Iceland Ocean Cluster Founder and CEO Thor Sigfusson has penned a new book providing a deep dive into the world of seafood sustainability.
The book, 100% Fish, investigates how seafood companies around the world are effectively implementing sustainability measures, providing examples others can learn from.
“I aim to highlight the remarkable strides taken by numerous seafood companies that have harnessed technology and expertise to not only extract value from fish but also to significantly reduce their environmental footprint,” Sigfusson told SeafoodSource. “By sharing more stories about seafood companies successfully attaining their sustainability objectives, we have the potential to inspire a broader shift toward embracing circular seafood practices.
Sigfusson’s book outlines the history of the seafood sustainability movement, which the industry began to take seriously in the mid-1990s, after the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) reported 60 percent of major fisheries were reaching or had already reached full exploitation levels.
Tracing that history to the present day, Sigfusson said he attempted to lay out the topic plainly, while acknowledging the challenge that much of the language used around seafood sustainability is often incredibly complex. He defined seafood sustainability for the industry as encompassing responsible management in which companies actively consider ecological, social, and economic environments in their policies. He said the industry has generally come to acknowledge the industry must pair sustainability with profitability to achieve long-term stability and success.
“This holistic approach is the best way to foster a company’s longevity,” he said.
Founded in response to the seafood sustainability movement, the Iceland Ocean Cluster aims to facilitate the implementation of sustainable solutions in the seafood industry, and especially seafood startups, through knowledge-sharing and the recruitment of help from academia.
In his book, Sigfusson concentrated on illuminating a process through which the industry can achieve 100 percent fish utilization.
“100% Fish means an ongoing search for ways to use seafood better and to be constantly scanning for every opportunity to boost sustainability and the reduction of harmful emissions,” he said. “The future of the seafood industry and our oceans depends on this.”
Sigfusson said there is a large disparity between the industry’s public claims toward recycling and reusing and its actual record. According to the FAO, discard rates in the U.S., Europe, and industrialized parts of Asia are around 9 percent to 15 percent, while the rate in developing countries is around 5 percent to 8 percent. Waste from seafood processing and distribution is between 10 percent and 18 percent globally, with developing countries typically wasting a higher proportion of their product, the FAO found.
Sigfusson said these statistics actually lowball the reality in the industry, saying some sectors, such as the North Atlantic whitefish industry, waste closer to 40 percent of their catch. Anecdotal data from fishery managers in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans also indicate a greater volume of waste than official figures suggest, Sigfusson said.
Consumers also waste a large proportion of the seafood they purchase, at around 40 percent for fresh and frozen fish, compared to just 12 percent for chicken, 16 percent for beef, 25 percent for pork, and 31 percent for turkey.
“In the United Kingdom alone, the annual 6 million metric tons of food waste could be the equivalent of 15 billion meals, and this waste is associated with more than 25 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions,” Sigfusson said.
Sigfusson said the seafood industry must prioritize attaining zero-waste processes, or get as close to that goal as possible, and that doing so could actually provide a net benefit given the growing value streams for using the entirety of each fish caught. Already, he said, there are traditionally lucrative products in the market such as canned liver; smoked and dried sides; heads used for soup; roe; milt; and fish oil. More recent additions to the global marketplace include supplements and nutraceuticals, enzymes, medicines from fish livers and intestines, collagen powder, collagen drinks, cosmetic products, fish leather, and fish skin for treating wounds that all use what is traditionally fish waste.
"The seafood industry has the opportunity to realize its huge potential by bringing on some new thinking and aiming for 100 percent utilization," Sigfusson said.
Photo courtesy of Iceland Ocean Cluster
