warning Hi, we've moved to USCANNENBERGMEDIA.COM. Visit us there!

Neon Tommy - Annenberg digital news

The Hunt For Sustainable Seafood Just Got Easier

Kim Nowacki |
January 10, 2010 | 2:45 p.m. PST

Staff Reporter
In the United States, seafood is a big business -- Americans ate 4.908 billion pounds of seafood in 2007, an average of 16.3 pounds of fish and shellfish per person.

Fear of mercury doesn't sway consumers, well, maybe a pregnant woman for nine months or so. Concern over killing innocent dolphins is so 1980s. And shark finning, while absolutely detestable, doesn't stare us in the face at most restaurants where the menu sticks to salmon, shrimp and tuna.

Besides, isn't seafood good for you? It's low in fat and full of omega-3 fatty acids, which are good for your heart.

And, let's not overlook the fact that seafood is totally delicious.

But because of over fishing and/or harmful fishing practices, this mass consumption can be detrimental to the future of seafood on a couple of levels, including maintaining a cheap, accessible protein source, as well as maintaining the overall health of the planet.

The solution many agree -- from scientists to activists and those whose livelihood depends on seafood -- is a consumer and cultural shift to demanding sustainable seafood, a term that refers to just about every aspect of getting the fish from the water to the dinner table.

"I think it's in everybody's best interest, besides the fact that it's good stewardship, to do the right thing. The right thing never fails," says Antonio de Lucia, who married in to the fishing business and is now the fourth president of the Long Beach Seafood Co., which prides itself on its environmental pro-activity.
 
"It may be hard," says de Lucia, "it may be difficult, it may create a bigger struggle than we would like to deal with, but ultimately the right thing always pans out."

*** *** *** ***

Over the past five years, the idea of going green means more than just recycling your soda cans. These days, it's everything from buying a Prius to eating free-range chicken or even participating in a cowpool, to retrofitting your home with solar panels and maybe your own wind turbine.

Still, sustainability is a rarely understood term. At least, though, it's out there, notes, Andrew Gruel, director of Seafood for the Future, a -- you guessed it -- sustainable seafood program based out the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach.

"By virtue of the fact people are overly aware of this, then it means something," he says, "it's just a matter of defining it."

Seafood for the Future is trying to do that -- for the consumer and the seafood seller. Begun a year ago with a grant from the Pacific Life Foundation, Seafood for the Future champions local chefs, restaurateurs, retailers and fisheries that serve or sell sustainable seafood.

"Ultimately, our goal here is to manipulate market forces with the objective of increasing sustainable seafood," says Gruel. "By increasing that demand and that supply, the price is going to come down and then we'll decrease the demand for the unsustainable sources."

To be sustainable, the seafood product has to reproduce very quickly, isn't in danger of being over-fished, fished illegally or in a way that harms the environment -- i.e., poorly run fish farms or net trawling that causes a lot of bycatch -- isn't over-endorsed to the detriment of its population or pumped full of chemical therapeutics.

The research behind Seafood for the Future comes from the National Marine Fisheries Service, the arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration responsible for managing marine resources.

The Aquarium of the Pacific isn't alone in championing sustainable seafood. The Monterey Bay Aquarium puts out the "Seafood Watch" list of what seafood is the best to buy, as does the National Marine Fisheries Service with its own "Fish Watch."
 
And this past October, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law a sustainable seafood bill (AB 1217) that aims to define what it means to run a sustainable fishing business and to create a product label "that may be used exclusively to identify seafood caught in California that is certified to internationally accepted standards for sustainable seafood." Participation, however, is voluntary.


Where Seafood for the Future differs slightly from these programs, is that instead of distributing a list of sustainable seafood items for consumers to ponder over at the grocery store or while perusing a menu, Seafood for the Future puts out a list of retailers -- Long Beach Seafood Co. is among them -- and restaurants that sell and serve sustainable seafood.

"Then, anytime they serve those species on their menu, we're going to put our logo (shown below) next to that seafood item," says Gruel, who along with Dave Anderson, the marine biologist of the program, went out into the market, did the research and then set out to connect sustainable fisheries and fish distributors with the chefs.

seafoodfuture.jpg
seafoodfuture.jpg

"So now when the consumer goes to the restaurant by virtue of that logo, it answers all of their questions," he adds. "It's a little bit more top heavy in terms of us doing the research but it also instills a sense of trust to the consumer, the chef, the restaurant and the retailer."

That's true at Nook Bistro, a casual and aptly named restaurant tucked away in the corner off Santa Monica Boulevard in West Los Angeles. It's one of the few L.A.-based restaurants that are part of the Seafood for the Future program; most are in Long Beach.

Offering ocean-friendly seafood dishes were always part of Nook's menu plan, says owner and manager Brian Frith-Smith. He and chef James Richardson did what initial Internet research they could to verify the arctic char, albacore tuna and calamari they were serving came to them in a sustainable fashion. But they were never quite sure.

 "It was a relief because it was something that was on our mind, that we were concerned about, but we were never 100 percent sure exactly how well we doing," says Frith-Smith. "For them to call us out of the blue and to want to include us in this program, we were feeling really proud of ourselves for that."

*** *** *** ***

That's really the frustrating part in all this. Consumers -- and concerned chefs -- have to rely a lot on what someone else is telling them when trying to do what Frith-Smith calls, "menu activism."

You have to believe that everyone involved is so for the right reasons.

 "At this point I put my trust in them," Frith-Smith says about Seafood For the Future's Gruel and Anderson. "Before we put a new dish on the menu I ask them about it. And they tell me. I trust those guys."

And it's hard not to believe in de Lucia when a conversation with him about sustainable seafood meanders from the simple justification of "doing the right thing" to a philosophical question on whether God is testing us to take care of the planet to the lament that in order to run a business, he still has to sell a small amount of shark and other questionable species.

 

De Lucia says in the past five years, especially the last two, he's seen a heightened concern from his customers over the carbon footprint and overall environmental impact of how the seafood they're buying comes to them.

"I like it when a consumer comes to me and says this what I'm looking for, these are my specs and this is the integrity of the product I want," says de Lucia. "The integrity is what we support and we support that customer because that's the type of customer we want to see more of."

And Frith-Smith also notes that plenty of people in the food service and hospitality business are concerned about sustainability.

"It's important mostly because it's the right thing to do," he says. "But also, for our own sake, we want to keep eating fish."

It's also a good business plan, as the sustainability trend becomes something more customers care about.

"Down the line people will start looking for it," says Frith-Smith. "It won't be like menu activism anymore, it'll be more mainstream within the next few years"

*** *** *** ***

And all parties involved say once sustainable seafood becomes the norm, the cost* will come down as the market demand shifts. That push, though, has to come from the consumer.

*Last month, a beautiful looking, wild-caught, antibiotics-free king salmon filet will cost you $22.99 a pound at Whole Foods. Also there, the tilapia with the sustainable label runs $9.99 a pound. At Nook Bistro, the seafood dishes are $10-$12.

For now, the incentive -- besides an eco-friendly ego rush -- to order a sustainable seafood dish at one of the Seafood for the Future partner restaurants is a free ticket to the Aquarium of the Pacific. Nook Bistro gave out about 450 aquarium passes during the first three months of participation.

However, the irony of an aquarium offering an incentive to eat fish is not lost on the animal rights group PETA, which issued a statement against the Seafood For the Future program.

 "You wouldn't go to a dog show and order a poodle burger," says Amanda Fortino, campaign coordinator for PETA. "And really, there isn't a certain type of fish you should eat over another one. It's just wrong try to and tell people there is"

PETA's stance is the aquarium should be educating the public on the dangers of fish farms and over-fishing.

Gruel counters that it's the aquarium's job to figure out a way to live in a healthy balance with the ocean -- and keep fish as a food source.

"It's very interesting to me to see people go, 'Well, you know what, there's so much (bad stuff) out there I'm just not going to eat seafood,'" says Gruel.

"Because that's just really giving up," he says. "You turn your back on it."

Reach reporter Kim Nowacki here. Join Neon Tommy's Facebook fan page or follow us on Twitter.

 



 

Buzz

Craig Gillespie directed this true story about "the most daring rescue mission in the history of the U.S. Coast Guard.”

Watch USC Annenberg Media's live State of the Union recap and analysis here.