reLAKSation 540
What he didn’t say:
At the launch of his ‘International Sustainability Unit’s report ‘Towards Global
Sustainable Fisheries’, Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales said that ‘Marine
capture fisheries represent the last major international industry based on the
hunting and gathering of wild animals.’ He then went on to say that ‘It is
however an industry that is far from primitive and indeed far from marginal in
an economic or social sense’. That may well be the case but unfortunately the
Prince missed a real opportunity for what he really should have said is that
whilst marine capture fisheries may well be the last example of
hunter-gathering, in every other area of food supply, man has turned to farming.
Prince Charles also said that fisheries need to
be managed in the context of the broader ecosystem because it is self-evident
that fisheries do not exist in isolation but as part of the wider ecosystem in
which they reside. Equally, fisheries cannot be considered as part of fish
supply in isolation since aquaculture increasingly contributes to the global
demand for fish. Yet, this ISU report fails to even mention aquaculture, let
alone consider the implications of supplying the world’s need for fish from wild
capture fisheries alone.
Prince Charles’s report also discusses the tools
which can be used to improve fisheries. These are smart economics, an ecosystem
approach and robust management but there is a complete failure to mention the
one single tool that can most effectively improve any wild catch fishery and
that is aquaculture.
Aquaculture’s omission from this report is of no
surprise. The sustainability movement of which Prince Charles’ ISU belongs would
never consider aquaculture as a solution to the problems of fish supply. Even
before sustainability was raised as an international issue, aquaculture was
never on the agenda. In a week when Mike Sutton was interviewed about the
decision by Alaskan salmon fisheries to leave the MSC programme, we were
reminded that Callander McDowell had been in contact with Mr Sutton before the
official launch of the then unnamed organisation to promote the idea of
aquaculture as an effective management tool and sadly Mr Sutton was unwilling to
even consider a meeting let alone discuss the idea.
Although to the best of
our knowledge Prince Charles hasn’t come out and said so in public, it is
unlikely that he is a great supporter of the idea of farming fish. According to
seafoodintelligence.co, he is a strong supporter of the Marine Stewardship
Council and a patron of the Marine Conservation Society whose views on
aquaculture are not the most encouraging. However, Prince Charles is also a
patron of the Salmon & Trout Association whose views on salmon farming are
regularly given an airing in the media.
The STA blame salmon farming
for the demise of wild salmon in Scottish rivers and are fighting for the
removal of salmon farming from most of the Scottish west coast.
According to IntraFish,
Prince Charles said that if sustainable management of fisheries is applied more
widely then the benefits will be seen as larger catches, higher earnings, more
secure jobs and healthier seas. Whilst we are not sure that this is exactly what
he said, Prince Charles seems to be offering a the fisheries’
industry
a carrot that even his organic garden at Highgrove House, for which he is
well-known, is unlikely to deliver. It is nonsense to suggest that better
management will produce higher catches that is unless the fishing pressure on
wild stocks can be reduced.
Fishing
pressure can only continue to rise as the population continues to expand and no
form of sustainable management will ever change this.
The only way that that fishing pressure can be
eased would be if demand is met from another source and that is from
aquaculture.
Prince Charles says wild
catch fisheries cannot be considered in isolation and this exactly why his ISU
cannot ignore aquaculture either now or in the future.
Prince Charles says that there
is real cause for optimism but without aquaculture such optimism can only be
misplaced
In-credible!:
Seafoodintelligence.com
report that the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch programme will spend the
next nine months evaluating sustainable certification schemes including the MSC,
GAA, Global GAP, Global Trust etc. to determine if any or all are credible. This
means that they must adhere to a robust process and are equivalent to at least a
Seafood watch ‘Good Alternative’ yellow ranking or above.
We, at Callander
McDowell, can only wonder at the self-importance of the Monterey Bay Aquarium
that they intend to judge other certification schemes against their own
assessment criteria.
Just as they plan to judge
whether any eco-label is credible or not, who has decided that the Monterey Bay
Aquarium is any more credible than any other advocate of sustainability? The
answer seems to be the Monterey Bay Aquarium itself.
The question of who is
arbitrator of what is and what is not sustainable has been raised by Chef Mitch
Tonks in his blog, (http://www.mitchtonks.co.uk/blog/
- Communication is Key). In
what is probably one of the best pieces of writing about sustainability and an
essential ‘must read’.
Mr Tonks was recently surprised to find that the
new ‘Fish 2 Fork’ guide rates his restaurants as some of the ‘worst’ in the
country. He contacted ‘Fish 2 Fork’ to find out why and was told that his low
rating was because he serves plaice and ray which are both on the Marine
Conservation Society’s (MCS) red list. Mr Tonks says he takes issues like
sustainability very seriously and even has MSC accreditation for his restaurant.
He was told by ‘Fish 2 Fork’ that the restaurants would be given a much higher
score if he took the two species off the menu.
However Mr Tonks is based in the fishing port of
Brixham and so spent time researching the state of the local plaice stock from
which he sources his fish. In his blog he provides a detailed explanation as to
why he should continue this species so we won’t repeat it here other than to say
that he thinks that the plaice fishery is actually a good news story that should
be highlighted rather than being penalised by the ‘Fish 2 Fork’ reviewers. The
rays are a by-catch which would be otherwise discarded and Mr Tonks thinks it is
right that they should be utilised. After-all, the Government has spent large
sums looking at discards and how to encourage restaurateurs like Mr Tonks to use
them.
Mr Tonks thought that he would compare his
restaurants with those that ‘Fish 2 Fork’ has awarded the highest scores to see
what he was doing wrong. One restaurant had four species of fish on its menu,
two of which were gurnard and pollock. These are hailed as the ‘new species to
eat’ yet face huge challenges. South coast pollock is tightly controlled as to
catch whilst gurnard is data deficient so no true picture of the stock is
available. Mr Tonks says he is confused so pity the consumer who is faced with
decisions as to what he should eat.
Mr Tonks says that the problem with ‘Fish 2 Fork’
is that decisions are all based on one source, the Marine Conservation Society.
He says that he is not suggesting that they are wrong but that possibly they do
not have all the answers and should not dish out blanket advice without
balancing against all the other relevant factors and expertise that is
available.
Mr Tonks echoes a view that we have expressed in
previous issues of reLAKSation. Just because they are a NGO with Royal patronage
doesn’t mean that they cannot be challenged. However in our experience the NGO’s
appear reluctant to engage with those who express a different view. As a
consequence we have the ridiculous situation that the British Government has a
fish buying policy that favours imported salmon from Alaska instead of locally
grown (and sustainable) Scottish salmon. As Mr Tonks suggests, this is simply
because the decision makers have based their policies on the views of the MCS
alone.
In the light of recent events, the UK Government
will now have to review its fish buying policy. Once Alaskan salmon ditches the
MSC certification, then will the MCS still award it its current rating or will
Alaskan salmon plunge down the ratings table and be considered off the menu.
Only time will tell if the MCS team have to face sleepless nights pondering the
advice they will have to give.
Meanwhile, there has been much said and written
about the Alaskan decision to pull out of the MSC scheme. Most of the comments
have come from those who have a direct interest in what happens. In addition a
small number of large retailers have said that they may look for an alternative
supplier if Alaskan salmon is not MSC certified but at this stage we think that
this is simply the stores supporting the status quo. As we have suggested
previously, we don’t think that this will be the first loss of the MSC label,
nor will it be the last, for we suspect that with time some of these sustainable
fisheries will prove to be far from sustainable.
Whilst everyone has been quick to add their views
to the mix, we have not heard from those who eventually have to make a decision
about sustainable seafood – the consumer. We have repeated suggested that most
consumers aren’t in the slightest bit interested in sustainability and therefore
the loss of the MSC logo by Alaskan salmon will make no difference. After-all,
there are currently plenty of packs of Pacific salmon in stores that do not
carry the MSC logo. We do wonder whether the real reason why the Alaskans have
decided to withdraw from the MSC scheme is that they have realised that the
costs outweigh the benefits.
This view has been reinforced
by comments made by ex-MSC and now Aquaculture Stewardship Council CEO Chris
Ninnes who told IntraFish that the ASC will be shorter, quicker and cheaper than
the MSC. We suspect it will also be more pointless!
Catch and protect:
According to Deadlinenews.co.uk, Mark Bilsby, River Director of the Dee District
Salmon Fishery Board said that ‘they must act now to protect future salmon
populations’.
This is a truly noble ideal and clearly one that
must be supported. After all, we are regularly told that the wild salmon is an
iconic symbol of Scottish rivers and therefore everything must be done to
support initiatives to help protect this important fish.
To coincide with the
start of the 2012 fishing season on the River Dee, Mr Bilsby was therefore
pleased to announce that the Scottish Government has given its approval, in
principle, to their application to permanently extend the angling season by two
weeks. How extending the time that anglers are given to catch and kill salmon
will help protect fish stocks is a mystery but it is all part of the warped
thinking behind
attempts
to conserve salmon stocks in Scottish rivers. Wouldn’t it make more sense to
reduce the length of the season to afford the fish more protection?
Mr Bilsby said that he is confident that having
first checked that an extension to the fishing will not damage salmon
populations and together with their tried and tested conservation policy the
extension is appropriate for this river during these difficult economic times.
This idea that the
current difficult economic crisis will help protect salmon stocks is a certainly
new to us unless Mr Bilsby means that increasingly tight money supply restricts
the number of anglers coming to fish and thus salmon will have a better chance
of passing up and down the river without facing death.
Or could it mean that the
various river owners are finding their rental incomes squeezed and that by
extending the season, they can screw every last penny out of the wild salmon
catch.
The River Dee season was
officially opened by comedian and keen fisherman Paul Whitehouse who made the
first cast at Potarch Bridge. Getting a funny-man to open the season wasn’t
perhaps such a good choice because the conservation policy on Scottish rivers,
such as the Dee, has gone way beyond any joke.