New MSC web site - the Good Fish Guide.

There’s No Excuse To Make The Wrong Fish Choice, As Simplified Sustainability Guide Is Launched.

The Marine Conservation Society (MCS) has today launched its most comprehensive sustainable seafood advice to date, giving consumers, industry, chefs and retailers the best chance they’ve ever had to make the right decision when it comes to buying seafood.


MCS says that by making the right choices now, and by varying the types of fish to go with chips or in chowder, consumers can allow depleted fish stocks to recover and ensure future generations have the opportunity to enjoy a fish supper.


A new online consumer guide to sustainable seafood, the Good Fish Guide, at www.goodfishguide.org.uk, gives straightforward advice and recipe ideas to help make buying choices simple and more varied. This site links with the more comprehensive Fishonline website, www.fishonline.org which is already widely used by the public, chefs and industry as a one-stop reference point when sourcing sustainable fish. Fishonline was the tool of choice for celebrity chefs during Channel 4’s Fish Fight series earlier this year, and is updated with easier search functions for fish buyers and consumers wanting to buy sustainably.


The MCS Pocket Good Fish Guide has also been updated, and now includes a credit card-sized guide to purchasing fish, with top buying tips and questions to ask at the fish counter when labelling isn’t sufficiently informative.


MCS Aquaculture and Fisheries Programme Manager, Dr Peter Duncan, says these sources of information are vital to saving fish stocks: “We know that in the UK, 90% of fish sales are from just five species – tuna, cod, salmon, prawns and haddock. But such a limited range causes problems not only for these target species, but also for fish caught accidentally that are then thrown away. We need to change the situation so that maybe 50-70% of sales would come from the top five and alternatives could start appearing – pollack, gurnard, coley, dab, sprats. Such fish have recently been unfashionable or discarded, but they are, in reality, tasty, often cheaper and more sustainable.”


MCS says the upgraded, easier to use versions of their guides provide lots of options for trying something new. They also reveal the best choices for many of those traditional species such as farmed prawns, salmon, cold water prawns and Scottish North Sea Haddock, which have either been farmed organically or caught from sustainable or certified fisheries. However, the charity says consumers may be limited in making the right choices because of poor and confusing labelling at the shopping front line – the supermarket and fish shop.


“The use of a traffic light system to indicate the nutritional value of supermarket produce is now well established. However, sadly, the labelling of fish and fish products sold in supermarkets has not kept up. It is still virtually impossible to tell precisely where most fish and fish products have been caught,” continues Peter Duncan.


MCS will continue to work with the seafood industry and other environmental organisations to ensure that labelling offers more answers than questions, and is firmly on the agenda for fish retailers.

Onshore.

Seaweed piles up on the beach as a fresh onshore wind has been de rigeur for the week......

is the proximity of the drain of significance?........

not sure which crow is vested with a yellow bill?.........

such is the power of the sea, the Wherry Town ruver outfall is now almost buried buy shifting shingle......

early bird gets a say in local politics as the Mission plays Polling Station for the day.......

the compliments abound......

not much doing on the market this morning, other than identifying the scales that aren't working......

big boats = big gear.......

the scallopers do their bit for crab bait........

a mix of pleasure, leisure and work crowd the pontoon berths......

more litter to be collected.......

a chance for all those interested in the Arts to get a hearing in the village next Tuesday and to determine their role on the all important Harbour Commissioner's advisory body........

thew sort of morning sky beloved by landscape artists, rain or sun in the offing in equal measure......

the Dutch gig team still partying after taking part in the World Championships on the Scillys......

Jubilee Pool repairs underway before the season proper starts.

Maria Damanaki talks at Seafood 2011.

European Union Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki addresses a crowd at an Industry Alliance for CFP Reform-organized discussion during the European Seafood Exposition on Wednesday.

In an exclusive interview with SeafoodSource Contributing Editor Lindsey Partos, European Union Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki addresses the challenge of finding common ground among stakeholders without weakening the effectiveness of a reformed Common Fisheries Policy or sacrificing the health of Europe’s fish stocks.

See her deliver the interview here.


  

May Day plus one.

Pen y glas, crabber against the fish market........

 all the boats do their bit at sea fishing for sea litter........

one very strong breeze, the same that prevented the Scillonian III from berthing in St Marys over the weekend thereby preventing the return of hundreds of gig rowers from the World Championships.......

 visiting Irish beamer Willie B makes her first appearance of the year........

Holyhead Towing Company's Colwyn Bay shelters for weather for a couple of days.......

 the same wind blows through the fish market.......

 a least these cracking turbot........

 and monk tails stay cool......

 up the other end of the market, whole monk, as is the norm for Irish boats, from the beamer Willie B.......

 the choppy seas over the weekend seem to have cut the Battery Rocks' swimmers' buoy from its mooring rope.......

it seems the man's on tour........

while the prom is awash at high water.

Busy day on a Dutch seiner UK153.

Our friend on the Lub Senior has had a fishy day today with six shots so far, better than the three he made yesterday.

Battery Rocks swimmers' buoy washed up.

Cornish crab is top table choice at the royal wedding reception.

Apparently, amongst the mainly Scottish seafood spread supplied some sumptuous Cornish crab was also enjoyed by 650 guests at the Royal wedding reception at Buckinham Palace last Friday. No clues as to which Cornish crab company was the honoured supplier.