Santa Monica Seafood of Rancho Dominguez, Calif., has pledged to buy the majority of its seafood from sustainable sources within the next five years, Ed Cassano, director of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program, told SeafoodSource on Tuesday.
The announcement comes as the aquarium officially unveiled “State of Seafood: Turning the Tide” at a press event in Los Angeles on Tuesday. The report, which comes on Seafood Watch’s 10th anniversary and will be updated biennially, serves as a benchmark for the sustainable seafood movement.
Santa Monica Seafood “is a big buyer, with a diverse clientele,” said Cassano.
The hope is that more chefs and retailers will become engaged in the Seafood Watch program through their relationship with Santa Monica Seafood, he explained.
More than two dozen chefs, including Alton Brown, Rick Bayless and Rick Moonen, have already joined the program’s “Save Our Seafood” campaign by pledging to shun species on the Seafood Watch seafood-buying guide’s list of species to avoid due to environmental concerns. Many of the chefs are already involved in the program and participate in the aquarium’s annual Cooking for Solutions event, but the hope is that more chefs will join the program as word of the “State of Seafood” report spreads, said Cassano.
The report is designed to be approachable and positive, he added, and highlights Atlantic swordfish as an example of a fishery that’s on the road to recovery. The species has moved off the seafood-buying guide’s “avoid” list and into its “good alternatives” category.
Cassano reiterated that the aquarium is open to helping more fisheries move off the guide’s “avoid” list. He also emphasized the need for environmentalists and seafood buyers to work more actively with fishermen and fish farmers to improve access to sustainable seafood, as demand for sustainable seafood is only rising.
“There’s great reason to be hopeful,” said Cassano. “Things are turning around, but we need to keep our foot on the gas.”
Copies of “State of Seafood” are available on the aquarium’s Web site.
