Environmentally friendly fish to eat in Ireland?

Baars

Hi all,

With my growing concern for the level overfishing in the world's oceans and my absolute and total lack of confidence in the Common Fisheries Policy of the EU to do anything about this I would like to ask the following questions:

What fish and fish products which are found in Irish supermarkets (incl Lidl/Aldi) can be responsibly eaten without contributing to the overfishing problem?

As plenty of fishfarming is also done irresponsibly, would anybody know which fish (products) from this industry which can be responsibly consumed?

Thanks

CJhaughey

There is a lot of misinformation talked about responsible fishing, TBH having seen first hand the process of certification for the MSC labels it really is a way of making wealthy fishermen wealthier.
A small fisherman participating in a mixed fishery(one that catches more than one species at a time) has no chance of getting certification, even if you could afford it.
If you have a huge trawler or are part of a group that fishes one species(Canadian salmon, Atlantic Mackerel etc) then the process is easy if not cheap
I would be slow to take any MSC certified product as being 100% sustainable, the driver behind the MSC is actually Unilever one of, if not the biggest food company in the world.
There was a big furore recently when Hoki from NZ was found to be not in accordance with the MSC label and this I feel is only the tip of the Iceberg.
It seems to make little sense to import fish from the other side of the world just because it has a MSC tick mark on the box, this practice is actually destroying the indigenous Irish fishing industry in a similar manner to the Brazilian Beef destroying the Irish Beef industry, although the farmers are a lot more vocal about the practice.

Anyway to digress, I would suggest that for truly sustainable fish you would be better to try buying from a Fishermans Co-op, if there are none near you then a specialist fishmonger would be a good choice, you can ask all the questions you want about sustainable fish from the fishmonger himself.
The best way is to go down to the pier and ask a small boat if they have any fish that they would sell you. It will be in a small fishermans interest to look after the fish stocks in the local area, in a small boat you don't have the luxury of heading to Iceland or Norway to catch your fish if the fishing grounds are cleaned out.

Prawns can be caught in a sustainable manner, especially now with escape grids being built in to nets that allow small fish to escape from the trawl.

Mackerel is a good choice, especially in the summer from small boats that jig for it.

Pollack is another fish that is commonly caught by line and is very similar to Cod (same family)



If you absoutely have to buy from a supermarket, Lidl sell wild salmon with herb crust which is approved and most of the fish they sell seems to have approval.

Baars

Thanks so much for the information. I live in Dublin City Centre. My local "Fresh" sells fish, although I am not sure if they would know about where there fish comes from. Otherwise, the fishmongers and fish co-op is a great idea