Here’s a look at SeafoodSource’s most-read stories and commentaries of this week:
5) Global per-capita seafood consumption reached an all-time high in 2008, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization’s “The State of the World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2010” report, released this week. Consumers worldwide consumed 115 million tons of seafood in 2008, with global seafood production reaching 142 million tons.
4) SeafoodSource Contributing Editor Mike Urch called out Tesco, questioning whether it has the measures in place to ensure that it offers its customers fish caught by methods that protect the marine environment, as it proudly boasts on its product labels. Tesco has pledged by the end of 2012 to sell only tuna caught by pole-and-line, and Urch said that, for consumers’ sake, Tesco should sorts out its quality control.
3) The newly formed Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture (GAAIA) this week launched an international campaign against “Big Aquaculture.” The “Salmon Farming Kills” campaign employs graphic imagery similar to the “Smoking Kills” campaigns against Big Tobacco and warns of the dangers of salmon farming, which the group’s global coordinator says should carry a health warning.
2) Rising labor costs on China’s east coast, where most of the country’s seafood processing is centered, show no signs of letting up. In the past year, labor costs have jumped between 10 and 20 percent, according to one Dalian-based seafood exporter. The exporter also believes wages will increase at a similar rate this year. Rising labor costs are attributed to the country’s rural labor pool being tapped as part of a new government program.
1) The U.S. government this week released its dietary guidelines, and, for the first time, it urged Americans, including pregnant and breastfeeding women, to eat seafood at least twice a week for heart and brain benefits. Previously, the twice-a-week recommendation was limited to heart patients. The move was praised by industry insiders, including Slade Gorton & Co. and the National Fisheries Institute, whose registered dietitian said the guidelines may lead the Food and Drug Administration and Environmental Protection Aagency to change their seafood-consumption advisory for methylmercury.
