Fishing News

Russian ban hits US exports of hake, surimi, pink salmon and salmon roe; canned products excluded

SEAFOODNEWS.COM  by John Sackton – Aug 7, 2014

Posted with permission of Seafoodnews.com | Copyright © 2014 Seafoodnews.com

D.B. PLESCHNER: Some Inconvenient Truths about California Squid Marketing

Greenberg missed the boat on a number of issues, including the overall carbon footprint of seafood, but equally important, the reasons why most of the squid that California exports is consumed overseas!

Read the original Paul Greenberg op-ed in the Los Angeles Times

August 5, 2014 (SeafoodNews.com) — The following opinion piece appeared today on SeafoodNews.com:

In his op-ed to the Los Angeles Times last week, author Paul Greenberg could have dodged some critical misstatements and inaccuracies about the marketing of California squid – the state’s largest catch.

All he had to do was check with local sources, including the California Wetfish Producers Association, which represents the majority of squid processors and fishermen in the Golden State and promotes California squid.

Instead, Greenberg missed the boat on a number of issues, including the overall carbon footprint of seafood, but equally important, the reasons why most of the squid that California exports is consumed overseas!

To set the record straight, here are some inconvenient truths you wouldn’t know about squid by reading last week’s op-ed:

First, size matters and price rules when it comes to California market squid, which are one of the smallest of more than 300 squid species found worldwide. The U.S. “local” market really prefers larger, “meatier” squid, notwithstanding Greenberg’s ‘locavore’ movement.

Greenberg acknowledged the labor cost to produce cleaned squid in California adds at least $1.50 per pound to the end product. In fact, local production costs double the price of cleaned squid, due to both labor (at least $15 per hour with benefits) and super-sized overhead costs, including workers’ comp, electricity, water and myriad other costs of doing business in the Golden State.

Del Mar Seafood is one processor in California that micro-processes cleaned squid at the request of markets like the CSA that Greenberg mentioned. In fact, virtually all California squid processors do the same thing at the request of their customers. But at 1,000 pounds per order, we would need 236,000 CSAs, restaurants or retail markets paying $1.50 more per pound to account for the total harvest. If the demand were there, we’d be filling it!

Greenberg also misconstrued the issue of food miles. Respected researchers like Dr. Peter Tyedmers, from Dalhousie University in Canada, found that transport makes a minor contribution to overall greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, when considering the carbon footprint of seafood (or land-based foods). Mode of production is far more important.

Here’s another surprise: California squid is one of the most efficient fisheries in the world – because a limited fleet harvests a lot of squid within a short distance of processing plants.

Studies show that the California wetfish fleet, including squid, can produce 2,000 pounds of protein for only 6 gallons of diesel. Squid are then flash frozen to preserve freshness and quality. Keep in mind that even with immaculate handling, fresh squid spoil in a few days.

As counterintuitive as it may seem, even with product block-frozen and ocean-shipped to Asia for processing, California’s squid fishery is one of the ‘greenest’ in the world. One recent survey estimated that about 30 percent of California squid is now either processed here or transshipped to Asia for processing (other Asian countries besides China now do the work) and re-imported.

China, although important, is only one export market that craves California squid. With a growing middle class billions strong, Chinese consumers can now afford California squid themselves. Many countries that import California squid prefer the smaller size, and California squid goes to Mediterranean countries as well. In short, most of the squid that California’s fishery exports are consumed overseas. Why? The U.S. palate for squid pales in comparison to Asian and European demand.

Also important to understand: California squid is the economic driver of California’s wetfish industry – which produces more than 80 percent of the total seafood volume landed in the Golden State. California squid exports also represent close to 70 percent by weight and 44 percent of value of all California seafood exports. Our squid fishery contributes heavily to the Golden State’s fishing economy and also helps to offset a growing seafood trade imbalance.

The sad reality is that price really does matter and most California restaurants and retail markets are not willing to pay double for the same – or similar – small squid that they can purchase for half the price.

Nonetheless, we do appreciate Greenberg’s pitch for local seafood. Our local industry would be delighted if, as he suggested, all Californians would be willing to pay $1.50 a pound more for California squid. We may be biased, but in our opinion California squid really is the best!

D.B. Pleschner is Executive Director of the California Wetfish Producers Association, a nonprofit designed to promote sustainable wetfish resources.

Paul Greenberg misses the boat in his push for local California squid; fails to understand market

Opening weekend at San Diego’s Tuna Harbor outdoor fish market draws larger than expected crowd

SEAFOODNEWS.COM [US San Diego] by Bradley J. Fikes – August 4, 2014

With the help of hundreds of San Diegans who waited patiently Saturday morning, San Diego’s once-dominant seafood industry opened a new chapter.

On a long-unused pier just north of Seaport Village, Tuna Harbor Dockside Market opened at 8 a.m, providing an open-air seafood market that carries overtones of Pike’s Market in Seattle or Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. The Port of San Diego and the county worked with local fishers to get the market legally certified and launched in just a couple of weeks.

Working under overcast skies, fishers directly unloaded the catch, including yellowfin, bluefin, black cod, sea urchin, octopus and rock, razor and box crab, from boats to stands. Whole fish as well as fillets were spread out on ice. Live crabs and sea urchins were kept in tanks.

The market is set to operate each Saturday, from 8 a.m. until the seafood sells out.

While the market is a novelty in 21st-century San Diego, buying fresh fish from those who caught it was part of life for the early- to mid-20th century residents. The city’s large fishing fleet would pull up to the Embarcadero, where locals could take their pick of fresh-caught seafood.

At that time, San Diego was known as the “Tuna Capital” of the world. The market moved around during those decades, from Broadway to what is now Seaport Village, and to where Chesapeake Fish Co. is now.

But increasing competition from other countries hollowed out the fishing fleet, causing the loss of many jobs locally.

Saturday’s launch showed today’s San Diegans what they’d been missing out on.

People reportedly began lining up around 6 a.m. By 9 a.m., the line had surpassed 220 people, some carrying or wheeling large coolers to haul away their catch. Around 10:30 the crowd was told the supply was beginning to run out.

Sea urchin was on the mind of one of the cooler-wheeling shoppers, Kristine Ortiguerra of San Diego. The market provides a great addition to the region, Ortiguerra said while waiting toward the back of the line.

“We’d like for this to be routine,” Ortiguerra said. “My parents would drive up to San Pedro for fresh seafood. Hopefully, that is what it’s going to be like.”

Near the front, Michelle Ashbaugh, also of San Diego, said she had been waiting in line for about two hours, starting a little after 7 a.m. Ashbaugh and her friend, Staci Marshall, were looking for crab and yellowtail.

Marshall said the market’s seafood had two advantages.

“It’s fresh, and you don’t have to pay the overhead,” Marshall said.

Bluefin listed for $8 a pound; rock crab for $2.50 a pound; sea urchin at $5 a pound; and sheepshead, famous or infamous for having human-like teeth, for $7 a pound.
The names of the boats each fish came from were displayed with the prices.

Sellers indicated their surprise at the unexpectedly large turnout.

“The crowd’s a lot larger than we had anticipated. This is better than anybody could have asked for on the first day,” said Dwight Colton, vice president of operations for Fish Market Restaurants.

“The goal is to make Saturday mornings at the dockside market the place to go for seafood here in San Diego,” Colton said. “On Saturday mornings, go here, then off to a farmer’s market.”

Availability of whole fish distinguishes the dockside market from other outlets, Colton said.

“Local albacore, rock fish — you can buy them whole,” Colton said. “You can’t get that in any of the markets.”

Live sea urchins, known as uni in sushi-speak, also distinguish the market. The savory echinoderms are available at sushi restaurants in limited quantities at irregular intervals.

The market is intended to operate year-round if there’s sufficient demand, Colton said.

“We’re working with the port, we’re working with the local fishermen to establish what everybody can bring each week,” he said. “A lot depends on what comes out of the ocean. Summertime is a peak season for varieties of seafood. But there’s a steady flow of fresh seafood coming out of our local waters throughout the year.”

The market is meant not only to stimulate the local fishing industry, but to provide fresh and healthy food for the county’s residents. It’s also an example of cooperation between local fishers, said the County of San Diego and the Port District, which owns the pier.

County Supervisor Greg Cox credited the county’s Department of Environment Health for cutting red tape to get the market certified and opened in less than two weeks, along with the Port of San Diego, and the fishers for making the market possible. Local fishermen Zack Roach Jr. and Luke Halmay were leaders in organizing the market.

Cox, whose district includes the pier, said at a brief ceremony that the new market marks a revival of fortunes for the local fishing fleet.

“This market is definitely going to help our local fishing industry and our ‘blue economy’ by allowing fisherman to sell the catch to you, the public, without any middlemen,” Cox said. “The market will also turn a quiet, unused pier, into a vibrant attraction for local residents and for tourists.”

The market also provides more healthy eating options, Cox said, consistent with the county’s “Live Well San Diego,” aimed at getting people to eat a more healthy diet, exercise more and not use tobacco products.

Port Chairman Bob Nelson told shoppers that the agency was “overwhelmed” at the response to the new market. He credited the San Diego Maritime Alliance and the California Coastal Conservancy with helping get the market off the ground.

Photo Credit: UT San Diego

Republished with permission from Seafoodnews.com. Read the original post here.

Farming The Bluefin Tuna, Tiger Of The Ocean, Is Not Without A Price

Dan Charles  |  July 30, 2014

Yonathan Zohar, Jorge Gomezjurado and Odi Zmora check on bluefin tuna larvae in tanks at the University of Maryland Baltimore County’s Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology. (Courtesy of Yonathan Zohar)

In a windowless laboratory in downtown Baltimore, some tiny, translucent fish larvae are swimming about in glass-walled tanks.

They are infant bluefin tuna. Scientists in this laboratory are trying to grasp what they call the holy grail of aquaculture: raising this powerful fish, so prized by sushi lovers, entirely in captivity. But the effort is fraught with challenges.

When I visited, I couldn’t see the larvae at first. They look incredibly fragile and helpless, just drifting in the tanks’ water currents. But they’re already gobbling up microscopic marine animals, which in turn are living on algae.

“It’s amazing. We cannot stop looking at them! We are here around the clock and we are looking at them, because it is so beautiful,” says Yonathan Zohar, the scientist in charge of this project.

It’s beautiful to Zohar because it’s so rare. Scientists are trying to raise bluefin tuna completely in captivity in only a few places around the world. Laboratories in Japan have led the effort. This experiment, at the University of Maryland Baltimore County’s Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology, is the first successful attempt in North America.

Scientists still have a long way to go to succeed. Most of the larvae have died, but hundreds have now survived for 10 days, “and we are counting every day,” says Zohar. “We want to be at 25 to 30 days. This is the bottleneck. The bottleneck is the first three to four weeks.”

If they make it that far, they’ll be juvenile fish and much more sturdy. Then, they’ll mainly need lots to eat.

Fully grown, the bluefin tuna is a tiger of the ocean: powerful and voracious, its flesh in high demand for sushi all around the world.

Journalist Paul Greenberg wrote about bluefin tuna in his book Four Fish. If you’re an angler, he says, catching one is an experience you don’t forget.

“When they come onboard, it’s like raw energy coming onto the boat. Their tail will [beat] like an outboard motor, just blazing with power and energy,” he says.

The fish can grow to 1,000 pounds. They can swim up to 45 miles per hour and cross entire oceans.

They’re also valuable. Demand for tuna has grown, especially in Japan, where people sometimes pay fantastic prices for the fish.

That demand has led to overfishing, and wild populations of tuna now are declining.

That’s why scientists like Zohar are trying to invent a new way to supply the world’s demand. They’re trying to invent bluefin tuna farming.

“The vision is to have huge tanks, land-based, in a facility like what you see here, having bluefin tuna that are spawning year-round, on demand, producing millions of eggs,” he says.

Those eggs would hatch and grow into a plentiful supply of tuna.

That brings us back to these precious larvae. Before there can be aquaculture, large quantities of these larvae have to survive. Here in the laboratory, the scientists are tinkering with lots of things — the lights above the tanks, the concentration of algae and water currents — to keep the fragile larvae from sinking toward the bottom of the tank.

“They tend to go down,” explains Zohar. “They have a heavy head. They go head down and tail up. If they hit their head on the bottom they are gone. They are not going to survive.”

Enough are surviving, at the moment, that Zohar thinks they’re getting close to overcoming this obstacle, too.

But that still leaves a final hurdle. The scientists will need to figure out how to satisfy the tuna’s amazing appetite without causing even more damage to the environment.

A tuna’s natural diet consists of other fish. Lots of other fish. Right now, there are tuna “ranches” that capture young tuna in the ocean and then fatten them up in big net-pens. According to Greenberg, those ranches feed their tuna about 15 pounds of fish such as sardines or mackerel for each additional pound of tuna that can be sold to consumers. That kind of tuna production is environmentally costly.

Zohar thinks that it will be possible to reduce this ratio or even create tuna feed that doesn’t rely heavily on other fish as an ingredient.

But Greenberg says the basic fact that they eat so much makes him wonder whether tuna farming is really the right way to go. It increases the population of a predator species that demands lots of food itself.

“Why would you domesticate a tiger when you could domesticate a cow,” he asks — or, even better, a chicken, which converts just 2 pounds of vegetarian feed into a pound of meat.

If farmed tuna really can reduce the demand for tuna caught in the wild, it would be worth doing. But it might do more good, he says, to eat a little lower on the marine food chain. We could eat more mussels or sardines. It would let more tuna roam free.

Read the original story here.

Climate data from air, land, sea and ice in 2013 reflect trends of a warming planet

Increases in temperature, sea level and CO₂ observed; Southern Hemisphere warmth and Super Typhoon Haiyan among year’s most notable events

July 17, 2014

In 2013, the vast majority of worldwide climate indicators—greenhouse gases, sea levels, global temperatures, etc.—continued to reflect trends of a warmer planet, according to the indicators assessed in the State of the Climate in 2013 report, released online today by the American Meteorological Society.

Scientists from NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., served as the lead editors of the report, which was compiled by 425 scientists from 57 countries around the world (highlights, visuals, full report). It provides a detailed update on global climate indicators, notable weather events, and other data collected by environmental monitoring stations and instruments on air, land, sea, and ice.

“These findings reinforce what scientists for decades have observed: that our planet is becoming a warmer place,” said NOAA Administrator Kathryn Sullivan, Ph.D. “This report provides the foundational information we need to develop tools and services for communities, business, and nations to prepare for, and build resilience to, the impacts of climate change.”

The report uses dozens of climate indicators to track patterns, changes, and trends of the global climate system, including greenhouse gases; temperatures throughout the atmosphere, ocean, and land; cloud cover; sea level; ocean salinity; sea ice extent; and snow cover. These indicators often reflect many thousands of measurements from multiple independent datasets. The report also details cases of unusual and extreme regional events, such as Super Typhoon Haiyan, which devastated portions of Southeast Asia in November 2013.

Highlights:

• Greenhouse gases continued to climb: Major greenhouse gas concentrations, including carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane and nitrous oxide, continued to rise during 2013, once again reaching historic high values. Atmospheric CO₂ concentrations increased by 2.8 ppm in 2013, reaching a global average of 395.3 ppm for the year. At the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii, the daily concentration of CO₂ exceeded 400 ppm on May 9 for the first time since measurements began at the site in 1958. This milestone follows observational sites in the Arctic that observed this CO₂ threshold of 400 ppm in spring 2012.
• Warm temperature trends continued near the Earth’s surface: Four major independent datasets show 2013 was among the warmest years on record, ranking between second and sixth depending upon the dataset used. In the Southern Hemisphere, Australia observed its warmest year on record, while Argentina had its second warmest and New Zealand its third warmest.
• Sea surface temperatures increased: Four independent datasets indicate that the globally averaged sea surface temperature for 2013 was among the 10 warmest on record. El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO)-neutral conditions in the eastern central Pacific Ocean and a negative Pacific decadal oscillation pattern in the North Pacific had the largest impacts on the global sea surface temperature during the year. The North Pacific was record warm for 2013.
• Sea level continued to rise: Global mean sea level continued to rise during 2013, on pace with a trend of 3.2 ± 0.4 mm per year over the past two decades.
• The Arctic continued to warm; sea ice extent remained low: The Arctic observed its seventh warmest year since records began in the early 20th century. Record high temperatures were measured at 20-meter depth at permafrost stations in Alaska. Arctic sea ice extent was the sixth lowest since satellite observations began in 1979. All seven lowest sea ice extents on record have occurred in the past seven years.
• Antarctic sea ice extent reached record high for second year in a row; South Pole station set record high temperature: The Antarctic maximum sea ice extent reached a record high of 7.56 million square miles on October 1. This is 0.7 percent higher than the previous record high extent of 7.51 million square miles that occurred in 2012 and 8.6 percent higher than the record low maximum sea ice extent of 6.96 million square miles that occurred in 1986. Near the end of the year, the South Pole had its highest annual temperature since records began in 1957.
• Tropical cyclones near average overall / Historic Super Typhoon: The number of tropical cyclones during 2013 was slightly above average, with a total of 94 storms, in comparison to the 1981-2010 average of 89. The North Atlantic Basin had its quietest season since 1994. However, in the Western North Pacific Basin, Super Typhoon Haiyan – the deadliest cyclone of 2013 – had the highest wind speed ever assigned to a tropical cyclone, with one-minute sustained winds estimated to be 196 miles per hour.

State of the Climate in 2013 is the 24th edition in a peer-reviewed series published annually as a special supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. The journal makes the full report openly available online.

“State of the Climate is vital to documenting the world’s climate,” said Dr. Keith Seitter, AMS Executive Director. “AMS members in all parts of the world contribute to this NOAA-led effort to give the public a detailed scientific snapshot of what’s happening in our world and builds on prior reports we’ve published.”

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in the Earth’s environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and to conserve and manage our coastal and marine resources. Join us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and our other social media channels.

Squid skin protein could improve biomedical technologies, UCI study shows

Conductivity could charge up futuristic disease treatments

What seafood guzzles the most gas?

CWPA note: California’s wetfish fisheries are the most efficient in the world (2,000 pounds of protein for 6 gallons of diesel).

Please download ‘Fishing Green‘ from our website californiawetfish.org — (under the Fast Facts link).

Some Inconvenient Truths about California Squid Marketing

Background:
On July 11 the Los Angeles Times carried an opinion editorial “The long journey of local seafood to your plate”, by author Paul Greenberg, who made a pitch for local seafood while lamenting the volume exported overseas.  Seafood News picked up the story, but with a twist.

Indeed, Greenberg could have dodged some critical misstatements, particularly about marketing California’s largest catch, market squid, if he had checked local sources, including the California Wetfish Producers Association, which represents the majority of squid processors and fishermen in the Golden State.  CWPA submitted the following op ed to the LA Times, to set the record straight.

First, here’s the story as it appeared in Seafood News:

Paul Greenberg makes case for locally caught fish while trashing global seafood supply chain

SEAFOODNEWS.COM [Los Angeles Times] by Paul Greenberg [Opinion]- July 11, 2014
Copyright 2014 The Los Angeles Times

Another glorious Golden State summer is upon us. San Joaquin Valley peaches are at their height and rolling in to farmers markets from Silver Lake to Mar Vista. Alice Waters’ foragers are plucking Napa zucchini blossoms for the chefs at Berkeley’s Chez Panisse. Barbecues in Sonoma are primed for grilling Niman Ranch grass-fed steaks.
 
And California squid are being caught, frozen, sent to China, unfrozen, processed, refrozen and sent back to the United States in giant 50,000-pound shipping containers.
 
That’s right: Every year, 90% of the 230 million pounds of California squid (by far the state’s largest seafood harvest) are sent on a 12,000-mile round-trip journey to processing plants in Asia and then sent back across the Pacific, sometimes to seaside restaurants situated alongside the very vessels that caught the squid in the first place.
 
Even as the locavore movement finds ever more inventive ways to reduce the distance between farm and table, the seafood industry is adding more and more food miles to your fish. And it’s not just squid. Overall a third of what is caught in American waters — about 3 billion pounds of seafood a year — is sold to foreigners. Some of those exports, such as California squid, wild Alaska salmon and tons and tons of Bering Sea pollock, make the round trip to Asia and back into our ports, twice frozen.
 
Why? To begin with, Americans want their seafood recipe-ready, and seafood distributors here don’t want to clean it. It’s messy, it takes time and, of course, it costs money. For many processors, the much lower labor costs in Asia make it less costly to pay for transporting squid to China and back than to clean it here.
 
Moreover, seafood processing plants are typically located close to the shore, which is exactly where well-heeled people like to build homes. Across the country, processing plants, oyster farms and canneries have been pushed out of their valuable shorefront locations by residents who didn’t want them next door. As a fisherman in Gloucester, Mass., told me recently: “Fish houses are getting turned into hotels all the time. But you never hear about a hotel getting turned into a fish house.”
 
So are we to let our seafood production infrastructure vanish entirely and watch dumbly as American fish and shellfish slip down the maw of the vast churning seafood machine of Asia? Moreover, do we really want to intermingle our food supply with the apparatus of China, a nation that is cruelly stingy with its labor force and that had such severe problems with food safety in 2007 that it executed the director of its food and drug administration for accepting bribes?
 
I would argue no.
 
And there are finally starting to be opportunities for keeping our seafood here — from net to table. In the last five years, dozens of community-supported fisheries, or CSFs, have been formed along U.S. coasts. Like community-supported agriculture co-ops, CSFs allow consumers to buy a share in the catch at the beginning of the season and receive regular allotments of guaranteed local seafood. CSFs help fishermen enormously by giving them start-up capital before they get out on the water. They also lock in a good price for fish that helps fishermen exit the ruthless price-crunching commodity market.
 
A few CSFs are even taking on squid. Alan Lovewell of Local Catch Monterey Bay CSF is collaborating with Del Mar Seafood of Watsonville to micro-process 1,000 pounds of squid for the Local Catch buying coop. This summer, for the first time, Local Catch members will get fully fresh (instead of double frozen) squid tubes and tentacles that make for fabulous grilling, stir-fries and Italian zuppa di pesce.
 
Yes, they’ll pay more for it. But if all Californians were to do it this way, economies of scale would prevail. It costs processors about $1.50 extra per pound to process squid here in America. Wouldn’t you be willing to pay that kind of premium to keep your squid fresh and out of China?
 
And even if you don’t have access to a CSF, there’s always the option of cleaning the squid yourself. Currently, the 10% of unprocessed squid that doesn’t go to China often gets used as bait. If you ask your fishmonger, you might be able to get some of that whole squid yourself. It’s really not that hard to clean it. And if you mess up the first time around, it’s not a big deal. Squid are actually incredibly cheap compared with most seafood, and it is high in omega-3s and minerals to boot.
 
The next time you fire up the backyard barbecue, consider buying a pound or two of California’s tentacled native seafood, getting out your knife and cutting board and experiencing squid as it’s meant to be eaten: fresh from the ocean and bursting with flavor.

***

And CWPA’s response:

Some Inconvenient Truths about California Squid Marketing
By D.B. Pleschner

In his op-ed to the Los Angeles Times last week, author Paul Greenberg could have dodged some critical misstatements and inaccuracies about the marketing of California squid – the state’s largest catch.

All he had to do was check with local sources, including the California Wetfish Producers Association, which represents the majority of squid processors and fishermen in the Golden State and promotes California squid.

Instead, Greenberg missed the boat on a number of issues, including the overall carbon footprint of seafood, but equally important, the reasons why most of the squid that California exports is consumed overseas!

To set the record straight, here are some inconvenient truths you wouldn’t know about squid by reading last week’s op-ed:

First, size matters and price rules when it comes to California market squid, which are one of the smallest of more than 300 squid species found worldwide. The U.S. “local” market really prefers larger, “meatier” squid, notwithstanding Greenberg’s ‘locavore’ movement.

Greenberg acknowledged the labor cost to produce cleaned squid in California adds at least $1.50 per pound to the end product. In fact, local production costs double the price of cleaned squid, due to both labor  (at least  $15 per hour with benefits) and super-sized overhead costs, including workers’ comp, electricity, water and myriad other costs of doing business in the Golden State.

Del Mar Seafood is one processor in California that micro-processes cleaned squid at the request of markets like the CSA that Greenberg mentioned. In fact, virtually all California squid processors do the same thing at the request of their customers. But at 1,000 pounds per order, we would need 236,000 CSAs, restaurants or retail markets paying $1.50 more per pound to account for the total harvest.  If the demand were there, we’d be filling it!

Greenberg also misconstrued the issue of food miles. Respected researchers like Dr. Peter Tyedmers, , from Dalhousie University in Canada, found that transport makes a minor contribution to overall greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, when considering the carbon footprint of seafood (or land-based foods). Mode of production is far more important.

Here’s another surprise:  California squid is one of the most efficient fisheries in the world – because a limited fleet harvests a lot of squid within a short distance of processing plants.

Studies show that the California wetfish fleet, including squid, can produce 2,000 pounds of protein for only 6 gallons of diesel. Squid are then flash frozen to preserve freshness and quality. Keep in mind that even with immaculate handling, fresh squid spoil in a few days.

As counterintuitive as it may seem, even with product block-frozen and ocean-shipped to Asia for processing, California’s squid fishery is one of the ‘greenest’ in the world. One recent survey estimated that about 30 percent of California squid is now either processed here or transshipped to Asia for processing (other Asian countries besides China now do the work) and re-imported.

China, although important, is only one export market that craves California squid.  With a growing middle class billions strong, Chinese consumers can now afford California squid themselves. Many countries that import California squid prefer the smaller size, and California squid goes to Mediterranean countries as well.  In short, most of the squid that California’s fishery exports is consumed overseas.  Why? The U.S. palate for squid pales in comparison to Asian and European demand.

Also important to understand: California squid is the economic driver of California’s wetfish industry – which produces more than 80 percent of the total seafood volume landed in the Golden State. California squid exports also represent close to 70 percent by weight and 44 percent of value of all California seafood exports. Our squid fishery contributes heavily to the Golden State’s fishing economy and also helps to offset a growing seafood trade imbalance.

The sad reality is that price really does matter and most California restaurants and retail markets are not willing to pay double for the same – or similar – small squid that they can purchase for half the price.

Nonetheless, we do appreciate Greenberg’s pitch for local seafood. Our local industry would be delighted if, as he suggested, all Californians would be willing to pay $1.50 a pound more for California squid.  We may be biased, but in our opinion California squid really is the best!

D.B. Pleschner is executive director of the California Wetfish Producers Association, a nonprofit dedicated to research and to promote sustainable wetfish resources.

More Big Whales in Ocean Could Mean More Fish, Scientists Find

New study reveals how scientists and fisheries managers underestimated the massive mammals.

The return of large whales—such as sperm (pictured), blue, right, and gray—could help ocean fish populations recover.

Photograph by Stephen Frink, Corbis

Brian Clark Howard
National Geographic
Published July 10, 2014

Scientists and fisheries managers have long underestimated the valuable role large whales play in healthy ocean ecosystems, a new study suggests. And, scientists add, those commercial fishermen who complain that whales steal fish from their nets have it wrong.

An increase in the number of large whales—like blue, sperm, right, and gray—around the world could lead to a healthier ocean and more fish, a team of scientists report in a review study published this month in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.

The underestimation occurred because “when oceanographic studies were started, large whales were largely absent from the ecosystem—because we had killed most of them,” says the study’s lead author, Joe Roman, a biologist at the University of Vermont in Burlington.

Large whales were heavily hunted until the 1970s. At that point an estimated 66 to 90 percent of the animals had been removed from ocean waters.

But since then, great whales have been slowly recovering. There are now more than a million sperm whales, and tens of thousands of gray whales.

Yet blue whales—the largest animal ever known to have lived on the planet—have been slower to rebound. In fact, they remain at about one percent of their historic range in the Southern Hemisphere. Roman says scientists think their absence may have altered the ecosystem in a way that made it harder for all life to survive there.

In recent years, as whale numbers have increased and technology has advanced—especially the ability to tag and track seafaring animals—we’ve begun to gain a better understanding of how important cetaceans are, says Roman.

“Whale Pumps and Conveyor Belts”

The scientists report that when whales feed, often at great depths, and then return to the surface to breathe, they mix up the water column. That spreads nutrients and microorganisms through different marine zones, which can lead to feeding bonanzas for other creatures. And the materials in whale urine and excrement, especially iron and nitrogen, serve as effective fertilizers for plankton.

Many great whales migrate long distances to mate, during which time they bring those nutrients with them. When they breed in far latitudes, they make important nutrient contributions to waters that are often poor in resources. Even their placentas can be rich sources of feedstocks for other organisms, says Roman, who calls whale migration a “conveyor belt” of nutrients around the ocean.

Whale deaths can be helpful too. When one of the massive mammals dies, its body sinks to the sea bottom, where it nourishes unique ecosystems of scavengers, from hagfishes to crabs to worms. Dozens of those scavenger species are found nowhere else, says Roman.

“Because [humans] took out so many whales, there were probably extinctions in the deep sea before we knew those [scavenger] species existed,” says Roman, who adds that he’s working on a new study to estimate how many of those scavenger species were lost.

Maddalena Bearzi, a marine biologist and president of the California-based Ocean Conservation Society who was not affiliated with the study, calls the paper “a great and interesting piece” that could help us better understand the role marine mammals play in the ocean ecosystem.

Fishers vs. Whales

For decades some commercial fishermen have complained that whales eat the fish that they’re trying to catch. Japan’s government has been particularly vocal, going as far as to say that whaling is necessary because “whales are threatening our fisheries.” (See “Japan’s Commercial Whaling Efforts Should Resume, Says Prime Minister.”)

Masayuki Komatsu, one of Japan’s international whaling negotiators, famously told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 2001 that “there are too many” minke whales, calling them “the cockroach of the ocean.”

Roman disagrees.

“It’s far more complicated than that,” he says, referring to the whale pump and the conveyor belt. “Our new review points to several studies that show you have more fish in an ecosystem by having these large predators there.”

The next step, he says, is to conduct more field studies on those processes. That could help scientists better understand exactly how plankton and other organisms respond to the presence of whales.

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