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News In Depth: Grouper Prices Rise
TAMPA -- Florida grouper is getting expensive and hard to find.
Diners, rattled by reports of fake grouper, are asking for the real thing just as Florida's aging grouper fleet struggles through a prolonged drought. So prices are soaring and restaurants are scrambling to adjust. Columbia Restaurant, a Tampa Bay area institution for more than a century, announced this week that it had removed grouper from the menu of its seven stores around the state because of inadequate supplies. On Friday, the Hurricane restaurant on Pass-a-Grille temporarily stopped serving the grouper sandwich that made it famous. The Gulf of Mexico's grouper catch is often cyclical and maddening. "We had the same problem five or six years ago," said Mark Twinam, owner of TW Wholesale, a Madeira Beach fish house. Last year, the St. Petersburg Times tested "grouper" dinners and sandwiches from 11 restaurants and found that six were other types of fish. The Florida attorney general's office investigated, with similar results. Five restaurants paid $2,500 fines and 12 others are under investigation for possible civil sanctions. No one knows for sure why the grouper catch is off. In 2006, federal regulators limited commercial trips to 6,000 pounds to protect red grouper. That hamstrung some heavy producers, but does not account for the dwindling supply. Ed Small, who fished grouper for 27 years, is rerigging his boat for porgies, a small, less desirable species in the snapper family. Last year, Small said, he caught about 1,200 pounds of grouper a day in January and February; that dropped to 375 this year. In one odd wrinkle of fishery management, a new regulation that targets red snapper fishing in Louisiana and Texas may be keeping grouper off restaurant tables in Florida. For the first time this year, commercial fishermen were assigned individual red snapper quotas, most of which went to eastern gulf snapper fishermen. Assured they can catch their snapper any time they want, eastern fishermen reportedly spent the early months of 2007 targeting yellowedge grouper, a deep-water species limited by a general, gulf-wide quota. Yellowedge traditionally are shipped to Canada, where diners have a taste for it. Florida restaurants mainly serve red grouper, which lives in shallow water. Through February, deep-water grouper landings ran 5 percent ahead of last year, while shallow-water red grouper landings had dropped almost 50 percent. – St. Petersburg Times News: Fish Fraud Found Throughout UK LONDON -- Shoppers have been misled about the quality of the fish they purchase at some of the best known shops in the country, including Harrods and Sainsbury's, the food standards watchdog reveals today.Up to 15% of fish labeled as wild and sold in shops across the country is actually farmed, according to research by the Food Standards Agency. Its study comes amid increasing consumer concern over the veracity of organic, regional and farm-quality food. Tests were carried out by the Government agency on sea bass, sea bream and salmon bought on the high street that can spot the discrepancies between wild and farmed fish. Of the 128 fish samples tested, 10% of the "wild" sea bass was farmed, rising to 11% of the sea bream and 15% of the salmon. Shoppers will have been left significantly out of pocket from the mislabeling, with wild salmon much more expensive than farmed. Sainsbury's was named by the FSA for labeling farmed salmon as "Wild Alaskan Salmon Fillet" at its store in Stroud, although the supermarket strongly denied the claim. A spokesman for Harrods said: "It appears that on the day the sample in question was purchased, human error may have been responsible for farmed and wild salmon being mixed up. Revised stock control measures have been implemented to avoid a recurrence of the problem."
- Telegraph, UK Legislative Brief: Arkansas Ban on Chinese Catfish LITTLE ROCK (AP) -U.S. Rep. Mike Ross, D-Ark., said Thursday that he's asked the FDA to ban imported Chinese fish being sold as catfish until an investigation is complete."Our food supply is critical to our national security and we must be confident we are importing the best and safest food sources for our families," Ross said. "To ensure the safety and health of all Americans, we must place an immediate, nationwide ban on these potentially contaminated fish and have them removed from our stores." Arkansas farming officials say they want the state health agency to test imported fish for banned antibiotics, which were found when Mississippi and Alabama recently tested catfish imported from several Asian countries. Ann Wright, a spokesperson for the Health Division of the state Department of Health and Human Services, said the agency was 'arranging ... to do testing in (Food and Drug Administration)-approved labs.' The Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce announced Tuesday it had ordered a halt to the sale of Chinese catfish in Mississippi grocery stores after tests found ciprofloxacin and enrofloxacin, members of the fluoroquinolones family of antibiotics, which are banned for use in the United States. The Alabama Department of Agriculture and Industries conducted similar tests and last week placed a stop-sale order on all catfish imported from China. – Associated Press News In Depth: Monkfish Regulation Frustrates Fishermen BARNEGAT LIGHT, New Jersey — Local commercial fishermen are frustrated by restrictions placed on monkfishing. Kevin Wark said he feels betrayed by the National Marine Fisheries Service and its 12-day period for monkfishing.At least last year commercial fisherman had the possibility of 10 carry-over days, or days unused the previous year, but that is not the case this year, Wark said. Monkfish has become more and more popular and is a fancy fish dish served in New York City, Wark said. A lot of the monkfish he catches is sold with the head on to countries such as Korea, he said. “People in Korea will eat the entire fish with no waste. They will pay a premium for this that no one in this country will pay for.” Once his nets are dropped offshore, Wark said, he is officially on the clock with the fisheries service. Those who are monkfishing are required to phone in to the fisheries service and are not off the clock until they reach the dock and phone in. Any time on the clock from three to 15 hours counts as 15 hours against the 12 days they are allowed. Anything more than 15 counts as what it is. Wark said he is frustrated because fishermen not only have trip and quantity limits but also time constraints. Throughout the years, the 1,500-pound trip limit has remained stable. “Years ago if you wanted to stay out there you could; you could do whatever you wanted to but now there's so many restrictions.” Wark is a member of the Mid-Atlantic and New England fisheries councils' advisory boards, and represents Barnegat Light. The councils, part of the fisheries service, began limiting monkfishing days in 1999 as part of a 10-year restocking agenda. Last year the fisheries service cut the time for monkfishing in 2006 from 40 to 12 days with 10 carry-over days. According to the fishery service Web site, additional days at sea may be available following an assessment of the monkfish stock in July. The cut in days at sea for fishermen is drastic and Rep. Jim Saxton, R-3rd, is disappointed with the new rule that is a burden on the local fishermen, he said. “We will be in touch with National Marine Fisheries Service and local fishermen this week. The rule itself is temporary pending the outcome of an assessment due in July. Depending on the outcome, we could be in a better place than we are now,” Saxton's office said. - The Press, Atlantic City Environmental News: Ship Seeds Seas With Iron A research ship is about to begin a project around the Galapagos Islands that will highlight the importance of marine plankton in the fight against global warming and climate change.Waterbird II, the research ship of an eco-restoration organization called Planktos, is on a "voyage of recovery" to "seed" the oceans with the iron in the hope of stimulating blooms of phytoplankton, the microscopic marine plants that soak up the energy of the sun to convert carbon dioxide into organic matter. The organizers of the venture hope to shine a spotlight on the critical role that plankton plays in maintaining the carbon dioxide balance of the oceans and the atmosphere with the help of several tons of iron dust. Scientists have long postulated that it may be possible to speed up the rate at which the oceans soak up atmospheric CO2 by stimulating the growth of plankton in the oceans with added iron - an essential nutrient for photosynthesis. The research ship has a crew of 17, including eight scientists, and is scheduled to sail to the Galapagos, Tahiti, the coast of South America, and the South Pacific. Noel Brown, a former director of the United Nations Environment Program, said that the pilot project to fertilize the oceans with iron filings is important in terms of raising awareness of the huge potential the oceans have in mitigating rising levels of atmospheric CO2. Normally plankton forms vast blooms at certain times of the year that can be seen from space. But this occurs only under certain conditions, such as adequate mineral availability - iron is often the limiting factor. The iron hypothesis was created by John Martin, an oceanographer at the Moss Landing Marine Laboratory in California, who died before his idea could be properly tested. A number of small-scale trials tested Martin's idea but it soon emerged that zooplankton multiplied as quickly as the phytoplankton, with the result that the animals quickly ate the organic material formed as a result of adding the iron. Nevertheless, the Planktos team believe that the Waterbird II mission will raise greater awareness of what the oceans can do in mitigating the effects of climate change. – The Independent, UK News Brief: Stop & Shop Ditches Seafood Deli Service PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Supermarket chain Stop & Shop is switching to self-service seafood sales in some of its 390 stores to manage costs at a time of high prices, a company representative says.The Quincy, Mass., chain last month began replacing its ice-laden display cases in some stores with refrigerators and freezers stocked with prepackaged fish. Dutch conglomerate Royal Ahold, which owns Stop & Shop, is making the same changes at its Giant store chain in the Chesapeake Bay region. “This is a business decision to control these costs,” said Robert Keane, a Stop & Shop spokesman. “The fish is just as fresh as before.” Fresh-seafood prices remain high after the end of Lent, when prices traditionally fall. Lobster hit a new high, for instance, selling for as much as $17 per pound at retail recently. Freshly caught cod cost hit $11.99 per pound, and winter flounder is $12.99 at retail. Supermarket chains around the country are taking diverging paths as they deal with such cost pressures and the inroads made by discount chains, drugstores and other retailers. – Providence Journal News: Klamath Tribes Say Buffett Missed the Point OMAHA – Members of California’s three largest Indian Tribes and allies from commercial fishing and conservation groups demonstrated today at the Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting, known as the Woodstock of capitalism.The group is demanding the removal of four Klamath Dams owned by Berkshire subsidiary PacifiCorp. Two members of the coalition asked questions directly to Buffett and his partner Charles Munger before a crowd of 27,000 shareholders. Ronnie Pellegrini explained to Buffett that her family lost 95% of its income last year because her husband is a salmon fisherman. Salmon fishing was banned along 700 miles of California and Oregon coastline last year due to low runs of Klamath salmon. Buffett’s dams are blamed for the declines of salmon. Wendy George, council member of the Hoopa Valley Tribe stated, "my people are river people, our entire culture, religion and subsistence is based on the river.” George appealed to Buffett to meet with the Tribes in order to find a solution to the problem. Buffett read from a statement, saying that regulators such as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would decide the issue. Buffett declined to acknowledge that the Tribes are seeking a negotiated settlement with the company as is common in dam relicensing proceedings. Buffett remarked to the crowd that “27 parties are involved in dam negotiations and there are 27 opinions.” Leaf Hillman of the Karuk Tribe said “there are actually 28 parties, but there are only two opinions about dam removal, PacifiCorp’s and everyone else's. Everyone else includes Tribes, conservation groups, counties, farmers, and governments. We have a real chance to end the Klamath crisis in a way that saves Berskshire money, yet PacifiCorp refuses to work with us in good faith.” The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission as well as the California Energy Commission have reported that dam removal is cheaper than relicensing even if the energy lost is replaced by other carbon neutral energy sources. Even the fiscally conservative Forbes Magazine opined that, “it would have been more heroic [of Buffett] to agree to meet with the people affected and to put his weight behind a fair and proper solution.” – Press release Brief: Crab Boat Resurrected as Tourist Attraction UNALASKA, Alaska -- A crab boat that spent nearly four decades in the Bering Sea will begin a second life as a tourist attraction in Ketchikan later this month.For a fee, visitors to the Southeastern port can get a tour of the fishing vessel Sea Star, which appeared on the first season of the Discovery Channel's Deadliest Catch before the boat was retired following crab rationalization in 2005. "The show is very popular--we get quite a few people coming down to the docks here in Seattle wanting to see a crab boat," said Sea Star owner Larry Hendricks, a retired crab fisherman who now works as a consultant for Deadliest Catch. Sea Star Tours is a joint project between Hendricks and Gary Stewart, the captain of the retired vessel Polar Lady, which also appeared on the first season of Deadliest Catch. Many of the series' current stars, including the captains of the Northwestern, the Cornelia Marie and the Maverick, are investors in the business, and Hendricks said they'll occasionally drop in on the Sea Star tours to talk with their fans. "They'll be working their regular vessels also, but we'll be flying them up to Ketchikan to make guest appearances," he said. The Sea Star venture is the latest example of how the success of Deadliest Catch has reverberated throughout the Alaskan crab business. The Aleutian Ballad, a crab boat on the current season of the show, is also running a tourism operation out of Ketchikan. Both the Northwestern and the Cornelia Marie now offer merchandise for sale on their websites. The Sea Star is in Seattle now, but Hendricks hopes to sail it up to Ketchikan by May 20. - KIAL News: Banned Bottomfish Removed from Menus HONOLULU — The owners of at least nine island restaurants have removed the bottomfish currently banned from being taken from Hawaiian waters from their menus, choosing not to pursue the species elsewhere in the Pacific Ocean.TS Restaurants, which owns Duke's Waikiki and six other island establishments, and Hawaii chef Peter Merriman, who owns two Big Island eateries, have taken the tasty and popular fish off their rotating menus to protect the sustainability of the overfished species, said Richard Moon, TS Restaurants' vice president. "We want to help decrease the year-round demand for these slow growing fish," Moon said. "We don't want to just shift demand to other areas. We think our customers will realize this is the right thing to do." The state Department of Land and Natural Resources banned commercial and recreational fishing from May through September for onaga, 'ehu, gindai, 'opakapaka, kalekale, lehi and hapu'upu'u found in the main Hawaiian islands. The state and the Western Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Council were alerted by the National Marine Fisheries Service in May 2005 that overfishing of the bottomfish species complex was occurring in the main Hawaiian islands. The state chose the summer to implement the ban because fishermen are often focusing on other species and these bottomfish are less popular during this period, said Alton Miyasaka, a state aquatic biologist. A similar closure is expected to be needed for the summer of 2008, officials have said. About 612,000 pounds of bottomfish were fished in the Northwestern and main Hawaiian islands in 2004. A majority of the catch was made in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands by a small group of fishing boats. – Honolulu Advertiser News In Depth: Sea Ice Melting Fast ANCHORAGE -- Imagine three-fourths of the land mass of Alaska disappearing in a decade. That's roughly the amount of sea ice that has vanished from the Arctic ice cap in recent years -- and now it's melting faster.So say two new reports from ice experts last week that climate-change scientists consider troubling, since sea ice keeps the Earth cool. An ice-free ocean warms it up. One report noted there was less Arctic sea ice in April than had ever been recorded that month since satellite imagery of the northern ocean began in 1979. Another found that the melting of the Arctic ice cap is proceeding faster than anyone expected. That second finding -- announced jointly by scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center and the National Center for Atmospheric Research -- concludes that all the summer Arctic sea ice should disappear "about 30 years" sooner than mainstream climate models earlier predicted. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, widely regarded as the gold standard for such projections, had estimated that summer sea ice in the Arctic probably declined at a rate of 2.5 percent a decade from 1953 to 2006. At that rate, the IPCC said, the summer ice cap would disappear sometime between 2050 and next century. But newly available data, "blending early aircraft and ship reports with more recent satellite measurements," show that the September ice actually declined at a rate of about 7.8 percent per decade from 1953 to 2006, the ice data center reported. That means the summer ice cap could disappear earlier than 2050. If it does, scientists say, the Earth will begin warming much more rapidly -- as the Arctic Ocean begins to soak up all of the sun's rays without the protective shield of the ice cap to bounce them back into space. But the reduction of the Arctic ice cap isn't always apparent from a vantage point in Alaska, scientists note. Late last summer, as the ice retreated drastically from the north coast of Siberia, prevailing winds and sea currents pushed old, multiyear pack ice close to Alaska's northern shore. Right now, however, the forecast is for western Alaska and North Slope communities to enjoy a relatively early summer, with ice-free shipping lanes opening up a couple weeks earlier than last year, National Weather Service ice forecaster Kathleen Cole said Friday. "We have some good open areas this year already near the eastern Russian coast and Norton Sound," Cole said. "Things will open up faster than they did last year -- and that's mostly due to the lack of multiyear sea ice in the Bering." In the short term, at least, that's good news for northern Alaskans. A longer ice-free season means barges can reach Kotzebue and Barrow earlier and later in the summer, thus eliminating the high cost of receiving food and supplies by air that much longer. – Anchorage Daily News Brief: Beard Foundations Names the Best NEW YORK -- The 2007 James Beard Foundation Awards Ceremony and Gala Reception was held at Avery Fisher Hall in Lincoln Center. Hosted by CBS Early Show anchor Hannah Storm, the Beard Awards glittered with designer-clad television celebrities and stars of the food world.And as you'd expect from any event produced by the preeminent nonprofit culinary organization, especially at its 20th anniversary celebration, the food was also dressed to the nines. More than 60 awards were presented, and more than 1,600 industry leaders attended the ceremony, which was followed by a reception dedicated to "Celebrating the Art of American Food," featuring an esteemed group of past Rising Star Chef award winners and nominees. Highlights of award winners include: Chicago's Frontera Grill named Outstanding Restaurant of the Year; Michel Richard (Michel Richard Citronelle, Washington D.C.) received the Outstanding Chef Award; New York's L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon named Best New Restaurant; Thomas Keller (The French Laundry, Yountville, Calif.) received the award for Outstanding Restaurateur; and David Chang (Momofuku Noodle Bar, New York) received the Rising Star Chef of the Year award. Established in 1990, the James Beard Foundation Awards – named after an Oregon boy who rose to prominence in New York – recognizes outstanding achievement within the fine food and beverage industry in North America. – PR NewsWire Quick Hits Overfishing in China: BEIJING – An oversupply of fishermen and fishing boats and over-exploitation of fishery resources are characteristic of China.At present, fishermen in the country adopt extensive and pirate fishing methods and have few choices for fishing nets, said Li Jianhua, director of the Fishing Bureau of the Ministry of Agriculture. Thus, fishing nets such as bottom trawl and trammel nets are still playing a leading role in many areas and the operation of illegally manufactured fishing boats is also prevalent in some areas. Illegal fishing is widespread and some illegal fishing methods such as electricity fishing are still used, which seriously damage fishery resources and water environment. Warming Chasing Lobster: PRETORIA, South Africa -- Global warming is a cold reality for unemployed West Coast fishermen, out of work because the fish they used to catch have migrated south, Parliament's environmental affairs portfolio committee heard. Speaking at the start of public hearings on transformation in South Africa's multi-billion rand fishing industry, environmental affairs deputy director-general Monde Mayekiso said there were indications a big drop in the region's fish stocks was due to climate change. Chefs Call for Cleaner Rivers: A national campaign to save wild salmon has been launched, as about 200 chefs from restaurants in 33 states call on Congress to pass laws to restore river habitats and tear down the massive hydroelectric dams that have decimated salmon species along the Pacific coast. The initiative, led by celebrity chef Alice Waters of Berkeley's Chez Panisse, follows last year's federal shutdown of 88% of the commercial salmon fishing along 700 miles of coastline in California and Oregon. Even More Fish Fraud: SAINSBURY, England – One in ten fish on sale in shops, including Sainsbury's, was incorrectly labelled as "wild" according to tests by the Food Standards Agency (FSA). The survey also found 15% of retailers provided shoppers with no information - or incorrect details - about the origin of their fish. Brief: Sen. Kerry Introduces Bristol Bay Bill WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., has introduced the Bristol Bay Protection Act, which would permanently prohibit oil and gas drilling in seafood-blessed Bristol Bay.The bill is the Senate companion to a similar bill previously filed in the House. The Bush administration last month said the government intends to hold an oil and gas lease sale in the bay in 2011. “This administration looks at every unspoiled landscape in America and wonders how much oil is buried beneath it. We can’t sell off Alaska’s coastline to the big oil companies,” Kerry said. – Wesley Loy, who writes for the Anchorage Daily News and Pacific Fishing News in Depth: Puget Sound Sockeye Officially ‘Threatened’ SEATTLE – The steelhead trout that still return to Puget Sound-area rivers are a dim reflection of the returns seen a just a decade ago.On Monday, the federal government decided it is time for serious changes to prevent Puget Sound steelhead from disappearing altogether. The National Marine Fisheries Service listed the fish as "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act. The "threatened" listing is not as severe as the agency's strongest protection, "endangered" but it still provides substantial protections for the fish, spokesman Brian Gorman said. "In terms of their present condition, they were in perilous shape, but it also means that they are now afforded some very serious federal protections," he said. "Other federal agencies (now) need to come to us for permission to do anything that might affect these fish." That combined with the state's $8 billion Puget Sound cleanup initiative bodes well for steelhead recovery, Gorman said. Though conditions may change for the fish, which biologists say are in decline because of habitat degradation, dams and culverts, unfavorable ocean conditions and harmful hatchery practices, little -- including sport-fishing opportunities -- is likely to change for people around Puget Sound. Many of the restrictions on shoreline development and land use are already in place because of existing chinook and chum salmon protections. A species categorized as "endangered" is in danger of extinction. One listed as "threatened" is likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future. The listing covers naturally spawned steelhead from river basins near Puget Sound, Hood Canal and the eastern half of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It also covers two winter-run hatchery stocks: the Green River natural and Hamma Hamma River. The Wild Steelhead Coalition said the listing was an important step in protecting the region's depleted wild steelhead populations. The group described the fish as an "extraordinary trout species (that) is born in Washington's rivers and streams, then migrates to the ocean, traveling as far as the Russia coast, to feed and grow to as large as 30 pounds before returning to their native Puget Sound-area rivers to spawn. – Seattle Post-Intelligencer Analysis: The Battle over the Klamath continues TULE LAKE, CALIF. — Under the rolling cloudscape of the Klamath Basin, agriculture fields have elbowed onto what once were marshes and shallow inland seas, shrinking the basin's wetlands by nearly 80%. Environmentalists have long fought to stop that farming, saying the refuges belong to the birds.But now, activists say, farmers in the Klamath Basin appear poised to cement their presence on the refuges, the basin's most productive farmland. Farmers are gaining an edge in closed-door settlement talks over the fate of four dams on the Klamath River, which meanders across two states before pouring into the Pacific Ocean north of Eureka, Calif. Environmentalists universally support dam removal, which would let endangered salmon reach upriver spawning grounds blocked for nearly a century. Activists with a pair of Oregon-based groups, however, fear that a looming compromise backed by the Bush administration will come at an unacceptable cost: an agreement to forever allow farming in the refuges. The 23-page settlement proposes up to $250 million to ease soaring electricity costs for irrigation pumps and possibly finance a renewable energy plant. Farmers and other big landowners could also be shielded from endangered-species restrictions invoked to revive imperiled fish species: the salmon, two types of suckerfish in Upper Klamath Lake and the bull trout, which is found in upstream tributaries. "The Bush administration has hijacked these talks about dam removal to advance unrelated policy goals bad for the environment and bad in the long term for the Klamath Basin," said Steve Pedery of Oregon Wild, a Portland nonprofit. At this point, that resolute stand is a lonely one. Other participants in the talks, including several national environmental groups, say it's too early to go to the mat over a deal that's anything but done. The administration's top negotiator declined to discuss details but rejected any notion of pressure from Washington. "I've had a free rein to do whatever I felt was right," said Steve Thompson, California-Nevada manager for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. "I haven't felt any pressures, other than that Klamath is controversial from all sides." Forging a consensus on the Klamath has proved extraordinarily complicated. Compromises, experts say, will be inevitable for the proposal to get federal and state support. "It's a huge stretch to imagine that commercial agriculture is benefiting wildlife populations in the long run," said Nancy Langston, a University of Wisconsin environmental studies professor who has studied the Klamath crisis. "But getting buy-in from as many people in the basin as possible is critical in the long run." After more than two years of discussions, 26 of the 28 groups — U.S. water and wildlife agencies, the states of California and Oregon, fishermen, four tribes and an array of environmental groups — have agreed to push forward to settle details in the agreement. – Los Angeles Times Editorial: Senator Wants End to Fishery Subsidies WASHINGTON -- The world's vast, blue oceans are among nature's most valuable assets, especially here in our state, which boasts a valuable commercial and recreational fishing industry. The resources that sustain Maine's fishing industry are fragile and must be protected.Our fishermen recognize the importance of fishery regulations that ensure a balance between protecting fish populations and allowing today's fishermen to sustain their livelihoods. However, fishermen from other nations, who chase the same fish, operate under more lenient regulatory regimes and often with the benefit of direct financial subsidies from their governments. This week, I co-sponsored a resolution in the Senate condemning foreign fisheries subsidies and the unsustainable fishing practices they encourage. Today, we face a global crisis in the world's fisheries. The United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that one-quarter of global fish stocks are overexploited, depleted or recovering from over-exploitation. These species include tuna, swordfish, shark and marlin. Meanwhile, foreign governments subsidize their fishing fleets, directly funding increased production in their fishing industries. This process can be harmful enough when the subsidies are directed at domestic fisheries within those countries, but it becomes even more problematic when fishermen use the financial backing to pursue species in international waters — species that U.S. fishermen are also chasing without the benefit of government handouts. The United States has developed a fisheries management regime, under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation Management Act and other statutes, that promotes sustainable fisheries management, ensuring that our living marine resources are managed to benefit the fishermen of today as well as future generations. Our fisheries regulations extend beyond the boundaries of our Exclusive Economic Zone to encompass activities of U.S. flagged fishing vessels on the high seas. But even where these international bodies do exist, if foreign countries are not members, they are not bound by the regulations of that organization. And many of the countries that engage in illegal, unreported, or unregulated fishing activities are the same countries that use government subsidies to super-size their fleets. It is clear that the United States needs to act as a strong voice in global fishing policy, and it is crucial that we do all we can to eliminate destructive foreign fishing subsidies. – U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) writing in Seacoastonline, N.H. News: Green Group Slams European Tuna Catch BRUSSELS, Belgium — Environmental group WWF slammed EU nations Tuesday over their failure to cut back Mediterranean catches of bluefin tuna, warning that stocks were facing collapse due to overfishing.The group called for an immediate closure of the bluefin tuna fishery in Europe. EU fisheries ministers failed Monday to agree on plans by EU Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg to introduce slimmed-down catch quotas. Bluefin tuna has become a much sought after delicacy in Japan and elsewhere, and has been heavily fished to meet demand. Over the past 30 years, Atlantic bluefin tuna stocks have dropped by 80%, and the global tuna export market in 2002 was worth $5 billion, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. Scientists have called for catch quotas to be halved, but because of commercial pressures nations fishing the Mediterranean have failed to respond. Officials said France, Spain and Italy managed to block reduced quotas, forcing a delay on the issue until June. Aaron McLoughlin, from the World Wildlife Fund, or WWF, said the "only option" now open to the 27-nation bloc was to suspend the tuna fisheries. "It is shocking that, in the face of scientific evidence, the EU has failed yet again to impose vital measures to save bluefin tuna in the Mediterranean," McLoughlin said. Britain's Fisheries Minister Ben Bradshaw said the EU's failure to act to save tuna, and also eel stocks, was damaging the EU's environmental image abroad. The WWF said EU nations were likely to fill its provisional bluefin catch quotas within the coming weeks after this year's fishing season started in the Mediterranean on May 1. After filling the yearly quotas, the European Commission is obliged under EU rules to shut down the fishery and ensure it is respected. – Houston Chronicle News in Depth: Puget Sound Steelhead to Get Protection SEATTLE – The steelhead trout that still return to Puget Sound-area rivers are a dim reflection of the returns seen a just a decade ago.On Monday, the federal government decided it is time for serious changes to prevent Puget Sound steelhead from disappearing altogether. The National Marine Fisheries Service listed the fish as "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act. The "threatened" listing is not as severe as the agency's strongest protection, "endangered" but it still provides substantial protections for the fish, spokesman Brian Gorman said. "In terms of their present condition, they were in perilous shape, but it also means that they are now afforded some very serious federal protections," he said. "Other federal agencies (now) need to come to us for permission to do anything that might affect these fish." That combined with the state's $8 billion Puget Sound cleanup initiative bodes well for steelhead recovery, Gorman said. Though conditions may change for the fish, which biologists say are in decline because of habitat degradation, dams and culverts, unfavorable ocean conditions and harmful hatchery practices, little -- including sport-fishing opportunities -- is likely to change for people around Puget Sound. Many of the restrictions on shoreline development and land use are already in place because of existing chinook and chum salmon protections. A species categorized as "endangered" is in danger of extinction. One listed as "threatened" is likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future. The listing covers naturally spawned steelhead from river basins near Puget Sound, Hood Canal and the eastern half of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It also covers two winter-run hatchery stocks: the Green River natural and Hamma Hamma River. The Wild Steelhead Coalition said the listing was an important step in protecting the region's depleted wild steelhead populations. The group described the fish as an "extraordinary trout species (that) is born in Washington's rivers and streams, then migrates to the ocean, traveling as far as the Russia coast, to feed and grow to as large as 30 pounds before returning to their native Puget Sound-area rivers to spawn. – Seattle Post-Intelligencer News: Locals Say Abalone Poaching Sentence Too Lenient PRINCE RUPERT, B.C. – Last month in Prince Rupert three poachers caught with 11,000 live abalone crammed into the back of their pickup truck were sentenced.It was the biggest bust of its kind in B.C.’s history, but did the punishment suit the crime? Some people in the poachers' hometown of Skidegate on Haida Gwaii say it wasn't nearly severe enough. An as-yet unpublished DFO report speculates that Northern abalone, once a $1 million a year industry in B.C., will be extinct in coastal waters within 50 years. Harvesting abalone has been illegal since 1990, when Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) put a total ban in place on stocks that reached near crash during commercial fishing heyday of the 1970s and 1980s. Stan and Dan McNeil and Randal Graf, were each charged with three counts, two under the federal Fisheries Act and one under the relatively new Species at Risk Act, a hallowed piece of legislation which claims to offer protection to threatened and endangered aquatic species. When the day of reckoning arrived, Stan McNeil was fined $20,000 and given a 12-month conditional sentence, six months of which could be served under house arrest. The other two were fined $10,000 each and given four months conditional sentence, with three months served under house arrest. All three men are prohibited from diving (that's how abalone are harvested), Stan for five years and the other two for two years each. Stan lost his boat (worth an estimated $150,000), his truck and his dive gear. Judson Brown is one of the locals surprised by what he considers a light sentence. He notes that Stan McNeil may have lost his boat and some gear, but he didn't entirely lose his ability to make a living. Brown wonders what happened to the man's commercial fishing licenses, potentially worth millions. Brown says if this was the case that was supposed to serve as a deterrent for future poachers, he doesn't think the judge went far enough. "Judges don't view resource protection in the same light as a bank robbery or an assault," he says. – The Tyee community newspaper News Roundup: Tainted Additives Reach Fish Farms The investigation into charges that tainted protein products from China have killed household pets and entered the human food chain through pork and beef has broadened to include feed used by fish farmers.Here is a digest of some of the articles in the world press concerning the matter: The Washington Post: “American Fish may be laced with melamine” WASHINGTON -- The tainted Chinese ingredient that was incorporated into U.S. pet food and later made its way into chicken and pig feed was neither wheat gluten nor rice protein as advertised, but was seriously contaminated wheat flour, government investigators said. The finding adds a new layer of fraud to an already seamy tale of international deception. Moreover, officials said, some of that contaminated flour, mislabeled as gluten, was mixed into fish food in Canada and exported to the United States, where it was fed to fish raised for human consumption. Accordingly, some American fish may be laced with melamine, the industrial toxin whose spread has revealed in startling detail the many ways in which the food chains for pets, farm animals and humans are internationally intertwined. "It shows the degree to which, with the globalization of agriculture, things that go wrong in one country can affect many of us who never thought we'd be touched," said Rebecca J. Goldburg, a biologist with advocacy group Environmental Defense. "Americans now need passports to travel just about anywhere, including Canada. It appears that food and even animal feed traveling from country to country should receive similar scrutiny." "Our food-safety system is broken," said Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn.), who chairs the subcommittee that funds the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Agriculture. She has called for the creation of an independent food safety agency that would consolidate tasks now handled by a dozen or so agencies. FDA officials said they do not yet know how many U.S. fish farms may have used the tainted feed or what kind of fish may be affected. Some of the fish may have been sold to grocery stories and restaurants, and others may have been raised to stock lakes and rivers for fishermen, they said. International Herald Tribune: Two Chinese companies guilty SHANGHAI – China has found two companies here guilty of intentionally exporting contaminated pet food ingredients to the United States, the government announced. The country's quality-control investigator released a statement on its Web site late Tuesday that also said officials at the two companies had been detained for their roles in shipping the tainted goods, which might have contributed to one of the largest pet food recalls in U.S. history. The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said its investigation found that the two animal feed companies - Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development and Binzhou Futian Biology Technology - had intentionally exported food ingredients laced with melamine, an industrial chemical used to make plastics and fertilizer. The two companies illegally added melamine to wheat gluten and rice protein, the government said, in a bid to meet the contractual requirement for the amount of protein in the products. China had earlier denied shipping any wheat gluten to the United States and had recently insisted that melamine could not have harmed pets. But the government essentially said Tuesday that the two companies had cheated pet food companies by adding a fake protein to the feed to make pet food suppliers believe they were purchasing high-protein feed when in fact they were getting lower-protein feed. Beijing also said the two companies had mislabeled their exports to avoid quality inspections, but that a nationwide survey had not uncovered other companies using melamine in feed products. The announcement came as investigators from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration were visiting China trying to determine the cause of death for as many as 4,000 U.S. pets. Animal feed producers here have acknowledged in recent weeks that for years they have used melamine to adulterate feed and gain bigger profit margins. Associated Press: Farmed fish third food animal contaminated WASHINGTON - Farmed fish have been fed meal spiked with the same chemical that has been linked to the pet food recall, but the contamination was probably too low to harm anyone who ate the fish, federal officials said Tuesday. The Canadian-made meal included what was purported to be wheat gluten, a protein source, imported from China. The material was actually wheat flour spiked by the chemical melamine and related, nitrogen-rich compounds to make it appear more protein rich than it was, officials said. After pigs and chickens, the farmed fish mark the third food animal given contaminated feed. The level of contamination is expected to be too low to pose any danger to human health, said Dr. David Acheson, the FDA's assistant commissioner for food protection. It wasn't immediately clear if any of the farmed fish entered the food supply. However, Acheson said at least one firm's fish were still too young and small to be sold. Investigators were visiting other U.S. aquaculture farms that used the contaminated feed. Farmed fish typically are sold for direct consumption or for stocking lakes and streams. The head of a St. Louis company said it brokered a deal to import nearly 353,000 pounds of the Chinese wheat gluten that went directly to a Canadian aquaculture feed ingredient company called Westaqua. Listings for Canadian fish meal producers include a company called Westaqua Commodity Group Ltd. When reached by telephone, the president of Westaqua Commodity Group Ltd., based in Vancouver, British Columbia, declined to talk about the matter. Acheson said that fish samples would be screened for signs of melamine. "Depending upon what we find in that testing, that is going to drive the next steps," Acheson said. The supposed wheat gluten was exported directly from China to Canada in a deal brokered by a U.S. company, ChemNutra Inc., Acheson said. ChemNutra also supplied the ingredient to a Canadian dog and cat food company, Menu Foods, that's since recalled dozens of brands. Steve Stern, a ChemNutra spokesman, said the Las Vegas company actually only cobrokered the deal to supply wheat gluten to the fishmeal producer: "We never owned it, we never sold it." Menu Foods has said it faces more than 50 lawsuits. It in turn has sued ChemNutra. And the FDA has searched facilities belonging to both companies. The Salt Lake Tribune: Unclear which states affected At this point, levels found in feed for animals and fish pose no health threat to humans, Acheson said during a telephone conference from Washington, D.C. Thousands of hogs and millions of chickens suspected of eating the tainted food may be released for slaughter if tests show the levels pose little risk. About 10 million fowl suspected of eating contaminated feed in the Midwest already have been sent to the marketplace and another 10 million broiler chickens to be sold for meat could be released soon. In Utah, a decision is expected this week on whether hogs on four northern farms will be sent to the marketplace. Initially federal officials had said that any animal suspected of eating tainted feed would be destroyed and buried. But more testing has shown levels in the feed were low and probably were excreted by the animals, federal officials said. "There is no reason to believe melamine in any concentrations are in the meat" of the animals sent to slaughter, said Kenneth Petersen, assistant administrator for field operations with the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Even with that being the case, federal officials said that recalled pet food tainted with melamine would not be allowed back into the manufacturing chain for animal feed. Brief: Another State Starts Testing Farmed Fish LITTLE ROCK -- The Arkansas Department of Health and Human Services has begun taking samples of frozen fish imported from Asia to test for prohibited antibiotics content, after Alabama and Mississippi found similar drugs in imported catfish.An official with the Food and Drug Administration and another with the state began taking samples from six distributors on Monday, said Ann Wright, a state Health and Human Services spokeswoman. The samples will head to FDA laboratories for further testing and results should be available within a week, Wright said. – Associated Press News: Farmed Fish Raised on Chicken Poop WASHINGTON -- In China, some farmers try to maximize the output from their small plots by flooding produce with unapproved pesticides, pumping livestock with antibiotics banned in the United States, and using human feces as fertilizer to boost soil productivity. But the questionable practices don't end there: Chicken pens are frequently suspended over ponds where seafood is raised, recycling chicken waste as a food source for seafood, according to a leading food safety expert who served as a federal adviser to the Food and Drug Administration.China's suspect agricultural practices could soon affect American consumers. Federal authorities are working on a proposal to allow chickens raised, slaughtered, and cooked in China to be sold here, and under current regulations, store labels do not have to indicate the meat's origin. According to the US Department of Agriculture, China's top agricultural export goal is opening the US market to its cooked chickens. Representative Rosa DeLauro, who is fighting the change, says China does not deserve entry to the coveted, closed poultry market. Agricultural exports from China to the United States ballooned from $1 billion in 2002 to nearly $2.3 billion in 2006, according to the US Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service. The USDA, which shares food safety oversight with the FDA, says its proposal to allow the sale of Chinese chicken is in the early stages and that there will be many opportunities for the public to be heard on the matter. In China's agricultural system, many farmers toil on 1-acre plots, while US farmers often work thousands of acres, said Michael Doyle, director of the Center for Food Safety at the University of Georgia and former chairman of the FDA's science advisory board. In China, "there are hundreds of thousands of these little farms," Doyle said. "They have small ponds. And over the ponds -- not in all cases, but in many cases -- they'll have chicken cages. It might be like 20,000 chickens in cages. The chicken feces is what feeds the shrimp." The USDA has found that up to 10% of shrimp imported from China contains salmonella, he said. Even more worrisome are shrimp imported from China that contain antibiotics that no amount of cooking can neutralize. Last month alone, the FDA rejected 51 shipments of catfish, eel, shrimp, and tilapia imported from China because of such contaminants as salmonella, veterinary drugs, and nitrofuran, a cancer-causing chemical. A long history of such test results spurred the FDA to begin working proactively with Chinese farmers on safer seafood production methods, Doyle said. "In terms of harmful bacteria, consumers have control over that. Even in [poultry] we produce in the US, there is contamination with salmonella," Doyle said. "In terms of veterinary drugs and pesticides, well, good food handling practices won't fix that. That has to be addressed in the country of origin." – Boston Globe Brief: Senate Approves Seafood Inspection Plan WASHINGTON – The Senate has approved a bipartisan amendment that authorizes the Department of Health and Human Services to increase inspections of fish, shrimp, seafood and other aquaculture products.The amendment was added to a prescription drug safety bill that passed yesterday. It was authored by Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions and cosponsored by fellow Republican Richard Shelby. The amendment allows H-H-S to inspect for antibiotics and other contaminants, already banned by the Food and Drug Administration. Sessions, in a statement, said substandard catfish and shrimp, mostly produced in China, should not be allowed to enter the U.S. market. Other co-sponsors included the Senate delegations from Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas. The measure still needs House approval. News: Don’t Worry About Bad Fish Feed, Authorities Say SEATTLE -- Canadian and U.S. officials agreed Wednesday that no consumers are at risk from salmon or other fish that were fed melamine-spiked feed from China, even as the chemical was traced to 57 fish-rearing operations from Yukon to Ontario.The feed contains the same chemical that triggered a massive pet-food recall. Although the fish feed was being voluntarily recalled by its major distributor, Skretting Canada, there have been no reports of unusual mortality among the millions of young salmon or other fish that ate the rations containing the low levels of melamine. After considering safety reviews, Canadian officials Wednesday said they had no plans to quarantine or test any of the affected fish before they eventually head to market. U.S. and Canadian reviews indicated that the melamine, unlike other chemicals such as mercury, does not accumulate in the body but is rapidly excreted. Therefore, it is not expected to end up in significant amounts in fish flesh that people would eat. David Acheson, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, said the agency would be sampling fish that received the Skretting feed to determine how much melamine they contain. Those fish include young salmon, trout and other species in six hatcheries in Washington and seven in Oregon. All of those hatcheries release fish into Northwest waterways for sport and sometimes for commercial or tribal fishing. John Kerwin, hatchery division manager for the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife, said at least 3.2 million small fish ate the melamine-spiked starter feed. It is typically fed only for a few weeks before the fish are switched to another formula. State officials noted that none of the fish appeared to have any ill effects. There were no plans to destroy any of the fish. - Seattle Times News: Inspectors Say Fish Farm Food Tainted VANCOUVER – Federal inspectors have confirmed that fish meal that may be tainted with the plastic material melamine was shipped to salmon farms in British Columbia, Agriculture Minister Pat Bell said Wednesday.Bell initially said it appeared that the food from the North Vancouver company Skretting Canada had not been distributed in B.C. But the Canadian Food Inspection Agency said some feed did go to B.C. farms. "CFIA has confirmed to us that in fact there are some B.C. farms that utilized the contaminated feed," Bell said. "Again, the advice that we have received from CFIA is there's no implications to human health." The inspection agency said because the food went to very young fish, there's no risk that the contamination would have made it to the food chain. Bell said Skretting Canada voluntarily recalled its product after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced farmed fish had been fed meal containing melamine, the same contaminant found in tainted pet food earlier this year. A spokesman for the company said it is working closely with the CFIA and the FDA in assessing risks to humans and the farmed salmon. – Canadian Press |