24/08/2007 - How the media gets it all mixed up

WEEKEND FEATURE: How the media gets it all mixed up

WORLDWIDE
Friday, August 24, 2007, 23:50 (GMT + 9)


In a recent feature story published in The Independent, a well known and well-respected daily newspaper of the media house Independent News and Media Limited, an excessive amount of misinformation was reported, demonstrating a clear lack of knowledge regarding the industry of fishery and aquaculture and the whole business of seafood in general.

Journalists Rob Sharp, Julia Stuart, and John Walsh -a qualified team of authors- of the feature story: The great zebu con – and other restaurant swindles, show a disgregard for the seafood, through several blunders, demonstrating their negligent way of obtaining knowledge and reporting it to the public. This is quite common in today's information-chocked age, where oft times even urban legends, because they are in print, are taken as fact. Today's press has lowered the bar on clear and factual reporting, leading many to believe, that when a wide-circulation paper such as The Independent, shows a disregard for news, there are few reliable sources to turn to. Shouldn't we be expecting more?

Ripped off by restaurants
The feature article is about how Britons are being ripped off by restaurants not serving what their menus promise in print. The team of journalists calls the rip off a scandal, but their lack of knowledge, demonstrated by their information, is more scandalous -and one perpetrated by them- than mislabeling or misrepresenting what consumers eat. One of the journalists writes that he has had a brief career as a restaurant critic, the brevity of which is reflected indeed by what he reports.

John Walsh starts off his attack of disguised seafood products in a careful way, showing that he is able to identify a scallop from a scallop or a bluefin tuna from a bluefin tuna depending on how it is caught. If it looks like the one sold in the supermarket Sainsbury's, it is logically not caught by diving or longlining. He may be right, but one wonders, how he can distinguish the one from the other.

Walsh writes: " I've been offered "diver-gathered" scallops and "line-caught bluefin tuna" wholly indistinguishable from the kind you get in Sainsbury’s. I'm not saying the waiters or the menus were lying through their teeth, but it's clear that they often are. So much of the scrupulously "sourced" ingredients are nothing of the sort.”

Julia Stuart then reports on her interview with Bjorn Van der Horst, a chef patron of Gordon Ramsay's La Noisette restaurant, who explains: It's difficult to tell if a restaurant is swizzing you. One thing to look for is the price. If they are selling wild line-caught fish, and it's cheap bass or turbot, you should be suspicious. Wild turbot costs between GBP 20 and GBP 25 a kilo and – knowing that there's about 60 per cent waste on that fish – if a portion doesn't cost between GBP 25 to GBP 30 then they're either selling it at a loss, or it's not wild turbot."

My own guess is that next time of Gordon Ramsay's La Noisette restaurant offers on it menu a line-caught turbot, something fishy could be up. Turbot for commercial use is not caught either by longlining or hand line.

Sea bass or not?
”Once cooked, the prime fillet of sea bass can be hard to identify – and there are many look-alikes, imposter species being dressed up as the original. Among the counterfeit fish recently identified in Britain's kitchens by local authorities were the Patagonian toothfish – itself threatened by overfishing – which is often sold under the moniker of "sea bass", despite bearing little resemblance to the fish in the wild,” he states.

Maybe the reason for this fish being called sea bass is that it is imported as Chilean sea bass. There is not much profit in substituting Patagonian toothfish and sea bass.

Scampi or not scampi
The journalists also attempt to show their knowledge about scampi: “It's common for eateries to pass off scampi tails glued together with additives as "scampi" pieces. They can even be minced scampi that has been breaded. This is “reformed scampi"."

They should probably look closer into what really is called scampi and what is not. Restaurateurs all over Europe misuse this name. Large shrimp from all over the world, wild of farmed, are passed on as scampi, though are never even close to being scampi. And the small pieces glued together are in most cases not scampi, but shrimp. British food writers, journalists, and chefs have been using the name scampi in unconscious way for years.

“Scampi is the plural of scampo, the Italian name for the Norway lobster (Nephrops norvegicus), also known as the Dublin Bay prawn (especially in Ireland and the U.K.) and langoustine (the French name). The name is used loosely both in Italy and elsewhere, though in Britain, food labelling laws define "scampi" as Nephrops norvegicus.” (Source: Wikipedia).

Not only does media do it injustice. There are thousands and thousands of cases of mislabeling by the seafood industry itself. Some Norwegian exporters of rainbow trout farmed in saltwater still promote it as “salmon trout”. The fish with this name is a North American species. Rainbow trout is a trout, and if a container of this species tries to enter the United States under the guise of being “salmon trout” the container risks being stopped at the border. But most of us accept that “salmon trout” sounds better than “rainbow trout” or trout.


Albatross line-caught by ugly trawler
”"Line-caught" conjures up images of an artisanal fisher with a rod. What it actually means is that an ugly great trawler has crossed the ocean with several hundred yards of nylon and hooks hanging out the back, indiscriminately killing all sea life as well as the occasional albatross. Even then, line-caught fish is more expensive than farmed or netted alternatives, since it is normally fresher and its flesh firmer. Most consumers cannot taste the difference, and an estimated five per cent is mislabeled by disreputable outlets or suppliers,” the feature article explains.

However, “A trawler is a fishing vessel designed for the purpose of operating a trawl, a type of fishing net that is dragged along the bottom of the sea (or sometimes above the bottom at a specified depth)”. (Source: Wikipedia)

So now we all know that line caught fish are caught by "ugly great trawlers." Seen as one of the most selective fishing methods, the journalists still purport that this fishery gear indiscriminately kills all sealife, and even causes incidental seabird catches. It is disturbing news that “trawlers” catching the "odd albatross" can deliver fresher seafood than fish farms.

In fact the seabird albatross does not inhabit the North Atlantic. Only a handful of observations have been made of its presence there. If Scottish and English fish farms are delivering less fresh fish than products received from the southern hemisphere or the Northern Pacific, they have severe problems of being slow with their logistics. The same goes for if they are slower in bringing their produce to the market than long-liners operating out of British harbours.

It is to be appreciated that the press is focusing on seafood substitutions and swindles, but it would be great to see this done by journalists with a minimum of understanding of the seafood industry and how it operates.

Why this lack of knowledge?
Journalists use language as a tool. The right choice of words makes a story more interesting, much like the right fishing gear will bring in a better catch. In their quest to catch the attention of their target audience, they may risk some important details that later can wreak havoc, much as a bottom trawl across the ocean bottom, with its indiscrimination.

Journalists and public relations people with an agenda, promoting a set of views on behalf of themselves, a organisation, or a company, often choose to show bias in their writing, and do not try to present any different point of view. This is common practice, and questionable, however, as long as they do not do it under disguise of neutral journalism it is acceptable. It is not acceptable that journalists representing a wide-circulation independent newspapers like The Independent forget to go their homework.

The name of a product also results in trade policies and protectionism. The North Americans have decided that only their species of catfish is allowed to be named catfish in their markets. Basa from Vietnam cannot be called catfish, which is supposed to make it clearer for consumers. But what is wrong with calling the same fish in the US and Vietnam as "catfish?" There is clearly a political slant. Not only does the seafood industry sometimes disguise what they are selling but journalists then mix up names because of a lack of knowledge, of both politics and the nature of the seafood industry.

Even those who should know often are not interested in using correct labels or names. Laks og Vildtcentralen, established in 1930 is one of Norway’s leading retailers and wholesalers of imported high quality seafood and they call imported black tiger shrimp scampi of course. And they are one of many thousands of seafood companies worldwide that disregard the correct use of product names.

So how can the seafood industry complain about journalists getting it wrong, when they don't have it very clear themselves? Until the seafood industry begins to get things right, they cannot expect the media to correct their errors, only report them. And bass will be a different bass, and a trawler will fish with longlines and scampi will be a term not just for nephrops but also any large shrimp.

And, yes, journalists will continue to behave like experts who can pick a scallop hand picked from the sea by a diver, from a scallop scooped up by a longline, or, sorry, was that a purse seiner? Not that would be for bluefin tuna... oh well.

Note from the writer:
This writer takes responsibility for his own mistakes, and his views do not necessarily express those of FIS.com. However, as journalists, we all must try to learn our mistakes and bridge the gap of what is information and what is heresay.

By Terje Engoe
www.fis.com

17/08/2007 - Celebrating 50 years of Norwegian-Russian co-operation

WEEKEND FEATURE: Celebrating 50 years of Norwegian-Russian co-operation

RUSSIAN FEDERATION
Friday, August 17, 2007, 23:50 (GMT + 9)


Russian and Norwegian scientists for 50 years have been co-operating. Cold war and other political problems not related to the scientific activities have never stopped this, and not affected the benefits from it for the fishing industry, not only in Russia and Norway, but also for other nations with fishing rights in the North East Atlantic.

A number of times Russian authorities have closed large areas of their jurisdictional sector of the Barents Sea off for Norwegian scientists for reasons not related to any scientific work, but for political issues. The problems have usually been resolved and Russian and Norwegian scientists, as well as fisheries, have benefited from the co-operation.

On August 21–22, the Russian marine research institute PINRO in Murmansk and the Institute of Marine Research (IMR) in Bergen, will hold a jubilee symposium in Tromsø to mark this half-century of collaboration.

Much negative reaction arose earlier this year when PINRO was not able to finance a research exploratory cruise agreed upon during the Russian-Norwegian Fishery Commission. But this week, director Viktor Komlitsjenko, at Pinro in Murmansk, informed the Norwegian fishery paper Fiskeribladet that two research vessels, Smolensk and Vilnius left harbour to commence coordinated research activities.

A Russian rejection of a permit for Norwegian research vessels to enter Russian zone added to this dilemma earlier this year. This trouble now serves to foreshadow results of the symposium next week.

The background for co-operation is found in the development of stocks of the North East Arctic cod and Norwegian spring-spawning herring in the 1950s. Although both countries were members of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES), which provides advice on resources management in the North Atlantic, a need for even closer co-operation remained.

In the 1950s, ICES did not advise on total outtakes of stocks, as fish stocks were not regulated in this way at that time. The Barents Sea and the Norwegian Sea were open seas where everyone could fish as much as they wanted, and the concepts of economic zones and allocations of total quotas still lay 20–30 years in the future.

Problems of unrestricted fishing
Nevertheless, the problems caused by unrestricted fishing were becoming obvious, and catches were becoming smaller. The data on age distribution of cod stocks suggested that the decline in catches was due to overfishing rather than to natural oscillations. The Norwegian fishery for young herring was at issue: Soviet scientists thought that this fishery was the main reason for the decline in herring catches during the 1950s.

The Norwegians rejected this claim, since the nursery grounds of the strong herring year-classes were out in the open sea, where young herring were not being fished. There was scientific disagreement regarding analytical methods and the choice of year-classes for the analysis, which made it difficult to reach agreement. Both the Russians and the Norwegians therefore felt the need for better cooperation, and with that began the co-operation between the IMR and PINRO.

Joint surveys
Since then, joint efforts have been extended and deepened, for example, via joint surveys. The 0-group surveys that started in 1965 have since become a part of the autumn ecosystem survey, which assesses the spawning success of all Barents Sea stocks. It provides what is probably the longest continuous survey series used by ICES and is important to make prognoses of fish. As cooperative efforts have evolved, annual meetings have been held within oceanography, biology and technology.

The introduction of economic zones was one very important factor in the co-operation resulting in the establishment of the Mixed Norwegian-Russian Fisheries Commission. Currently, the main emphasis for Norwegian and Russian scientists is to agree on matters the commission deals with, particularly as regards stock development and quota recommendations.

Without a joint set of recommendations from Norwegian and Russian scientists, it is difficult for the commission to adopt effective resolutions. However, the work of the Fisheries Commission is evolving, and Norwegian and Russian scientists now collaborate on long-term strategies, catch regulations and ecosystem management, rather than simply obtaining figures for the following year’s quota recommendations.

Also the work of the more recent Norwegian-Russian Environmental Commission is likely to affect the cooperation.

A key element in the co-operation is the annual scientific meeting, where 10–20 Norwegian researchers meet their Russian colleagues to discuss questions raised by the Fisheries Commission.

Joint surveys are also organised, the most extensive of these being the above mentioned ecosystem survey in August- September, in which three Norwegian and two Russian vessels take part. A joint Norwegian-Russian report is published in the wake of this cruise. The co-operation also covers exchanges of otoliths and annual meetings dedicated to age determinations of important fish species. Since 1983, Norwegian-Russian symposia have been organised at intervals of one to three years.

International quality control
Although, most of the data on important fish stocks in the Arctic are collected by Russian and Norwegian scientists, large quantities of information are processed under the auspices of ICES, particularly by the Arctic Fisheries and Northern Pelagic working groups. Within ICES, both Russian and Norwegian scientists work towards a joint understanding of models and input data, while ICES provide the international quality control. ICES are therefore a pillar in the Norwegian-Russian co-operation.

At the jubilee meeting in Tromsø, the scientists will summarise some of the results obtained and understandings reached in the course of 50 years of co-operation between IMR and PINRO. They will also be looking ahead, anticipating a trend towards different types of ecosystem studies and more co-operating partners. For this reason, institutions from several other countries have been invited to make presentations at the meeting.


By Terje Engoe/ Institute of Marine Research
www.fis.com

11/8/2007 - The challenges of sea turtle conservation

WEEKEND FEATURE: The challenges of sea turtle conservation

WORLDWIDE
Friday, August 10, 2007, 23:50 (GMT + 9)


Turtles have created fortunes for some, and losses for others. They are for the most part a protected species, and seen as a problem by the commercial fishing fleet. Tundi Agardy at the World Ocean Observatory places into perspective the actions taken to protect dwindling turtle stocks.

What is it about sea turtles? How are they able to move us so deeply, perhaps more than any other marine creature? And why has the compassion that they have managed to generate not translated into effective conservation of marine turtle species throughout the world?

Sea turtles have touched the lives of so many people, in diverse and sometimes paradoxical ways. Unlike many other charismatic but less accessible marine animals like dolphins, whales, manta rays and whale sharks, a great number of people -- young and old, rich and less so, urbanites and farmers, environmentalists and naysayers -- have had the opportunity to interact with turtles in the wild.

Whether we encounter a large lumbering nesting female or a small helpless hatchling, sea turtles manage to convert even the most unsentimental among us into ardent conservationists.

There are seven recognized species of marine turtles, including the leatherback Dermochelys coriacea, the loggerhead Caretta caretta, the hawksbill Eretmochelys imbricata, green turtle Chelonia mydas, flatback turtle Natator depressus, olive ridley Lepidochelys olivacea, and the Kemps ridley Lepidochelys kempii.

All are either endangered or threatened. Leatherbacks, hawksbills, and Kemps ridleys are considered critically endangered – holding on to their existence by the skin of their teeth1.

Perhaps because of their increasing rarity, in many parts of the world, encountering sea turtles at sea or on a nesting beach is cause for great excitement. Some tourism operators cater specifically to those who want to witness a turtle laying its eggs (and some, like Earthwatch based in the United States and Frontier based in the United Kingdom, can arrange expeditions for those willing to volunteer their time and energy for sea turtle conservation and research projects).

At the same time, sea turtle eggs or meat represent an important (and often free) source of protein in most tropical developing countries – this and the lack of alternative protein sources have made conservation of turtles in the poorest countries a difficult endeavor. The challenges of saving sea turtles from extinction are a microcosm of marine conservation challenges everywhere – representing both huge obstacles to success and reasons for hope.

Sea Turtles as Metaphor

Marine turtles are at once emblematic flagships for the oceans, and umbrella species whose management must be directed at a series of linked ecosystems. People connect with sea turtles in different ways, viewing them a symbol of all enigmatic ocean creatures, or as the face of an ageless cautionary tale about man versus nature.

The strange attraction that people feel towards sea turtles makes them symbols of something bigger -- clear candidates for flagship status. Their story is indeed the story of all the ocean’s inhabitants, though saving them from extirpation involves a suite of conservation tools and policies. Sea turtles have been around a long time, some sixty million years, and for this reason they hold our fascination as ancients.

They are charismatic megavertebrates, ever so graceful as adults swimming through the water and oh-so-cute crawling out of the nest. And they share some traits with us – needing to breathe at the surface, returning to land to reproduce, struggling to survive and keep their evolutionary lineages going in a rapidly changing world. Perhaps it is these traits that make it so sea turtles in harm’s way conjure up such pathos – whether it is the sight of the turtle drowned in the fishing net, of feral dogs attacking a stalwart nesting female, or of tiny hatchlings undertaking the mad scramble down the beach.

Marine turtles are arguably the most logical organisms to denote as umbrella species. Their conservation requires the preservation of intact habitats ranging from tropical nesting beaches to sub-Arctic foraging grounds. Although this is also true for highly migratory species of fish and for most marine mammals, sea turtles are unique in that they rely not only on ocean habitat but also on terrestrial habitat.

Nesting beaches must remain open and secure for sea turtles to utilize them, access to these beaches must be maintained, and the nesting beach environment must be almost pristine to successfully support sea turtle reproduction. The more disturbance on the beach, the greater the chance that the female will abort her eggs in the water or unsuccessfully attempt to make her nest, known in the turtle lingo as a “false crawl”. Light contamination on the nesting beach – a common occurrence on most beautiful wide sandy beaches in the tropics where sea turtles lay their eggs – dooms both adults and young, as light from behind the beach fatally draws turtles away from the sea.

Once the hatchlings leave the safety of their underground nest on the sandy beach, they scurry to the ocean to escape the innumerable dangers of land and find relatively safe nursery habitats in which to grow. Just where these nursery grounds are is still a mystery – in the Atlantic Ocean the Sargasso Sea has been fingered as the most probable place where small turtles can both find food and escape predation by hiding in the drifting sargassum weed.

As sub-adults, sea turtles often congregate in nutrient rich shallow waters to continue their slow growth to adulthood (most species take a decade or more to mature and will live for several.) These critical areas vary according to the species – for herbivorous green turtles, seagrass meadows and areas of algal-encrusted rock reef are preferred; for the sponge-eating hawksbills, diverse and healthy coral reefs are the only habitat where they can survive; for leatherbacks, cold and rich upwelling areas in temperate zones provide large quantities of the jellyfish they consume with vigour, and for the others that are omnivores, areas that support large populations of benthic fish and crustaceans are the coastal habitats of choice.

Adult turtles may go to different feeding grounds altogether, and when sexually mature will travel to breeding areas to mate. Gravid females come ashore on tropical nesting beaches to lay their eggs – a hundred or more at a time, in nest pits that they painstakingly excavate with their hind flippers. The process of finding access to the beach, hauling a huge body built for aquatic life onto gravity-encumbered land, then crawling with flippers made for water across wide swaths of sand, rock, and berms, is extraordinarily difficult.

Finding a suitable nesting spot (like all reptiles, turtles do not incubate their eggs but rather let the warm sand of tropical beaches do it for them – the temperature and moisture level must be just so…), digging the nest, laying the eggs, then carefully covering the nest and disguising it takes hours, by which time the mother turtle is spent – and highly vulnerable to a host of predators, including man.

So, the need to meet the ecological requirements of these far-ranging species is huge. Yet in addition to protecting these disparate critical habitats on land and in the sea, conservation of sea turtles requires maintaining connections between these places. Migration corridors link tropical nesting beaches with temperate feeding grounds, sometimes thousands of miles away.

Sea turtles are considered other sorts of symbols as well, beyond flagships or umbrella species. Some view sea turtles as canaries in the coalmine, reminding us of how our impacts on the oceans are reaching critical thresholds. A good example is provided by the hawksbill, which frequents coral reefs in all the world’s tropical seas. The hawksbill turtle could be considered a keystone species of sorts: its grazing on a wide assortment of sponge species on the reef prevents any one sponge from dominating the reef and thereby reducing biodiversity and productivity. When hawksbills disappear from large reef tracts, they may well signal the decline of these delicately balanced ecosystems.

To other people, sea turtles are a highly valuable commodity. Sea turtle meat is considered an important food source; sea turtle eggs, though widely protected, are coveted not only as food but as aphrodisiacs in some places. The beautiful shell of the hawksbill, known as beko in the trade, is still being used to make expensive bracelets, combs, eyeglass frames, and other curios. Sea turtle bones, fat, and oil are used for medicinal purposes (though their curative value has never been scientifically demonstrated). Then there are the non-market values attached to these marine icons. Sea turtles are revered in some religions. Tourists speak of life-changing experiences when interacting with them.

For all the ways that we value sea turtles, one hopes that the most appropriate analogy is not that of the passenger pigeon, a species whose great value spelled its ultimate doom.

Saving Sea Turtles
Conservation of sea turtles is clearly no easy feat. Their reliance on diverse habitats, ranging from unsullied and open access tropical beaches, to offshore nursery grounds, to unrestricted migration corridors across whole ocean basins, to productive feeding grounds on coral reefs, seagrass meadows, and cold open ocean areas, means that cooperation among countries is essential.

Marine and coastal protected areas are an indisputably important tool in the sea turtle conservation toolkit. But these protected areas must be strategically linked throughout the chain – weak protections at any of the necessary habitats can undermine even the strongest conservation efforts at the nesting beach or in coastal habitats frequented by adults. High seas protected areas are needed, even though these are difficult to establish and even more difficult to enforce2.

Pelagic protected areas will have to address fishing, shipping, and even contamination by debris – plastic bags, balloons, polypropalene pellets, and other trash constitute an insidious threat to all turtle species. And even protected beaches are difficult to maintain in a way suitable for maintaining or recovering sea turtle populations: introduced species such as dogs, cats, pigs, goats, raccoons, mongoose, etc. are difficult to eradicate from the beach, and there is only so much manpower available to guard nesting females and clutches of eggs through their two month long incubation periods.

While important nesting beaches can be and often are protected as parks or reserves, in many cases the very existence of the beach is at risk from human activities, sometimes far from the coast. With worldwide use of freshwater for irrigation, consumption, and hydroelectric power, estuaries around the world are showing signs of massive sediment starvation (decreases of freshwater limiting the delivery of sediment to the coast)3. This affects the maintenance of shorelines and some beaches.

Others are formed by sands produced through a combination of coralline animal and coralline algae remains. When coastal development or blast fishing destroys part of the reef system, beach formation can cease and beaches erode away. And increasingly frequent tropical storms and the occasional tsunami can instantly erase nesting beaches from the face of the earth.

Perhaps even more important than habitat protections are international agreements, regulations, and enforcement of laws concerning commercial fishing in areas frequented by turtles – either those resident or those migrating through. Longline fisheries have decimated leatherback turtle populations, especially in the eastern Pacific4. Gillnets are devastating to all marine turtle species. And bottom trawls routinely drown loggerhead, ridley, and other species – since sea turtles commonly feed on the very things we wish to catch, such as shrimp or prawns. Since so many sea turtles are killed incidentally in commercial fishing operations, their protection means restructuring how and where we fish -- something that is notoriously difficult to do when highly lucrative fishing interests are at stake.

We cannot forget that on the other end of the economic spectrum, sea turtle eggs and adults represent an important source of protein to impoverished and marginalized people the world over, who continue to harvest adult turtle products even when the practice is illegal, because of lack of economic or subsistence alternatives. For such people the choice is considered one between “us and them”, and conservation commonly takes a back seat to human survival.

Turtle Excluder helps

This is not to say that marine turtle conservation has not made great headway in the last 50 years. Some populations of sea turtles are stable or recovering, thanks to intensive efforts to protect nesting beaches, equip the most damaging fishing gear with Turtle Excluder Devices (TEDs), establish voluntary ordinances to shield nesting beaches from artificial light, and create strict regulations on take (as exists, at least on paper, in most coastal countries in the world). And there are innovative approaches being adopted as well. In the U.S., temporary closures are instituted in the mid-Atlantic when northwardly migrating leatherback turtle numbers reach a critical threshold. In the Pacific, many fishing fleets have instituted the use of circle hooks on longlines, to reduce turtle by-catch, and that of other highly valued but not targeted species5.


However, for every step forward we seem to falter, and even take some steps back. The Pacific populations of the leatherback turtle are plummeting so drastically that some predict their imminent extirpation6. The Kemp's ridley is barely holding on despite many decades of head-starting and a strong focus on getting all shrimp trawlers in the Gulf of Mexico where they occur equipped with TEDs. And many coastal species, such as loggerheads and green turtles, show signs of disease, such as extensive fibropapillomas. Fibropapillomatosis has been called the most important health problem affecting sea turtles in the wild7. There seems to be a clear link between water quality and the aetiology of this disease, such that outbreaks are occurring in more and more new places as coastal habitats become increasingly degraded.

There are also bigger forces at play. Climate change threatens to send some species over the brink, not only by affecting habitat or food availability, but also because higher than normal sand temperatures at nesting beaches will produce only one gender of hatchling (usually all males).

Thus, despite turtles having touched so many humans, we seem somehow incapable of securing their futures alongside our own. As a metaphor, then, the continued decline of something so thoroughly cherished around the world is a sobering one indeed.


By Tundi Agardy, PhD
World Ocean Observatory

Endnotes

1. People wishing to get more detailed information about the extant sea turtle species should visit the following websites: www.seaturtlestatus.org and www.seaturtle.org. A compendium of scientific descriptions of natural history, behaviour, and conservation is available in K. Bjorndal [ed.] 1995. Biology and Conservation of Sea Turtles. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington DC. The late Archie Carr wrote many popular accounts of sea turtles, including his famous So Excellent a Fishe. 1967. Charles Scribner and Sons, NY; decades later Jack Rudloe wrote Time of the Turtle. 1979. E.P. Dutton, NY. Most recently, O.G. Davidson wrote Fire in the Turtle House: the Green Turtle and the Fate of the Ocean. Perseus Books Group, Cambridge, MA. There have been hundreds of other publications about sea turtles in the past decades.

2. See D. Hyrenbach, K. Forney and P. Dayton. 2000.Marine protected areas and ocean basin management. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems 10:437-458.

3. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. 2005. Vol. 1 Current State and Trends. Island Press, Washington DC

4. Spotila et al. 1996. Worldwide population decline of Dermochelys coriacea: are leatherbacks going extinct? Chelonian Conservation Biology 2:209-222.

5. See for example Watson, J.W. and D.W. Kerstetter. 2006. Pelagic longline fishing gear: A brief history and review of research efforts to improve selectivity. Marine Technology Society Journal 40:6-11.

6. Spotila, J.R., R.D. Reina, A.C. Steyermark, P.T. Plotkin and F.V. Paladino. 2000. Pacific leatherbacks face extinction. Nature 405:529-530.

7. Herbst 1994 and George 1997, cited in Formina, A. et al.. 2007. Fibropapillomatosis confirmed in Chelonia mydas in the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa. Marine Turtles Newsletter 116:20-22

3/8/2007 - Profit from fish farming made deep inside the rock

Profit from fish farming made deep inside the rock

NORWAY
Friday, August 03, 2007, 23:50 (GMT + 9)


Deep inside the hard granite rock, below mountains rising more than 1,000-metre up from the fiord, there is a small tunnell going in to the mountains. Inside the tunnel there is a wide large hall. Though it appears to have been made as a shelter for protection against a nuclear war, it was actually constructed there for farming of fish by the company Norsk Fjellfisk.

Tyssedal is a village built around the metallurgic industry served by hydroelectric power from the more than 2,000-millimetre annual rain fall on the mountain plateau above. The town is nestled in the Sørfjorden fiord on the west coast three hours from the City of Bergen.

The old industrialised village is not where one would expect an aquaculture venture to exist, but in 1997 a local entrepreneur saw the possibility of using heated water from the metallurgic plant, combined with clean waters from the mountain plateau to farm fish.

In the harsh Norwegian climate it is near to impossible to operate a land-based, fresh water, fish farm in the outdoors. The cost of heating water would be enormous, and it would be cheaper to build a hall outside in the open. But a hall needs lots of maintenance, and also needs to be heated, whereas inside the mountain the temperature is stable and maintenance on the “building structure” is nonexistent.

In a country where salmon farming was increasing fast, and hundreds of ventures had gone bust during the early times of production, did not leave leave many believing that the trout venture would succeed: too expensive, too small, and no market. There were many arguments, and they were correct in one thing: the farm went bust.

But new investors came, and today it is the only such farm not just surviving. but also beginning to thrive. Last year they posted a 10 per cent operating profit. The new owners, Hardanger Fjellfisk AS have proven that farming of brown trout inside a mountain can be a good business.

“We have good clean water. The heated water from the metallurgical plants we buy at a cost, which gives us much lower energy cost than if we were buying any other energy,” says farm manager Ove Kambestad. He has been managing the farm since the beginning, and has not lost faith in the project.

“We are doing this alone. There are some other land based farms raising mainly rainbow trout for a production of “rakfisk,” a product in which the fishgoes through a kind of fermentations process. Our fish is now distributed all over the country, from Oslo to Bergen. It is sold via fishmongers, fish displays at supermarkets, and it is widely available in restaurants,” explains Kambestad.

It is early morning, around 4.30 am when Fis.com arrives at the farm, while Kambestad and a colleague are transferring trout from circular tanks to large square tanks with oxygenated water. The trout is transported to a slaughterhouse 80 kilometres away, not an ideal way to go about. New solutions are being discussed to save cost and time.

Now the slaughtering of fish takes place one or two times a week in the modern facilities. If there was a slaughtering facility close to the farm could the slaughtering take place any day during the week.

We are slaughtering all through the year. We have different generations of trout making it possible to harvest the increase in biomass continuously”, tells Kambestad. He is adding that the farm has a total production volume of 1,100 cubic meters. Total time from the trout larvae’s starting to feed, until the fish is ready for harvest with a size of around 5-800 gram, is 18 months.

The biological feed conversion factor is impressive at 0.89, when it started at 1.1 to 1.2 in the initital stage. The current feed factor is better than most Norwegian salmon farms. True, there is a difference between land-based farming and farming in cages in open water, because if feed is fed to salmon and not eaten it tends to sink down and go through the net in the cage. However, feed given to the trout at Hardanger Fjellfisk ,when not consumed, sinks down and lays at the bottom of the cage before being drained out, and the trout has not been feeding much on the feed that sinks down to the bottom of the cage.

Skretting AS, a Nutreco subsidiary, produces the feed used at the farm, and they have developed a special slow sinking formula with the right nutrients for this fish.

“For us Skretting AS has been a very good partner. Not only have they developed feed formula just for our farm. They have also been a very good adviser helping us whenever we have had any problems”, says Kambestad.

There is no real forum were Kambestad can discuss issues regarding farming of trout. Salmon farmers can have their association, and a large number of different venues, exhibitions, conferences meetings where they are meeting to discuss issues of interest. For Kambestad the contact is, as with the rest of the aquaculture industry, really just kept up by dialling the phone number of Skretting.

There are many land-based farms in Europe producing trout, mostly rainbow variety, and a few producing brown trout. Kambestad does not like to compare the quality of the fish with the quality obtained in other European farms.

The fish produced at Hardanger Fjellfisk has its genetic origin from a famous fast growing stock in the Tunhovd Lake. Not only is this stock quick to develop, it also produces very high quality fish. Coupled with the fact that the feed has a content of 80-milligram astaxanthin per kilo, it is easy to understand the difference.

Most brown trout produced anywhere in the world is white in flesh. Hardanger Fjellfisk is using high content of astaxanthin to produce fish with a deep red colour. Norwegian customers will not eat any salmonid fish if the flesh is not a nice and deep red. This is because both the wild salmon and the sought after trout living in the mountains have this deeply red coloured meat.

The annual production is now around 75,000– 80,000 kilos. Last year the company posted an operating profit of around EUR 120,000, against a loss of EUR 23,000 the year before. Hard work and persistence has proven that it is possible to make money deep inside the mountains of a Norwegian fiord.

By Terje Engoe
www.fis.com

Photos: T. Engoe