Edible San Diego

The Confounding Nature of Sustainable Seafood
By Caron Golden

Salmon. It can make you crazy. Are we only supposed to eat wild Alaskan salmon? What about farmed? What's in the chemicals added to make it, well, salmon colored? How about Scottish salmon? It's so delicious but it has to be shipped here and how is that good for the environment?

Forget salmon. What about swordfish. Is it OK to eat it now? And, no bluefin tuna? Seriously?

Talk about sustainable seafood is all the rage. With two-thirds of the world's fisheries reaching depletion and overfishing putting some species, including some in California, close to extinction, we have serious issues to consider as consumers. We aren't supposed to eat endangered species or seafood caught by large trawlers with turtle bycatch. Or eat some farmed fish.  We're encouraged to eat local, but what's local? San Diego waters?  Baja? The Pacific? We're encouraged to eat species like swordfish that are caught by harpoon or hook and line, not net. But how do we know how it's caught?

Good luck, consumers, keeping all the do's and don'ts straight.

And, yet it's important to make the effort. U.S. consumers eat about 16 pounds of seafood per person each year. And, if the pocketbook holds the power, we need to wield ours better. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), U.S. consumers spent almost $70 billion for fishery products in 2008,including $46.8 billion at restaurants, carry-outs and caterers. We spent $22.7 billion in retail sales for consumptionat home. That means we can influence what shows up in restaurants and stores. But we have to be smart about it.

Just What Is Sustainable Seafood?

Addressing how to be a good consumer is complex, not the least because depending on whom you talk to you get a different definition of sustainability. NOAA holds that seafood is sustainable when "the population of that species of fish is managed in a way that provides for today's needs without damaging the ability of the species to reproduce and be available for future generations." Carl Safina, president of Blue Ocean Institute, defines it as seafood "produced in a way that we can keep doing it without getting into a situation in which we can't do it anymore." Almost the same thing.

But talk to representatives of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which produces Seafood Watch, probably the best known of the many consumer seafood buying guides, and you get quite a different response.

"We're an aquarium, so our definition revolves around healthy oceans and intact ecosystems," says Sheila Bowman, Seafood Watch senior outreach manager. "We're not talking about seafood. We're talking about fish. We aren't in the business of feeding people. We're here to help the ocean."

Then there's Don Kent, president of Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute. "When talking about sustainability, it's a synergistic concept putting environmental stewardship and ethics in balance with pragmatism. At the end of the day if you don't operate your facility with respect for the earth, Mother Earth bites you in the ass."

Trey Foshee, executive chef and partner of George's at the Cove in La Jolla, is ardent about sustainable seafood, but he, too, has his own definition of what that is, which to him "means to be constantly putting pressure on and reading and educating myself on what we can do from a restaurant perspective on not impacting the environment."

It goes on. What about the issue of carbon footprint? Is buying from a well-managed fishery in New Zealand as good as buying local or are we indulging ourselves? And how about issues not directly related to the seafood, like the packaging? Is it sustainable to buy from a restaurant that refuses to take styrofoam packaging and instead uses returnable/ reusable containers for wholesale delivery?

What about economics? What is sustainable about putting much of a community's industry out of work? Andrew Spurgin, cofounder of the public education project Passionfish and co-owner/ chef of Waters Fine Catering, points to Somalia as a case in point. "Everyone complains about the pirates there, but a lot of these pirates were fishermen. Their fisheries were devasted by industrial trawlers and they're pirating to feed their families."

Clearly, that's an extreme example but marine biologist and Passionfish's exectutive director Carl Rebstock tells of the fallout from the closing of a rockfish rookery in Monterey Bay. "People remember that a number of these out-ofwork fishermen began drinking. As the drinking increased spousal abuse spiked. As spousal abuse became more pronounced, truancy rates among school kids went up. These are the ripple effects of ‘sustainability' on a community," he says. "You have to pay attention to the environment but without considering downstream impacts, you can do quite a bit of damage to society."

So, it's complicated. And, some of the decision-making consumers have to do centers around how much research they're willing to put in on an ever-changing industry that is often accused of fudging its practices.  "There's a lot of lying in the seafood business," says Safina. "There's misrepresentation of what things are and where they come from."

It also has to do with personal values and economics and even a willingness to try new things. Perhaps grilled sardines instead of tuna sashimi. Farmed fish instead of wild. And consuming less of it all, just as with beef, pork, and chicken.

Fisheries Management

Most of the people interviewed for this story agree that the United States is far ahead of almost all other countries in managing their fisheries. NOAA Fisheries Service, also known as NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), is the federal agency responsible for fisheries management in what is called the United State's "Exclusive Economic Zone" (EEZ), which is waters three to 200 miles offshore most of the continental U.S., except western Florida and Texas, where it's nine to 200 miles off the coast. The 30 coastal states are responsible for the waters up to those lines, although NOAA plays a supportive and advisory role in partnership with the states.

Judd Brown, owner of San Diego wholesale distributor Pacific Shellfish and the restaurant The Fishery, is a longtime commercial and sport fisherman who has seen drastic changes in the last 40 years in local fisheries. He says that decades ago, there was a perception that the abundance of fish was inexhaustible but the population of various species gradually declined to the point of crisis and he believes it was then managed as a crisis.

"In the 1940s and '50s, the U.S. government gave low interest-rate loans to build fisheries to exploit. Companies overbuilt fleets and eventually catches declined," he explains. "But it became a political issue over employment and nothing changed until it virtually collapsed. Only then did the government start doing something about it."

In 1976, the Magnusen-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act was drafted. It's since been reauthorized many times over as marine resources have shifted and changed. It established national authority over the EEZ and while the specifics of the Act have changed over the years, according to NOAA, the overarching theme is to conserve and manage U.S. fisheries based on 10 National Standards approved by Congress.

Of course, that's just the U.S. and the fact is that we import 84 percent of our seafood, based on NOAA's numbers. In 2008, that amounted to 5.2 billion pounds of product like shrimp, tuna, salmon, groundfish, freshwater fish, crab, and squid. And where is it coming from? China and Thailand are the top two countries, followed by Canada and Chile. So, it's just as important to keep in mind that none of the regulations established by NMFS is relevant to that 84 percent.

Unless you know where your seafood comes from, the whole issue of sustainability becomes moot. Industry people tick off the names of countries where fishing practices are deemed dicey. For instance, in Mexico, where regulation is lax, large trawlers that catch shrimp are banned unless they have modern turtle excluder devices, or TEDs.

But, says Dan Nattrass of Cataline Offshore Products, "not all of them have them or are up to date." And, there isn't the budget or perhaps the will to enforce those bans.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium is finalizing a study on the state of fishing in countries other than the United States with plans to release it at the end of the year or beginning of 2011. But Bowman says that "while requirements here are head and shoulders above some other countries, some countries are understanding the issues and making changes."

Meanwhile Catalina Offshore Products does much of its purchasing from small fishermen in Baja California. Using pangas with outboard motors, this is old-school, low-tech, low-infrastructure fishing. Is that in and of itself sustainable? No, acknowledges Nattrass, but "at least in the open ocean in the Pacific, limited by weather and size, the impact is greatly reduced so the fish stocks are generally robust."

And, walk through the warehouse of Chesapeake Fish Co. in downtown San Diego and you'll find an assortment of fish shipped over from countries like Argentina (Chilean seabass), Costa Rica (swordfish) and Canada (farm-raised Atlantic salmon), alongside local catch. But for Steve Foltz, Chesapeake's vice president of sales, the imports can be troubling. "With all these domestic limitations, we're going to import from around the world. But how do you monitor their techniques and issues around bycatch," he asks. "What do we do about lost jobs here?  How do we know they're not overfishing?"

Friends Don't Let Friends Eat Farmed Fish: Overkill?

When it comes to addressing the choices around sustainable seafood, aquaculture or farmed fish is part of the equation as a way to take pressure off wild fisheries. According to NOAA, half of our imported seafood is from aquaculture. But the U.S. supplies only about 5 percent of domestic seafood supply and U.S. marine aquaculture, a $1 billion industry annually, accounts for less than 1.5 percent. The largest sector? Shellfish like oysters, clams, and mussels, which account for about two-thirds of total U.S. marine aquaculture production. Salmon, of course, follows at about 25 percent, and then shrimp at 10 percent.

These are potentially scary numbers, although, in fact, some would find it scary that we're farming fish at all. On a large bulletin board in a stairwell at Pacific Shellfish is a bright yellow bumper sticker proclaiming "Friends Don't Let Friends Eat Farmed Fish."

"These are fish fed on foraged fish from wild stocks," he says. "They're getting better at it but the feed-to-yield ratio is three pounds feed for one pound of flesh. It's ridiculous."

Matt Rimel, owner of seafood distributor Ocean Giant and Zenbu restaurants, has been in the fish business for over 20 years. He's no fan of farmed fish either. "I don't eat farmed fish because I know farmed fish live on shit. I sell it because my customers ask for it, but I wish I didn't have to," he says.

There are longstanding concerns about what the fish are fed (including byproduct from cattle and chicken), antibiotics and disease, how their feces are treated and disposed, crowding, escaping and the impact of the farms on the surrounding environment.

According to Bowman, salmon farms located next to wild salmon runs have a documented negative effect. And, she notes that farmed fish have a different diet than wild fish, so they won't have the same color or musculature. In fact, farmed salmon, for example, have been shown to contain more fat because they're fed fattier food than in the wild. And they taste less "fishy." That, along with lower prices and added coloring that makes them seem more "salmony," has made them more popular with consumers.

But, contrary to what you might think, the Monterey Bay Aquarium is not taking a stand against farmed fish. "We're definitely in the camp of fish farming done responsibly and well, [which] is absolutely the only way we're going to see the demand for fish that is growing met," Bowman says. "Just like industrial cows and chicken and pork farmers are doing more positive things, we're seeing this with fish farming."

She points out that according to a United Nations report, 2010 is the year when Americans will start eating more farmed fish than wild fish.

Kent is among those who are heavily involved in aquaculture. At their Mission Bay facility Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute has grow-out tanks of white seabass, for instance. It's part of a longstanding and successful local replenishment program to boost the wild population. They'd like to establish a for-profit fish farm but Kent explains that plans to start the permitting process are on hold for about six months for various reasons. President Obama wants to do a study of a marine spatial planning system for federal waters, NOAA is taking on regulatory authority over aquaculture in federal waters and there are two potential bills-one in the House of Representatives and the other in the Senate-that could impact their two-year permitting process.

So, Hubbs is working on a demonstration project in Mexico. "We want to show people how this can be done in a sustainable way. We're working with a couple of different farms to raise yellowtail, striped bass and white seabass, and working on lining up California halibut."

Kent points out that often-reviled farmed salmon is grown exceptionally well in some places, including Maine and British Columbia. And he trashes several high-profile complaints about farmed salmon. "It's said they have no omega-3 fatty acids. Bunk. That there are elevated PCBs in farmed salmon. Bunk. And, it destroys the environment. Bunk."

"Commercial fisherman want to devalue farmed salmon," he says.

"A lot of what's going on is that people who demonize farming are basically doing a ‘let them eat cake.'"

In San Diego, mussels, clams, abalone and oysters are raised at Carlsbad Aquafarm in Carlsbad. Hubbs has its Marine Fish Hatchery nearby-in fact, just across the Aqua Hedionda Lagoon- where it's raising white seabass.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium's Bowman says five years ago you'd have been hard-pressed to find good things going on in aquaculture, but in the last five years she's seen impressive improvements. "Even some farmed salmon is being done right," she acknowledges.

The Consumer Conundrum

San Diegans are lucky. As a Pacific Rim region we have immediate access not just to imported seafood from overseas and along the western Pacific coastline, we have some tremendous local-micro local-seafood. Pacific sardines, halibut, swordfish, spiny lobster, sea urchin, yellowtail and seabass dwell in our bays and along the coast, along with locally farmed mussels, oysters, abalone and clams. But how many of us opt for local, healthy species over more commercial popular seafood?

"One thing we do a good job at is expose people to fish they should be eating," says Foshee. "We sell sardines, local yellowtail and white seabass. My job as a chef is to come up with ways to do something more interesting with fish people are less familiar with instead of just using fish with name recognition. It's what I've done with sardines."

Brian Sinnott, executive chef at 1500 Ocean, agrees with Foshee. "Local yellowtail is great. Sea urchin is fantastic. Tilefish is a good example of a threatened fish in the Atlantic but sustainably raised in Baja."

Of course, the chefs are in business to make money and have to weigh what will sell when creating their menus. So do retailers. And, costs, which can be a difference of several dollars a pound, are an issue.

Customers not only have to demand sustainable seafood on menus and in retail cases, they also have to be willing to pay for it, says Brown.

The other challenge for consumers is identifying what these "sustainable" choices are. Consumers can find guides on websites including NOAA's FishWatch (www.nmfs.noaa.gov/fishwatch/), the Environmental Defense Fund (edf.org/seafood), Blue Ocean Institute (blueocean.org/seafood/seafood-guide) and, of course, Monterey Bay Aquarium (www.montereybayaquarium.org/ cr/seafoodwatch.aspx). Now, are these guides the easy fix for consumers? No; a pocket guide is one tool among many, including

Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) labels at major retailers like Whole Foods and some restaurants. MSC is a certification and ecolabeling program for sustainable seafood. Some seafood companies believe they're being charged upwards of $150,000 a year to get a label for something already managed by the Federal government, but others like Carl Safina acknowledge that while it's a controversial group, "I believe they're 99 percent trustworthy."

Smart consumers should also recognize that they need to ask their restaurants and vendors questions about where seafood comes from, how it was caught, if it's sustainable. The bottom line? Buy from businesses you trust.

"Know your fish monger," says Catalina Offshore Products's Tommy Gomes. "Buy in good faith, eat well and educate yourself on what is good to buy and what stocks are healthy."

Gomes has, in fact, seen a shift in customer demand and interest. "Customers started out wanting fresh fish but they see what we're doing in sustainability and they want that, too. It adds to the reason they come here."

It's made an impact on businesses like Trader Joe's, which in March announced a goal of shifting all seafood purchases to sustainable sources by Dec. 31, 2012, and to use their purchasing power to leverage change among seafood suppliers.

Bowman is optimistic. "I've met people in this business who are not just out to make as much money as they can, but to be in harmony with the planet as they fish. Years ago no one knew what kind of damage a trawl could do to an ocean floor because we couldn't see it.  Now we have the technology to do it and changes have been made.

And given an opportunity, these fish can rebound. We see hopeful things so I mostly feel hopeful."

Caron Golden is an award-winning freelance writer whose work appears in Saveur, Culinate and her blog, San Diego Foodstuff. She is a food columnist for SDNN.com and a regular guest on KPBS radio's These Days.