling process. This may mean we’re overpaying and getting a less safe catch. Bigeye tuna, for example, is higher in mercury than yellowfin tuna.

Read the full story at the Huffington Post

WIDESPREAD MISLABELING OF FISH MEANS CONSUMERS ARE EATING A LOT OF BAIT AND SWITCH SEAFOOD

May 24, 2017 — In a diminutive shack in Eugene, Oregon, in a neighborhood that until recently was a better place to find meth than a decent meal, Taro Kobayashi is carving into the pinkest block of tuna I’ve ever seen.

Kobayashi is the owner and head chef of a restaurant called Mamé. He seats no more than 19 people at once, and if you didn’t make a reservation, you might not squeeze in until after 10 p.m. The cramp and the call ahead are worth it, though, because Kobayashi buys fish only if he knows precisely where it came from—the fisherman, the boat and the body of water. He doesn’t buy fish unless it’s in season, no matter how much his customers might ask for it. He can tell you all about why it’s better to wait five days to serve tuna (that gives the flesh time to recover from the stress of being caught) or how the yellow tint on the seared Nantucket scallops indicates they’re female. Knowing his fish is “really important,” Kobayashi says. When asked about the mystery meat served at most sushi bars across the world, he says, “You guys deserve better.”

You might assume his obsessive focus on quality ingredients would be common in a cuisine that features raw fish, but it isn’t. Even after a glut of media reports last year on the publication of an alarming book that exposed a rampant practice of fake fish being sold as real fish, complacent consumers are still being duped. In November, the nonprofit seafood sustainability advocate Oceana released a report updating its review of seafood fraud globally. The news was mostly bad. On average, the percentage of seafood mislabeled has hovered around 30 percent for the past decade, according to an analysis of 51 peer-reviewed studies published since 2005. “The snapper is 87 percent wrong?” says Kobayashi, referring to a stat from an earlier version of Oceana’s report. “That’s insane. We should be outraged, as a nation.”

The industry is changing but slowly. Sushi heads are newly alert, and the industry is scrambling to meet their demand for honestly sourced fish.

One of the nation’s few hubs for traceable seafood is Oregon, especially Portland. At Portland’s Bamboo Sushi, every item on the menu is tagged with a different-colored fish icon, signifying the range of sustainability and traceability offered. Bamboo is one of only a handful of sushi spots nationwide that hips its patrons to what they’re eating and where it came from. The reason that’s so rare, says founder Kristofor Lofgren, is because stocking quality fish is tough. “Most sushi restaurants are mom-and-pop,” Lofgren says. “They need fish. They call a local distributor. They ask, ‘What do you have?’ and the distributor asks, ‘What can you spend?’ They end up with an acceptable medium range.”

Read the full story at Newsweek

ISSF Annual Report Focuses on Tuna Fishing Best Practices and Participating Company Conformance with Science-based Conservation Measures

May 23, 2017 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) released its 2016 annual report today, Best Practices, Better Solutions, which outlines tuna sustainability achievements and argues for continuous improvement of global tuna fisheries through collaboration and advocacy.

“ISSF marked its seventh anniversary in 2016, and I’m proud to have been part of this unique organization from the beginning,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson in her opening letter. “Through our many activities and partnerships over the years — made possible by progressive tuna companies and other funders — we have deepened our understanding about what it takes to ‘be’ sustainable, and to advance the cause.”

Best Practices, Better Solutions focuses on ISSF’s collaborations on “best practices” in tuna and ocean conservation sustainability with fishers, tuna companies, retailers, regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs), and other governing bodies, working closely with nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), scientific agencies, and charitable foundations.

Report Highlights

The report offers these special features:

  • Spotlights on fish aggregating device (FAD) management, electronic monitoring and reporting, and harvest control rules — including timelines that track best-practice milestones 2009-2016 as well as graphics showing RFMO proposal activity
  • Graphics documenting skipper acceptance of best practices, including bycatch mitigation techniques
  • Charts showing tuna stock status based on catch and abundance
  • Table with Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) performance indicator averages for global tuna fisheries
  • Summary of ISSF advocacy efforts, including joint letters, blogs, and RFMO side events
  • Graphic showing how RFMO proposals track with ISSF advocacy priorities
  • Reflections from outgoing ISSF Board chair Juan Corrales

It also covers these notable ISSF achievements:

  • Five new tuna companies joined as participating companies in 2016.
  • ISSF Skippers Workshops were held in China and Vietnam for the first time; a record 343 vessel crew were trained in 2016 workshops.
  • In North America, Europe, and Africa 32 retailers that purchase tuna have incorporated ISSF guidelines in their procurement policies.

Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report

ISSF’s annual report also serves as the platform to share the organization’s annual Conservation Measures and Commitments Compliance Report. The report shows a conformance rate of 97.5 percent by 28 ISSF participating companies as of March 31, 2017 — up from 95.6 percent in November 2016 — across 21 ISSF conservation measures in effect in 2016. Twenty-two of 28 companies were fully compliant across all measures.  

The report tracks ISSF participating companies’ progress in conforming with measures like these:

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. MRAG Americas conducts independent auditing based on a rigorous audit protocol.

In addition to a summary report, MRAG Americas issues individual company reports that document in detail each organization’s compliance with ISSF’s conservation measures. ISSF publishes these individual company compliance reports on its website.

ISSF Participating Companies account for about 75% of the global canned tuna market.

Eat more seafood for your health, right? Actually, it’s not that simple.

May 20, 2017 — The Dietary Guidelines for Americans strongly suggest that adults eat two servings of seafood, or a total of eight ounces, per week. Fish and shellfish are an important source of protein, vitamins and minerals, and they are low in saturated fat. But seafood’s claim to fame is its omega-3 fatty acids, including docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), which are beneficial to health.

Omega-3s are today’s darling of the nutrition world. Many observational studies have indeed shown them to help alleviate a range of conditions including high blood pressure, stroke, certain cancers, asthma, Type 2 diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease. However, there isn’t complete scientific agreement on the health benefits of omega-3s, especially when considering the lack of strong evidence from randomized clinical trials, which are the gold standard for research.

So what exactly is the evidence that seafood is good for your health?

The strongest evidence exists for a cardiovascular health benefit, and from consuming seafood (not just fish oil), which is significant because heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States.

One of the things I research is Americans’ meat and protein consumption. Though many of us are concerned about getting enough protein, most Americans actually get more than enough protein.

Rather, the problem is that most of us don’t include enough variety of protein sources in our diet. We eat a lot of poultry and red meat but not as much seafood, nuts, beans, peas and seeds. For seafood in particular, consumption is estimated at about 2.7 ounces of seafood a week per person, well below the recommended eight ounces.

So the solution might seem simple: Increase public-health messaging along the lines of “Seafood is healthy. Eat more of it.” But it’s a bit more complicated than that.

Read the full story at the Washington Post