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Will you join the fight to save wasted fish?

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Fishermen with netted fish
Profile photo of Miranda Akhurst Miranda Akhurst
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Are you one of the 500,000 plus people that have been joined Hugh’s Fish Fight? Do you also think it’s wrong that perfectly good fish are being chucked back into the ocean due to EU quotas?

I’m a bit of a ‘greeny’ anyway, so when I caught one of Hugh’s episodes on Channel 4 last week, I signed up to the petition to change Europe’s fisheries policy straightaway.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall wants to end the practise of ‘discarding’, where fishermen throw perfectly good fish overboard (mostly dead) just because an EU ‘quota’ says that they’re supposed to be catching another type of fish.

An average of 7.3 million tonnes of fish are discarded each year simply because they’re unwittingly caught in fisherman’s nets.

Overwhelming support

I was impressed that when I visited the programme’s website thousands of other people felt the same – the website had crashed because of the huge number of people who had been inspired to support the campaign.

I was even more impressed when supporters grew from the thousands to the hundreds of thousands in just a few days. But what really blew me away, and made me realise Hugh was creating real change, was when friends (who usually mock me for my obsessive recycling habits) were talking about sustainable fish in the pub over the weekend.

Plus, in the days since the series aired sales of the ‘alternative’ fish celebrated by Hugh have soared. It seems that, overnight, consumers are suddenly aware of the impact their preference for salmon, tuna and cod has on both fish stocks and the environment. It’s great that people are realising the potential of coley, pollack and sprats, and are more aware of the environmental benefits of buying organic salmon.

Fish stocks still need protection

The only worry is if sales of sustainable fish continue to grow, while our appetite for non-sustainable options remain the same (i.e. we eat more and more fish), we could face the same situation as we saw with Atlantic Salmon in the 1970s – there’d be no fish left to catch!

So while the review of Europe’s fisheries policy should throw out landing quotas and ban discards, it must also protect fish stocks. We need regulations that help the recovery of species in decline, by controlling which species can be caught and when.

So if you want to see fish stay on the menu of your favourite restaurant, join the Fish Fight today and take this op-perch-tuna-ty to express yourself in the comments below.

Comments
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richard says:
21 January 2011

I have joined the fight against the operation of the EU fishing quota policy.

It is ludicrous to throw back DEAD fish because they are over quota or undersized. It would be far more effective to INCLUDE those dead fish in the quota – remember they are dead – and consequently reduce the current quota by that amount.. That would not actually reduce the number of fish left in the sea, The current policy does – the worst of both worlds.

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Doug says:
21 January 2011

I agree too…….

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Sophie Gilbert says:
21 January 2011

Me too.

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fat sam says:
21 January 2011

I watch HFW’s programme and with my heart I almost signed up. But then my brain engaged and I thought more about this.

Firstly, why are dead fish thrown back? Answer: because a trawler has reached its quota for that particular type of fish. Catching huge amounts of fish, efficiently, whilst trying to maintain a quota, is not easy. To stop exceeding the quota trawlers will need to catch fish in smaller amounts and gradually build up to their quota so as not to exceed it. Unfortunately, unless you send a man under the water to count the fish entering the nets this is not easy to achieve. So, it can be done, but it takes time and therefore comes at a price A price that will be passed on to consumers. No! cry the consumers, we want cheap fish!

And not all fishing trips end up with over-catch. But the programme doesn’t show you that because that’s not what they’re highlighting.

What happens if the trawlers are allowed to sell the dead fish? Answer: they’ll simply exceed their quotas, shrug their shoulders, rub their hands and say, ‘Whoops, we didn’t mean to, honest’ (or, more likely, ‘[Gritos]. No era mi intención, honesto.’ This only benefits the fleets and doesn’t help the fish. The quotas are in place to preserve fish stocks and prevent the fleets profiting from over-catch.

What if the trawlers are allowed to give the dead fish away? No way, Jose, why would they give away free fish?! They are a business. I’m not entirely sure that the trawler alongside HFW was happy about him taking the dead fish that they had just thrown back.

The only real solution is for fleets to improve the way they catch fish – but fishing on a grand scale is not an exact science. Smaller nets maybe?That’s reducing efficiency and increases costs. We, as consumers, will have to pay more. Are we prepared to pay more?

Whilst it’s an emotive subject we need to think that this practise is there for a purpose. We may not like that practice but let’s think about this objectively without letting the emotional sight of hundreds of dead fish being thrown back into the sea.

Finally, call me cynical, but is this more about HFW and Channel 4 promoting the River Cottage brand?

PS If anyone disagrees with this view there’s nothing worse than someone simply hitting that disagree button. Hit the button, man up and state your argument. Let’s debate this properly.

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richard says:
22 January 2011

The throwing of dead fish is bad for the stocks of that species of fish – If Fishermen were really interested in saving the stocks – then they should give the dead excess to OTHER fisherman in the same fishing port. So that the second fishing boat catches less.

I really don’t care if Channel 4 has a motive to publish this – as it is true – It is still wrong to decimate fish stocks. and that is what happens.

The practice of quotas is ill thought out and should be stopped or radically modified.

BTW they can use ultra sound or similar to estimate size of shoals – but they don’t – they simply fish for maximum catch – not minimum impact on stocks – If fact the quotas came about because left to themselves the trawlermen would have fished the seas “dry”.

If that means smaller nets – then so be it.

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Hannah Jolliffe says:
21 January 2011

I’ve joined the Fish Fight campaign – have been saying for years that they need to rethink quotas, it’s crazy to throw dead fish back in the sea. I was discussing this with friends recently and one was questioning why they don’t have annual quotas – that way if they get a good catch they can keep it and when their quota runs out they can’t go out fishing anymore.

As an aside, it is good to see more sustainable fish types being promoted, but there could still be more awareness about them. When do you see coley and pollack being used on TV cookery shows? I subscribe to a monthly food mag and rarely see anything but the popular fish (salmon, haddock etc) being featured in recipes either.

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Miranda Akhurst says:
21 January 2011

I think while Fat Sam (or should that be Cynical Sam?) is sceptical about the Fish Fight and Hugh’s intentions, he’s rightly raised the other problems with the fishing industry – fishing methods and cheap fish.

While I won’t go on about how far fishing has moved on from the days when my grandparents were on first name terms with their local fisherman, I do think we need to reassess our fishing methods (and throw out those horrible combine harvester like trawlers that rake up the sea floor http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/oceans/problems/bottom-trawling), and also face up to the real cost of fish – should it really be so cheap?!

And I agree with Hannah, annual quotas for fish would make far more sense.

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fat sam says:
22 January 2011

Annual quotas do sound good but how on earth do you make them work in practice without by catch and throwing back dead fish? You can fish for a certain type of fish in an area but there’s no guarantee of not picking up plenty of something you don’t want to – and this is what leads to the awful practice of fish being thrown back in the sea.

Hugh’s intentions are all well and good but I feel his argument is fatally flawed. Actually, can anyone tell me what Hugh is actually proposing as a solution? His own website is pretty non-committal and doesn’t offer anything decisive.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like seeing dead fish being thrown back but what can we really do? I’ve still not read any plausible solutions to this problem other than perhaps introducing a complete ban on trawling saltwater fish to help stocks recover. This would severely hamper HFW’s own objectives: that of promoting healthy fish eating. Isn’t that what some might call a bit of an own goal? How many of HFW’s fans are prepared to stop eating fish altogether to help our vastly depleted stocks recover? Shouldn’t HFW stop serving fish?

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