Marks & Spencer to change tuna policy
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Independent Minds
Marks & Spencer is to change the way it sources tuna amid rising concern about over-fishing.
By the end of this month, M&S said it would become the first UK food retailer to source only pole & line or line-caught tuna for its fresh foods from sandwiches to fresh steaks. By the end of this year, it hopes to source only pole and line-caught fish for its canned tuna.
Conservationists say pole and line and line-caught are the best for ensuring that fishing boats do not kill other species such as turtles and sharks.
Concern about over-fishing has been growing ahead of the nationwide release this Friday of a new film about over-fishing, The End of the Line, which charts the decline of bluefin tuna - which M&S has never stocked, but which is on the verge of extinction in the Mediterranean due to demand for sushi and sashimi. The restaurant chain Nobu has insisted it will keep serving bluefin while advising diners to choose more sustainable dishes.
Princes and John West tuna brands were criticised by Greenpeace last year for buying most of their fish from boats using purse seine nets, which snare other species thrown back into the sea dead.
M&S said it was switching all of its canned tuna to pole and line caught skipjack, the most plentiful tuna species, while its fresh tuna will be line-caught yellow-fin.
In the pole and line system, tuna attracted by bait thrown into the water are hooked onboard while targeted line fishing is similar to angling. Both systems eliminate by-catch.
Paul Willgoss, M&S head of technology, said: “We know that fish sustainability is big concern for our customers and we want to make it as easy as possible for them to buy delicious food that they can trust. Now every time they walk into an M&S store they can be rest assured that whether they buy a tuna sandwich or a tasty tuna pasta bake, it has been made using pole and line or line-caught tuna.”
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Comments
The gesture from M&S is welcomed, but we should bear in mind that longline fishing is carried out on an industial scale too with the lines being upto 100km (approx 62 miles) long. So even with this method its possible to catch species other than the tuna. But it is somewhat better than the "shotgun" effect of catching everything in the long nets.
Eating animals is wrong for many other reasons too, the production of meat and animal products for mass consumption, especially through factory farming, is environmentally unsustainable.
According to a 2006 United Nations initiative, the livestock industry is one of the largest contributors to environmental degradation worldwide, and modern practices of raising animals for food contributes on a "massive scale" to air and water pollution, land degradation, climate change, and loss of biodiversity. The initiative concluded that "the livestock sector emerges as one of the top two or three most significant contributors to the most serious environmental problems, at every scale from local to global."
It requires 10 times as many crops to feed animals being bred for meat production as it would to feed the same number of people on a vegetarian diet.
If you eat fish, you are supporting an industry that plunders our oceans with no regard for the horrible pain and suffering that fish and other marine animals endure or for the diverse ocean ecosystem that is imperative to the survival of all underwater life.
Scientists warn that the damage caused by the fishing industry is irreparable. If you care about the environment, leave fish off your plate and in the ocean where they belong.
Humans have canine teeth and are carnivarous. Its not possible to converts humanity into vegetaranians. However, we need to consume in moderation, farm with care, avoid wasting food and so on.
On the other hand, all the prophecies for the final phase for mankind are valid now, so just carry on living a good life and watch it happen...