This comes as no surprise since when celebrity chef Tom Aikens tried to tempt Londoners with sustainably sourced fish and chips made from pollock, his fish and chips restaurant lasted only months before shutting its doors for good.

When frozen fish producers Bird’s Eye asked consumers about issues of sustainability, they found that 84% of respondents expressed concern about the state of wild fish stocks and of these 90% knew that cod was one of the species most affected. According to the Marine Conservation Society, the biomass of North Sea cod has fallen from 250,000 tonnes in 1970 to 37,000 tonnes in 2007. Following the implementation of a recovery programme, this increased to 50,000 tonnes last year. Despite this low level, Bird’s Eye found that only 10% of consumers said that they would stop buying cod.

Against this background, UK supermarket Sainsbury’s must have felt that they faced a real challenge when they decided to launch their new campaign to persuade their customers to forgo cod and eat pollock instead. We have discussed their launch of pollock under the new name of ‘Colin’ in previous issues of reLAKSation so will not dwell on that here except to say that we have gone out of our way to attempt to obtain an example of the new packaging without success. We have visited two of the ten stores selected to sell the new product and been unable to locate any of the product, something not helped by the fact that none of the staff we spoke to knew anything about ‘Colin’ at all.

What we find of more interest is that in their original press release, Sainsbury’s Environment Manager, Alison Austin, is quoted as saying that ‘At Sainsbury’s, we’re passionate about sustainable sourcing and protecting dwindling fish stocks. We want to highlight that there are other species to eat other than cod and haddock. If we eat as much pollock as the French, it could make a massive difference to saving cod’.

If the future of cod stocks depends on Sainsbury’s customers buying the new ‘Colin’ then the future will be bleak because there doesn’t seem to be any available. However, we know of at least one way that Sainsbury’s could help safeguard stocks of wild caught fish. They could deter their customers from buying cod rather than encourage them to do so. This week Sainsburys are selling line caught cod fillet from their fish counters at only £5.20/kg which is about half price (£10.50/kg). Such promotional discounts are a sure-fire way of persuading customers to buy even more cod and surely do little to reduce the fishing pressure on wild caught stocks.

Sainsbury’s received a great deal of publicity from their attempt to rename pollock to try to make it more attractive to consumers but the focus on the name did little to highlight the underlying issues. In, fact this publicity stunt has actually drawn more attention to the fact that they have made little sustained effort to encourage consumers to eat other species. However, to be fair to Sainsbury’s, neither has any other supermarket. Both fish counters and chilled shelves could feature a sustainable fish of the week together with an explanation as to why consumers should be buying that specific species and recipes and even tastings.

Sainsbury’s could even go further. They have declared that by the end of 2010, they plan to move 80% of its fish to either MSC or other green rated standards. Why wait to 2010? Do it now. In fact, if Sainsbury’s are so concerned about the state of cod stocks, then why not stop selling cod completely.

The problem for Sainsbury’s is that there is no simple answer. All cod stocks are not threatened like those in the North Sea. Pacific cod stocks are so healthy that they are certified by the MSC as sustainable. Icelandic and Norwegian stocks are also reported to be healthy and some Norwegian cod is also now MSC certified. Sainsbury’s stock line caught cod rather than trawled and this places less fishing pressure on stocks.

The difficulty is that the combination of some recovery by falling demand has meant that cod is currently plentiful in the marketplace, so plentiful that most retailers have cod on one form of promotion or another. As we previously discussed, fishermen even want a high profile celebrity to tell consumers that it is OK to eat cod again.

British consumers are very traditional in the fish they eat but most fish retailers stock a wide range of other species. The fish industry needs to persuade consumers that there are lots of exciting taste experiences to be had by trying new species. However the way to do this is not through some scare tactics over the state of fish stocks but rather that they are great to eat.

Space – the final frontier?: Our comments in the last issue of reLAKSation suggesting that the EU’s new strategy on aquaculture could be restricted by the lack of space in Europe generated some response. One worth mentioning came from Danish Aquaculture, who pointed out that the Danish national zoning plan for mariculture indicated potential for the production of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of trout. The real limitation being not the space but rather the lack of real political will.

The point that we had been trying to make is that compared to other key aquaculture producing areas, Europe is at a disadvantage and always will be under current production methods. However, the way we farm fish today does not have to be the way that we farm in the future and the real scope for expansion, not just in Europe, but on a global basis, is to utilise the open sea.

The EU strategy on aquaculture makes one reference to offshore aquaculture in that it is an example of why public funded research is needed to kick start investments that may be too risky for individual farming companies to consider at present. However, we, at Callander McDowell, would suggest that offshore aquaculture is not the solution to space but open-sea aquaculture is.

Our principle, Dr Martin Jaffa, spoke at a conference in Brussels in 1995 which considered the question of aquaculture as a solution to declining wild catch fisheries. The focus of his presentation was that large scale farming could occur out in the open sea utilising the skills and experience of two other non-farming industries. In common with Danish Aquaculture, our belief is that it was not space or technology that was limiting but rather the will to work across industries and government departments.

This message was brought home this week when the US Department of the Interior’s Mineral Management Service decreed that no fish farming would take place off existing US oil rigs. At the same time, the US commerce secretary has said that the Obama administration’s new fish farming guidelines that could lead to offshore aquaculture, will be overseen by NOAA.    

This compartmentalised vision of how offshore aquaculture could develop will ensure that such ventures may be many years away yet. No one is seriously proposing that existing rigs should be used for aquaculture but this separation of the oil industry may hamper the opportunities that may exist.

Back in the early 1990’s a UK House of Lords enquiry suggested that the cost of decommissioning the many oil platforms in the North Sea could cost billions, a view echoed by Aupec oil consultants in 2005. They say the figure could be £11 billion. This will cover the decommissioning of 61 oil fields in the near future, 300 by 2020 and over 550 by 2030.

In 1995, we suggested that if some of this decommissioning cost was diverted towards finding a second use for oil platforms then open sea aquaculture could become a reality. What we suggested at the time was that redundant and stripped back oil platforms could become the operational hub for a huge farm working on an all-in, all-out principle. Traditional fishermen, working from their fishing vessels, would supplement their restricted fishing activities and hence their incomes by managing these farms. Much of the technology already exists to make this work but the will and the investment is lacking. The new EU strategy for aquaculture could change this although we are not holding our breaths with anticipation.

Open sea aquaculture would enable large scale fish production to change the whole perception of the fish supply chain to one that can meet world demand for fish. Like space open sea aquaculture is the final frontier but whether there is the will to make it happen, remains to be seen.

B-log: As usual, the European Seafood Exposition passed by in a whirl. Meetings and appointments meant that a comprehensive tour of all the halls proved impossible. What we did see caused us to ponder the intentions of some exhibitors with regard to the design of their stand. Some are extremely welcoming whilst others are not. Certainly, that belonging to the EU encouraged passers by to visit due to its open plan styling. One every occasion we passed by, the stand was busy, even if visitors were just reading the literature.

By comparison, the Marine Stewardship Council’s stand was not very welcoming at all. Its design was enclosed like a tunnel so that to any visitor, was akin to entering the unknown. Maybe the design was intended to restrict visitors to those who share their views.

According to seafoodsource.com one of the hot topics of the show was the question as to whether the Alaskan salmon industry will find a new client so that a new audit can take place this year. The current audit runs out in October. Rupert Howes of the MSC said that he is confident a new client will be found.

We, at Callander McDowell, being ardent advocates of aquaculture, are excluded from the MSC loop since the MSC refuses to have anything to do with farmed fish. We are not party to the current discussion but it seems that Mr Howes’s confidence may be more in hope than in reality. Certainly, the underlying mood is that the MSC needs Alaskan salmon more than Alaskan salmon needs the MSC. This view is expressed in a letter to IntraFish from Tony Cadden who writes that the salmon industry should not give in to MSC extortion as Alaskan salmon can sell just as well on its own merit.

Yet, an IntraFish editorial suggests that Alaskan salmon should find a way to continue with MSC certification as the MSC label has opened doors in Europe and other markets. Looking back through the mists of time it may seem that MSC certification helped bring Alaskan salmon to Europe but actually Pacific salmon has been selling well in the UK for many years, albeit in canned form. The surge in interest in ‘fresh’ Alaskan salmon however was due to being able to claim a wild origin. A sustained campaign against farmed salmon caused some consumers to have concerns about pigmentation and health care. The availability of a wild salmon, even though it was not the same fish and was hatchery raised, meant that these consumers could ease their conscience. The fact that the fish were MSC certified was a bonus but not the driving force. The fish would have sold just as well without certification. The unanswered question is what would have happened if the environmental groups had not mounted their anti-farmed salmon campaign? Would consumers have been so interested in wild Alaskan salmon?

This leaves the key question as to whether Alaskan salmon still needs the MSC certification? We think that the answer can be found in IntraFish’s Brussels blog. Editor, Drew Cherry, writes that his Sunday recession lunch was a trip to Belgium-based fast food chain ‘Quick’ (obviously ignoring Government advice that it is possible to eat cheaply and healthily without resorting to fast food).

He adds that the 450 unit chain was the first fast food operation to carry the MSC logo on its menus and on the boxes of their fish sandwich. The fish in their ‘King Fish’ sandwich was then New Zealand hoki.

This year, Mr Cherry writes that the MSC logos have now disappeared form the menu and the sandwich box. Investigating further Mr Cherry says that the Quick website states that they now use pollock. Given the challenges facing the hoki fishery as to whether it should have been recertified, Mr Cherry says that this is not unexpected.

Yet, hoki is still certified by the MSC and so is pollock so there is not a reason why the Quick should have stopped using MSC certified fish. It’s possible that cost could be another reason why the MSC logo has disappeared. Uncertified pollock is cheaper which is why many companies now use it in their products rather than use fish from a MSC certified source. However, there may be another reason.