What is fresh, local fish worth to you? What costs more- a fish that is caught in the Philippines, frozen then shipped to Hawaii- or a fish that is caught in Hawaii then sold? Why are people sitting on the Lanai of some luxury hotel watching fishing boats on the horizon while eating an “onaga” snapper that was caught in Malaysia? Why does Hawaii export 40% of the fish it produces while importing 70% of the fish it consumes?
When I worked at a hotel we had a small budget to feed our employees. Normally we couldn’t afford fish- but sometimes, when they were on sale, we would buy boxes of frozen mahi mahi filets from the fish company for the employee cafeteria. They would come in thirty pound cases, frozen solid, labeled “product of the Philippines”. On the same day we would receive fresh mahi mahi from a local fisherman and pay four dollars per pound for the whole fish. When you adjust this price for the yield of an average fish, the price per pound jumps to eight dollars. Now, if someone in San Francisco wanted this same filet they might pay twelve dollars per pound. The price per pound of the mahi filet from the Philippines was under three dollars.
Many of the employees at the hotel ate the staff lunches with great enthusiasm; I was not one of them. When the box of mahi mahi was opened to defrost the filets wept a clear brine that smelled of formaldehyde, and no matter how hot the pan, the flesh refused to brown. We would often use strong Thai curries to cover the tainted smell of the fish. At the time I naively assumed this stench was the tell tale sign of a fish packed in a last ditch effort to preserve it for commercial sale, but the true source is far more disturbing.
The Filipinos make more money selling their fish to Hawaii than selling it locally, and the Hawaiians make more money selling their fish to the mainland than keeping it to sell locally. So the Hawaiians are eating Mahi that was caught in the Philippines so they can sell their catch to the mainland, while the Filipinos are eating fish that was imported from China because they can’t afford to keep fish caught locally.
Even off the coast of New York blue fin tuna are regularly exported to Japan because local markets cannot keep up with Tokyo prices. These Tuna are cryogenically frozen and cut with giant band-saws before being sold at high end sushi bars.
Is it just me, or does it seem like everyone is eating old fish? Filipinos are eating Frozen Chinese fish. Hawaiians are eating frozen Filipino fish. People on Mainland America are eating old Hawaiian fish and Japanese are eating old fish from everywhere. Hardly anyone is eating fresh fish because they would rather sell it to someone else!
And now we come to the more ominous portion of this story. Beyond the obvious issues of food quality and fuel cost, there are even more disturbing things to consider. In 2007 the FDA rejected over 200 shipments of farmed fish from China citing the use of illegal drugs, chemicals or other preservatives. Less developed nations are unable to detect contaminants that may pose a public safety risk. In 2005 over sixty percent of the restaurants in Indonesia were found to be serving fish contaminated with formaldehyde, a tissue preservative commonly used in embalming fluid. In 2007 Vietnam suffered a similar epidemic. Late last year the The Tambuyog Development Center, an organization focused on promoting sustainable fisheries in the Philippines, issued a statement saying that the government should not participate in the global food trade. Executive director Milo Tanchuling said, “How can the government allow liberalized trade policy when it cannot assure public safety?”
Over the last twenty years China has grown into a dominant force in the global fish market. Currently they produce 115 billion pounds of seafood, or roughly 70% of all globally farmed fish. This astounding figure is made possible by the roughly 4.5 million independent fish farms that operate in lakes, beaches and rivers around the country. With few environmental regulations, and almost no enforcement, these farms depend on heavily dousing the water with antibiotics and pesticides to enable the fish to live in water so contaminated it’s considered toxic.
Thankfully things here at home are different! We have a sophisticated network of government funded agencies that insure we are protected. On any given Sunday afternoon we can pick up a few snapper filets at the neighborhood grocery and know that they are wholesome. Or can we?
On my quest to understand the irony of the global seafood trade I stumbled across some interesting reports created by the United States Government Accountability Office outlining some of their concerns with imported seafood. I have provided a few of the most shocking portions below- but would encourage you to do your own research at HYPERLINK "http://www.gao.gov" www.gao.gov (search “seafood”)
“ The FDA has to rely on labor-intensive inspections of products at the port of
entry as its primary line of defense against the entry of unsafe foods. We
continue to believe that port-of-entry inspections alone do not effectively
ensure the safety of imported seafood.” 2001
“More than 80 percent of the seafood that Americans consume is imported. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for ensuring that imported seafood is safe and produced under sanitation and safety systems comparable to those of the United States. Since GAO reported in 2001 that FDA's seafood inspection program did not sufficiently protect consumers, additional concerns have arisen about imported seafood containing banned substances, such as certain antibiotics. GAO found that FDA continues to experience long delays between finding deficiencies and taking action. For example, GAO's review of foreign firm inspection records found that it took an average of 348 days for FDA to alert port-of entry personnel about serious safety problems identified at six foreign firms.” 2004
“In 2007, Americans consumed almost 5 billion pounds of seafood. Most seafood buyers, at many levels--importers, distributors, supermarkets, restaurants, and individual consumers--assume that the seafood they buy is what the seller claims it is. However, this is not always the case. Sometimes seafood products are mislabeled for financial gain--an activity called seafood fraud. The FDA examines only about 2 percent of imported seafood annually” 2009
In other words, the FDA has failed to fix problems that were identified over twelve years ago, problems that pose serious concerns to American consumers. Let’s not forget the incident in 2007 when over 6,000 pounds of highly toxic puffer fish entered the US labeled as Monk Fish. A portion of this product ended up at fish markets in Hawaii and several people in Chicago became ill after consuming the tainted flesh. Each puffer fish, called fugu in Japan, contains enough tetrodotoxin to kill 30 adults; not exactly the kind of fish you want your neighborhood chef getting ahold of.
All of this news is especially tragic for Hawaii, an island state that once sustained itself from the bounties of the sea,relying solely on family and friends to provide for the community. Now, with no tangible connection from source to table, Hawaii faces a grave culinary future and further loss of its cultural heritage and identity.
What is the fresh, local fish worth to you now?
No comments:
Post a Comment