Fish and chips choices get ethical as Forest and Bird releases new Best Fish Guide

Friday, 24 June 2016

We love our fish and chips, but which seafood on the menu is sustainable? (Video first published in June 2016)

Deciding between battered or crumbed is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to making the right order at the local fish and chip shop.

Making sustainable fish choices has come under close examination in recent months, as Forest and Bird gears up to release its 2016-17 Best Fish Guide later this year.

The guide is a wallet-sized chart ranking 78 of New Zealand's 130 commercially-fished species according to their ecological sustainability, and helps consumers choose the most sustainable fish to buy.

Yoti Ioannou from Theo's Fisheries in Riccarton Rd, Christchurch, with a fresh fish.

In the last guide, blue cod, kahawai, trevally and salmon were given the green light. Tarakihi and gurnard were deemed orange, but snapper, elephant fish and sole (under flat fish) went in the no-go red category.

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Gigi Saweros from Theo's Fisheries in Christchurch. The fish and chip shop is passionate about sustainability.

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Yoti Ioannou says his family's fish and chip shop takes sustainability 'extremely seriously'.

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Forest and Bird Advocacy Manager Kevin Hackwell said the traffic light-style guide encouraged consumers to make sustainable choices.

'We love to see people catching their own fish, but if they are going to buy we want them to be supporting the best practitioners who are supplying the most sustainable fish.

'It is a really important industry and we want to see it done well and done right.'

Hackwell said consumers should avoid buying fish caught by set-netting or bottom trawling.

'Set-netting is completely indiscriminate. It kills penguins, dolphins and all kinds of sea birds. Bottom trawling plunders through coral and sponge forests that are hundreds of years old.'

Theo's Fisheries, in Christchurch, had been in Yoti Ioannou's family for over 66 years. He said his family took the sustainability of their fish extremely seriously.

'I went and worked for the Ministry of Fisheries as an observer on boats so I've seen it all. We make sure all our fish has come from the best, most sustainable sources.'

Ioannou said he had seen a significant increase in the number of people asking about the source of fish over the last few years.

'Nobody ever used to ask, but now we have heaps of people wanting to know where the fish is from and how it was caught and we love it.

'We are really passionate about it so we like telling people.'