The four fish we're overeating -- and what to eat instead | Paul Greenberg

Summary

The speaker reflects on the decline in fish biodiversity, noting a childhood spent fishing in Connecticut. He observes a global trend of market reduction to four main seafoods: shrimp, tuna, salmon, and cod. He critiques current fishing practices, highlighting the environmental costs of shrimp farming and the inefficiency of tuna aquaculture. The speaker advocates for more sustainable seafood choices, such as mussels and seaweed, and ponders the potential of creating a new type of fish for aquaculture that could be a net gain for marine protein.

Takeaways

• 🐟 The speaker's personal experience of fishing in Connecticut changed dramatically over time, with a noticeable decrease in the variety of fish, akin to a sports team losing many players.
• 🌍 The global fish market has seen a significant reduction in diversity, with shrimp, tuna, salmon, and cod becoming the most commonly available seafood options worldwide.
• 🔍 The speaker's investigation into this phenomenon led to the realization that the reduction in seafood variety is not unique to his personal experience but is a global trend.
• 🚀 Post-World War II advancements in technology, such as sonar and lightweight polymers, have been redirected towards fishing, leading to a massive increase in fishing capacity and a subsequent reduction in fish populations.
• 🌊 The current annual removal of fish from the oceans is equivalent to the weight of the entire human population of China, indicating the scale of the impact on marine ecosystems.
• 🦐 Shrimp farming is particularly harmful to the environment, destroying mangrove forests and contributing to bycatch issues, which are then ground up and used as feed for the shrimp.
• 🐠 Tuna management is complex due to its global nature, requiring international cooperation for effective conservation, but aquaculture is not a viable solution due to tuna's high energy demands and speed.
• 🐟 Salmon farming has improved in terms of feed conversion ratios but continues to have significant environmental impacts, including the use of wild fish as feed and the proliferation of aquaculture.
• 🐟 The term 'whitefish' encompasses various fish species, often used as a low-cost protein source in processed foods. The Filet-O-Fish sandwich is a case study in how market demands have led to overfishing of certain species.
• 🌱 Alternatives to the current seafood consumption patterns include eating more bivalves like mussels, which are high in omega-3s and have a lower environmental impact, or considering vegetarian sources of protein like seaweed.
• 🔬 The potential for creating a new type of aquacultured fish that is vegetarian, fast-growing, and high in omega-3s exists but has not yet been scaled up to meet global demand.

Q & A

What significant change did the speaker notice in his fishing experience when he returned to Connecticut in the early 90s?

The speaker noticed that his team of fish had shrunk, indicating a decline in the variety and number of fish in the area where he used to fish.

What four types of seafood are commonly found in fish markets around the world according to the speaker?

The four types of seafood commonly found are shrimp, tuna, salmon, and cod.

How does the speaker relate the reduction in seafood variety to historical human behavior?

The speaker relates the reduction in seafood variety to historical human behavior by pointing out that humans have a tendency to simplify the natural world, as evidenced by the narrowing of species in fire pits from 10,000 years ago to the domestication of a few key animal species like pigs, cows, sheep, and goats.

What technological advancements from World War II were redirected towards fishing?

Technological advancements such as sonar and lightweight polymers that were perfected during World War II were redirected towards fishing.

What is the current global fishing capacity in terms of the amount of fish taken out of the sea annually?

The current global fishing capacity is between 80 and 90 million metric tons taken out of the sea every year.

Why is shrimp farming considered environmentally harmful according to the speaker?

Shrimp farming is considered environmentally harmful because it often takes place in mangrove forests, which are important for soil retention, coastal protection, and providing habitats for young marine life. Additionally, the process involves significant destruction of these ecosystems.

What is the 'Grinding Nemo' phenomenon mentioned by the speaker?

The 'Grinding Nemo' phenomenon refers to the practice of catching a large amount of bycatch, which is then ground up and used as shrimp feed, contributing to an ecosystem that is essentially eating itself.

Why is tuna a poor candidate for aquaculture according to the speaker?

Tuna is a poor candidate for aquaculture because they are warm-blooded and can swim at high speeds, which eliminates the advantages of farming a fish that is typically cold-blooded and less active.

What is the issue with salmon farming as described in the script?

The issue with salmon farming is that it initially required a significant amount of wild fish to produce a pound of salmon, and despite improvements, the industry's rapid growth means a large number of small fish are still being used as feed.

What is the significance of the Filet-O-Fish sandwich in the context of the script?

The Filet-O-Fish sandwich is significant because it illustrates the shift in fish species used for the sandwich due to cost and availability, starting from halibut to Atlantic cod, and now primarily Alaska pollock, reflecting broader trends in the fishing industry.

What alternative protein sources does the speaker suggest as a more sustainable option for our food system?

The speaker suggests bivalves like mussels and seaweed as alternative protein sources that are high in omega-3s, protein, and are more sustainable due to their efficiency in water filtration and low carbon footprint.

Outlines

00:00

🐟 The Shrinking Seafood Variety

The speaker reminisces about his childhood fishing experiences in Connecticut and the variety of marine life he observed. He contrasts this with his return in the 1990s to find a significant reduction in biodiversity, akin to a sports team losing players. He explores the global seafood market's focus on four main species—shrimp, tuna, salmon, and cod—and questions the sustainability of this narrow selection. The speaker delves into the post-World War II industrialization of fishing, leading to an exponential increase in fishing capacity and a massive extraction of marine life, equating to the weight of China's population annually. The narrative also touches on the rise of aquaculture, particularly in China, and its environmental implications.

05:02

🌍 Global Impacts of Seafood Consumption

The speaker discusses the environmental and ethical issues surrounding the four most consumed seafood items in the West: shrimp, tuna, salmon, and 'whitefish.' He details the inefficiencies and ecological damage caused by shrimp farming, including habitat destruction and the 'Grinding Nemo' phenomenon where bycatch is turned into feed. Tuna management is critiqued for its global complexity and the challenges of conservation. Salmon farming's success is juxtaposed with its ecological footprint, including the reduction of wild salmon habitats due to dam construction. The speaker also addresses the transformation of the Filet-O-Fish sandwich from halibut to pollock, reflecting broader trends in seafood substitution and the industry's reliance on a few key species.

10:05

🌱 Alternatives for Sustainable Seafood

The speaker suggests alternative solutions for sustainable seafood consumption, emphasizing the potential of lesser-known species like clupeids and bivalves like mussels. He highlights the high omega-3 content and carbon efficiency of these options, proposing a shift in consumer preference and market demand. The speaker also advocates for the consideration of seaweed as a marine vegetable rich in nutrients and its potential use in cattle feed to reduce water usage. He concludes with a call for the development and scaling of a new type of aquacultured fish that could provide a net gain in marine protein and omega-3s, urging a move towards more sustainable seafood choices.

Keywords

💡Overfishing

Overfishing refers to the practice of catching fish at a rate that is faster than their capacity to reproduce and replenish, leading to a decline in fish populations. In the video, the speaker discusses how overfishing has led to a 'shrinking' of his 'team' of fish, indicating a personal and environmental loss. The script mentions the dramatic increase in fishing capacity post-World War II, which has contributed to overfishing on a global scale.

💡Aquaculture

Aquaculture, also known as fish farming, is the practice of raising fish in controlled environments. The speaker in the video points out the boom in aquaculture, noting that it has started to exceed the amount of wild fish caught. However, he also highlights issues such as the environmental impact of shrimp farming in mangrove forests and the inefficiency of tuna farming due to their warm-blooded nature.

💡Bycatch

Bycatch refers to the unintentional capture of non-target fish and marine species during fishing operations. The script mentions 'Grinding Nemo,' a phenomenon where bycatch, including species valuable to reef ecosystems, is ground up and used as shrimp feed, illustrating the broader ecological consequences of certain fishing practices.

💡Mangrove Deficit

Mangrove Deficit describes the loss of mangrove forests due to human activities such as shrimp farming. The speaker discusses how these forests are important for coastal protection and as habitats for young marine life. The destruction of mangroves for aquaculture has significant environmental implications, as highlighted in the video.

💡Sustainable Seafood

Sustainable Seafood pertains to fish and other seafood that is sourced or farmed in ways that do not deplete natural resources, maintain ecological balance, and ensure the health of marine ecosystems. The video discusses the unsustainable practices in the seafood industry and suggests alternatives like consuming bivalves or seaweed, which have a lower environmental impact.

💡Omega-3 Fatty Acids

Omega-3 Fatty Acids are essential nutrients that are found in certain fish and are known for their health benefits, particularly for heart and brain health. The speaker in the video mentions the desire for fish with an 'oily fish profile,' referring to those rich in EPA and DHA, which are types of omega-3 fatty acids. The video also discusses the potential for alternative sources like mussels and seaweed to provide these nutrients sustainably.

💡Carbon Intensity

Carbon Intensity measures the amount of greenhouse gas emissions produced per unit of activity, in this case, per pound of fish caught or farmed. The video script points out that shrimp fishing is one of the most carbon-intensive methods, highlighting the environmental costs of certain seafood production practices.

💡Fisheries Management

Fisheries Management involves the regulation and oversight of fishing practices to ensure the sustainable use of fish stocks. The speaker mentions ICCAT, the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas, as an example of a management organization that has room for improvement in its global efforts to conserve tuna stocks.

💡Aquafeed

Aquafeed is the feed used in aquaculture to nourish farmed fish. The video discusses the inefficiency of using wild fish as a primary ingredient in aquafeed, particularly for salmon farming, and suggests the need for more sustainable feed alternatives.

💡Bivalves

Bivalves are a class of marine and freshwater mollusks that include mussels, oysters, and clams. The speaker in the video suggests bivalves as a sustainable seafood option because they filter feed, requiring no forage fish, and are high in omega-3 fatty acids, making them an environmentally friendly choice.

💡Seaweed

Seaweed, or macroalgae, is a type of marine algae that can be farmed for various uses, including as a food source. The video script highlights seaweed as a potential sustainable protein source that can be used in animal feed, reducing the pressure on wild fish stocks and providing a resource that requires minimal water and land.

Highlights

The speaker's personal connection to fishing and the changes they've witnessed in their local fishing grounds.

The surprising uniformity of seafood available in markets worldwide, with a focus on four main species.

The historical reduction in the diversity of animals consumed by humans, paralleling the current trend in seafood.

The post-World War II technological advancements that have led to an exponential increase in fishing capacity.

The environmental impact of shrimp farming, including the destruction of mangrove forests and the 'Grinding Nemo' phenomenon.

The challenges in managing global fish like tuna and the inefficiencies of tuna aquaculture.

The historical decline of wild salmon populations due to dam construction and the rise of salmon aquaculture.

The evolution of the Filet-O-Fish sandwich and the implications for fish species selection in the industry.

The concept of 'whitefish' and the sustainability issues surrounding the species used for this market segment.

The potential of using forage fish directly for human consumption instead of as feed for other seafood.

The nutritional and environmental benefits of consuming bivalves like mussels as an alternative to traditional seafood.

The possibility of seaweed as a sustainable source of protein and its potential to improve water quality.

The theoretical development of an ideal aquacultured fish that could provide a net gain of marine protein and omega-3s.

A call to action for a more mindful and sustainable approach to seafood consumption and production.

The importance of aligning our seafood choices with our minds rather than just our appetites for a healthier ocean ecosystem.

Transcripts

So when I was a kid ...

this was my team.

(Laughter)

I stunk at sports.

I didn't like to play them, I didn't like to watch them.

So this is what I did. I went fishing.

And for all of my growing up I fished on the shores of Connecticut,

and these are the creatures that I saw on a regular basis.

But after I grew up and went to college,

and I came home in the early 90's,

this is what I found.

My team had shrunk.

It was like literally having your roster devastated.

And as I sort of looked into that,

from a very personal point of view as a fisherman,

I started to kind of figure out,

well, what was the rest of the world thinking about it?

First place I started to look was fish markets.

And when I went to fish markets,

in spite of where I was --

whether I was in North Carolina, or Paris, or London, or wherever --

I kept seeing this weirdly repeating trope of four creatures,

again and again --

on the menus, on ice --

shrimp, tuna, salmon and cod.

And I thought this was pretty strange,

and as I looked at it, I was wondering,

did anyone else notice this sort of shrinking of the market?

Well, when I looked into it,

I realized that people didn't look at it as their team.

Ordinary people, the way they looked at seafood was like this.

It's not an unusual human characteristic

to reduce the natural world down to very few elements.

We did it before, 10,000 years ago, when we came out of our caves.

If you look at fire pits from 10,000 years ago,

you'll see raccoons, you'll see, you know, wolves,

you'll see all kinds of different creatures.

But if you telescope to the age of -- you know, 2,000 years ago,

you'll see these four mammals:

pigs, cows, sheep and goats.

It's true of birds, too.

You look at the menus in New York City restaurants

150 years ago, 200 years ago,

you'll see snipe, woodcock, grouse, dozens of ducks, dozens of geese.

But telescope ahead to the age of modern animal husbandry,

and you'll see four:

turkeys, ducks, chicken and geese.

So it makes sense that we've headed in this direction.

But how have we headed in this direction?

Well ...

first it's a very, very new problem.

This is the way we've been fishing the oceans over the last 50 years.

World War II was a tremendous incentive to arm ourselves in a war against fish.

All of the technology that we perfected during World War II --

sonar, lightweight polymers --

all these things were redirected towards fish.

And so you see this tremendous buildup in fishing capacity,

quadrupling in the course of time,

from the end of World War II to the present time.

And right now that means

we're taking between 80 and 90 million metric tons out of the sea every year.

That's the equivalent of the human weight of China

taken out of the sea every year.

And it's no coincidence that I use China as the example

because China is now the largest fishing nation in the world.

Well, that's only half the story.

The other half of the story

is this incredible boom in fish farming and aquaculture,

which is now, only in the last year or two,

starting to exceed the amount of wild fish that we produce.

So that if you add wild fish and farmed fish together,

you get the equivalent of two Chinas created from the ocean

each and every year.

And again, it's not a coincidence that I use China as the example,

because China, in addition to being the biggest catcher of fish,

is also the biggest farmer of fish.

So let's look though at the four choices we are making right now.

The first one --

by far the most consumed seafood in America and in much of the West,

is shrimp.

Shrimp in the wild -- as a wild product --

is a terrible product.

5, 10, 15 pounds of wild fish are regularly killed

to bring one pound of shrimp to the market.

They're also incredibly fuel inefficient to bring to the market.

In a recent study that was produced out of Dalhousie University,

it was found that dragging for shrimp

is one of the most carbon-intensive ways of fishing that you can find.

So you can farm them,

and people do farm them,

and they farm them a lot in this very area.

Problem is ...

the place where you farm shrimp is in these wild habitats --

in mangrove forests.

Now look at those lovely roots coming down.

Those are the things that hold soil together,

protect coasts, create habitats for all sorts of young fish, young shrimp,

all sorts of things that are important to this environment.

Well, this is what happens to a lot of coastal mangrove forests.

We've lost millions of acres of coastal mangroves

over the last 30 or 40 years.

That rate of destruction has slowed,

but we're still in a major mangrove deficit.

The other thing that's going on here

is a phenomenon that the filmmaker Mark Benjamin called "Grinding Nemo."

This phenomenon is very, very relevant

to anything that you've ever seen on a tropical reef.

Because what's going on right now,

we have shrimp draggers dragging for shrimp,

catching a huge amount of bycatch,

that bycatch in turn gets ground up and turned into shrimp food.

And sometimes, many of these vessels --

manned by slaves --

are catching these so-called "trash fish,"

fish that we would love to see on a reef,

grinding them up

and turning them into shrimp feed --

an ecosystem literally eating itself and spitting out shrimp.

The next most consumed seafood in America,

and also throughout the West,

is tuna.

So tuna is this ultimate global fish.

These huge management areas have to be observed

in order for tuna to be well managed.

Our own management area,

called a Regional Fisheries Management Organization,

is called ICCAT,

the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas.

The great naturalist Carl Safina once called it,

"The International Conspiracy to Catch all the Tunas."

Of course we've seen incredible improvement

in ICCAT in the last few years,

there is total room for improvement,

but it remains to be said that tuna is a global fish,

and to manage it, we have to manage the globe.

Well, we could also try to grow tuna

but tuna is a spectacularly bad animal for aquaculture.

Many people don't know this but tuna are warm-blooded.

They can heat their bodies 20 degrees above ambient temperature,

they can swim at over 40 miles an hour.

So that pretty much eliminates

all the advantages of farming a fish, right?

A farmed fish is --

or a fish is cold-blooded, it doesn't move too much.

That's a great thing for growing protein.

But if you've got this crazy, wild creature

that swims at 40 miles an hour and heats its blood --

not a great candidate for aquaculture.

The next creature --

most consumed seafood in America and throughout the West --

is salmon.

Now salmon got its plundering, too,

but it didn't really necessarily happen through fishing.

This is my home state of Connecticut.

Connecticut used to be home to a lot of wild salmon.

But if you look at this map of Connecticut,

every dot on that map is a dam.

There are over 3,000 dams in the state of Connecticut.

I often say this is why people in Connecticut are so uptight --

(Laughter)

If somebody could just unblock Connecticut's chi,

I feel that we could have an infinitely better world.

But I made this particular comment

at a convention once of national parks officers,

and this guy from North Carolina sidled up to me, he says,

"You know, you oughtn't be so hard on your Connecticut,

cause we here in North Carolina, we got 35,000 dams."

So it's a national epidemic, it's an international epidemic.

And there are dams everywhere,

and these are precisely the things

that stop wild salmon from reaching their spawning grounds.

So as a result, we've turned to aquaculture,

and salmon is one the most successful, at least from a numbers point of view.

When they first started farming salmon,

it could take as many as six pounds of wild fish

to make a single pound of salmon.

The industry has, to its credit, greatly improved.

They've gotten it below two to one,

although it's a little bit of a cheat

because if you look at the way aquaculture feed is produced,

they're measuring pellets --

pounds of pellets per pound of salmon.

Those pellets are in turn reduced fish.

So the actual -- what's called the FIFO, the fish in and the fish out --

kind of hard to say.

But in any case,

credit to the industry,

it has lowered the amount of fish per pound of salmon.

Problem is we've also gone crazy

with the amount of salmon that we're producing.

Aquaculture is the fastest growing food system on the planet.

It's growing at something like seven percent per year.

And so even though we're doing less per fish

to bring it to the market,

we're still killing a lot of these little fish.

And it's not just fish that we're feeding fish to,

we're also feeding fish to chickens and pigs.

So we've got chickens and they're eating fish,

but weirdly, we also have fish that are eating chickens.

Because the byproducts of chickens -- feathers, blood, bone --

get ground up and fed to fish.

So I often wonder,

is there a fish that ate a chicken that ate a fish?

It's sort of a reworking of the chicken and egg thing. Anyway --

(Laughter)

All together, though, it results in a terrible mess.

What you're talking about

is something between 20 and 30 million metric tons of wild creatures

that are taken from the ocean and used and ground up.

That's the equivalent of a third of a China,

or of an entire United States of humans

that's taken out of the sea each and every year.

The last of the four is a kind of amorphous thing.

It's what the industry calls "whitefish."

There are many fish that get cycled into this whitefish thing

but the way to kind of tell the story, I think,

is through that classic piece of American culinary innovation,

the Filet-O-Fish sandwich.

So the Filet-O-Fish sandwich actually started as halibut.

And it started because a local franchise owner

found that when he served his McDonald's on Friday, nobody came.

Because it was a Catholic community, they needed fish.

So he went to Ray Kroc and he said,

"I'm going to bring you a fish sandwich, going to be made out of halibut."

Ray Kroc said, "I don't think it's going to work.

I want to do a Hula Burger,

and there's going to be a slice of pineapple on a bun.

But let's do this, let's have a bet.

Whosever sandwich sells more, that will be the winning sandwich."

Well, it's kind of sad for the ocean that the Hula Burger didn't win.

So he made his halibut sandwich.

Unfortunately though, the sandwich came in at 30 cents.

Ray wanted the sandwich to come in at 25 cents,

so he turned to Atlantic cod.

We all know what happened to Atlantic cod in New England.

So now the Filet-O-Fish sandwich is made out of Alaska pollock,

it's the largest fin fish fishery in the United States,

2 to 3 billion pounds of fish taken out of the sea every single year.

If we go through the pollock,

the next choice is probably going to be tilapia.

Tilapia is one of those fish nobody ever heard of 20 years ago.

It's actually a very efficient converter of plant protein into animal protein,

and it's been a godsend to the third world.

It's actually a tremendously sustainable solution,

it goes from an egg to an adult in nine months.

The problem is that when you look about the West,

it doesn't do what the West wants it to do.

It really doesn't have what's called an oily fish profile.

It doesn't have the EPA and DHA omega-3s

that we all think are going to make us live forever.

So what do we do?

I mean, first of all, what about this poor fish, the clupeids?

The fish that represent a huge part of that 20 to 30 million metric tons.

Well, one possibility that a lot of conservationists have raised

is could we eat them?

Could we eat them directly instead of feeding them to salmon?

There are arguments for it.

They are tremendously fuel efficient to bring to market,

a fraction of the fuel cost of say, shrimp,

and at the very top of the carbon efficiency scale.

They also are omega-3 rich, a great source for EPA and DHA.

So that is a potential.

And if we were to go down that route what I would say is,

instead of paying a few bucks a pound -- or a few bucks a ton, really --

and making it into aquafeed,

could we halve the catch and double the price for the fishermen

and make that our way of treating these particular fish?

Other possibility though, which is much more interesting,

is looking at bivalves, particularly mussels.

Now, mussels are very high in EPA and DHA, they're similar to canned tuna.

They're also extremely fuel efficient.

To bring a pound of mussels to market

is about a thirtieth of the carbon as required to bring beef to market.

They require no forage fish,

they actually get their omega-3s by filtering the water of microalgae.

In fact, that's where omega-3s come from, they don't come from fish.

Microalgae make the omega-3s, they're only bioconcentrated in fish.

Mussels and other bivalves

do tremendous amounts of water filtration.

A single mussel can filter dozens of gallons every single day.

And this is incredibly important when we look at the world.

Right now, nitrification, overuse of phosphates in our waterways

are causing tremendous algal blooms.

Over 400 new dead zones have been created in the last 20 years,

tremendous sources of marine life death.

We also could look at not a fish at all.

We could look at a vegetable.

We could look at seaweed, the kelps,

all these different varieties of things that can be high in omega-3s,

can be high in proteins,

tremendously good things.

They filter the water just like mussels do.

And weirdly enough,

it turns out that you can actually feed this to cows.

Now, I'm not a big fan of cattle.

But if you wanted to keep growing cattle

in a time and place where water resources are limited,

you're growing seaweed in the water, you don't have to water it --

major consideration.

And the last fish is a question mark.

We have the ability to create aquacultured fish

that creates a net gain of marine protein for us.

This creature would have to be vegetarian,

it would have to be fast growing,

it would have to be adaptable to a changing climate

and it would have to have that oily fish profile,

that EPA, DHA, omega-3 fatty acid profile that we're looking for.

This exists kind of on paper.

I have been reporting on these subjects for 15 years.

Every time I do a new story, somebody tells me,

"We can do all that. We can do it. We've figured it all out.

We can produce a fish

that's a net gain of marine protein and has omega-3s."

Great.

It doesn't seem to be getting scaled up.

It is time to scale this up.

If we do,

30 million metric tons of seafood, a third of the world catch,

stays in the water.

So I guess what I'm saying is this is what we've been going with.

We tend to go with our appetites rather than our minds.

But if we went with this, or some configuration of it,

we might have a little more of this.

Thank you.

(Applause)