End of the Line, a documentary based on journalist Charles Clover’s book of the same name, is showing at a handful of film festivals and will play in some cities on June 8th-World Oceans Day.  I had a chance to watch the film and have a few thoughts to share.

The film begins with beautiful footage of marine life and quickly (and graphically) moves toward its key message: The oceans are overfished and fish populations are in trouble. Some of the most well-known and well-respected marine scientists are interviewed in the film to confirm these bleak trends.

I appreciate the filmmaker’s intention to tell this important story about the oceans. Our oceans are under incredible pressure and overfishing is a HUGE problem. In their latest global status report, the FAO states that slightly over half (52%) of fish populations are fished at their maximum sustainable limits, and there’s no room for further expansion. An additional 28% of fish populations are overexploited, depleted, or recovering from depletion. Why this happens requires a longer discussion, but the short of it is that overfishing happens when fishing quotas (i.e. limits on how many fish can be caught) are exceeded, or because no regulations or ineffective regulations exist to control fishing. Sometimes regulations are on the books but aren’t enforced. And corruption in the market is a reality that undermines even the well-intentioned.

Even so, I wish that a more complete story was told in the film. Read the rest of this entry »

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the government agency that’s responsible for managing fisheries in U.S. waters, is asking for public comments on proposed policies for addressing what’s known in the industry as illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing (a.k.a. pirate fishing) and bycatch (unintentional or incidental catch) of protected species like whales and sea turtles. Okay, there are a lot of acronyms in that first sentence (I even left some out) but the point is: as citizens we have an opportunity to express our opinion about how these public resources are managed.

Here’s mine: Hats off to NMFS for addressing these critical issues! Together with my colleague, Margaret Wittenberg – Global Vice President of Quality Standards and Public Relations, we’ve submitted comments to NMFS letting them know that Whole Foods Market cares about sourcing seafood sustainably and minimizing the impacts of fishing on the marine ecosystem. To source seafood right, though, we need strong regulations that address illegal fishing because as a grocery store, we can’t police the oceans.

We’re urging our fishery managers to do everything possible to provide the tools necessary to help us avoid sourcing from fisheries that catch fish illegally or take protected species. For example, denying port privileges to nations fishing illegally and prohibiting the import of fish products in violation of these rules would be a huge step forward; it would put the onus of responsibility on nations to fish responsibly, rather than on a grocery store like Whole Foods Market to figure out who is fishing legally and who isn’t. Finally, there may be fisheries that operate legally within a country that is found to be engaging in illegal fishing in other sectors. Consequently, we agree with NMFS’ approach to have alternative certification procedures that allow products to be certified on a shipment-by-shipment or shipper-by-shipper basis.

If you’d like to submit comments yourself, the deadline is May 14, 2009 and details can be found on Federal Register Docket No. 070514119-81404-02 (pdf).

You can read the full letter (pdf) that Whole Foods Market submitted to NMFS.

What do you think? Let us know and, more importantly, let the NMFS know!

In developing the newly enhanced Seafood Quality Standards for farmed seafood at Whole Foods Market, I had the amazing opportunity to visit farms in remote locations around the world to learn about the wide range of aquaculture practices used to raise farmed seafood. I’m often asked, “What’s the most amazing place that you’ve visited?” While every country and the people that I’ve met have been incredibly different and interesting, I often answer, “Iceland.”

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Shrimp farming and healthy mangrove ecosystems…Can the two go hand in hand?

The past few months have been an exciting time for seafood at Whole Foods Market. In July 2008 we released our newly enhanced standards for farmed finfish and shrimp. In launching these standards, we set a high bar not only for how our seafood is raised, but also for environmental performance in aquaculture globally. Our commitment to sustainability reaches beyond our own stores, which is why we’ve posted our standards on our website and contribute to share and discuss our work at conferences and meetings worldwide.

As we have received several questions from customers particularly interested in shrimp and wanting to know what Whole Foods Market is doing specifically to protect mangroves from the impacts of shrimp farming, I’ll focus this posting on the topic of mangroves.

What are mangroves, anyway?

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Sometimes you meet people who are truly remarkable. I met such a person in September 2007 on a trout farm visit to Idaho. Following two days of presentations at the U.S. Trout Farmers Association meeting, my fellow fishmongers and I were greeted by Leo Ray, who loaded us into his truck for an all day tour of the Snake River Canyon of South Central Idaho. A tall, fit man of undeterminable age, Leo is a zoologist, fish farmer, and naturalist. What’s remarkable about Leo is that he not only possesses tremendous knowledge of aquaculture and knows every inch of the vast land around him—the geology, river systems, the wildlife, etc.—but he shares it. With his wisdom and appreciation for nature, Leo transformed for me what first appeared as a dry, rough, rocky landscape into a living ecosystem that interacts each day with large agriculture and aquaculture industries.

Trout at Leo’s farm are raised in concrete raceways situated on a down-sloping hill. This set-up allows him to utilize gravity for water to flow, which is critical for maintaining healthy oxygen levels, among other things. The water in this system flows downhill from one portion of the raceway to the next. Sediments are collected at the end of each level of the raceway and then flushed to settling ponds before the water is released back into the river or into irrigation canals for local farmers. Farms must have Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) permits and monitor water quality according to the Total Maximum Daily Load limits. In Idaho farms are required to monitor water quality each month and report results to the EPA and the Department of Environmental Quality. In addition, these agencies do annual spot checks on the farm. Allowable discharges are based on assessments of what the river can assimilate.

While currently all of the trout we sell at Whole Foods Market comes from flow-through raceway systems like Leo’s, we continue to keep our eye on developments of other types of systems such as closed, re-circulating systems. However, a major benefit of the flow-through raceway system is that there are no energy inputs to create flow in the water. In contrast, closed, re-circulating systems require energy inputs, which have a carbon footprint.

What about feed?

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I am at the new Whole Foods Market store in Tribeca, NYC perusing the seafood counter on a most exciting day. Today we launched our new quality standards for farmed seafood at Whole Foods Market, a culmination of two years work to set the bar high for aquaculture practices worldwide. I watch as an inquisitive customer reads through our brochure detailing the key highlights of the new standards while the team member wraps up her salmon. Her eyes shift from the brochure to the salmon in the case. “Does this salmon that I’m buying come from this farm, pictured here in this brochure? Does it meet your standards?” she asks the team member. “It sure does,” he replies proudly to the customer’s delight, “all of our farmed seafood will need to meet our standards and be approved through an independent third party audit.” “That’s so cool,” she declares, and away she goes, pulled by the hand by an impatient toddler.

As I scan the seafood case, I see fish from many of the farms that I’ve visited over the last two years-salmon from Norway, trout and catfish from North Carolina, shrimp from Vietnam, and Arctic char from Iceland, to name only a few. It’s been a stimulating and inspiring process developing these standards. Learning about the problems and finding solutions-my favorite kind of work. Speaking with scientists, environmentalists, and producers, I investigated every issue related to aquaculture: feed, predator control, water quality, chemical use, environmental contaminants, siting, traceability, etc. With the best available science, I armed myself with all the information. Then I went into the field. I visited hatcheries, farms, feed mills, and processing plants to get a closer look at how farmed fish are produced and to really understand what producers are doing, and not doing.

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