Two interesting and equally extreme points of view: (1) our seafood resources are robust and (2) it is a stretch that regional local subsistence economies can survive.
The facts only support one view, that is, wild marine fisheries are under siege. Any rebound in wild seafood populations reflect only the smallest first steps in what will be a decades long process to rebuild even a shadow of the bounty the seas once held. We must continue to restrict our consumption of wild seafood to rebuild the ocean eco-sytems and begin to better understand the effects of environmental toxins contained in seafood.
Furthermore, I truly believe all evidence is that local and regional sustenance fisheries can exist and are in fact the best way to allow local communities to maintain their cultural connection to the sea while permitting a limited harvest of recovering seafood species.
I was once a big supporter of Tim O'Shea and CleanFish, but when corporate success and meeting investor goals trumps the health of the planet and local communities, we need to question the motivation behind the eco-slogans. We must accept that globalization is rarely virtuous, it is an expression of economic Darwinism that will and does destroy local communities that rely on the sea for their survival.
My company has adopted the principal of "cultural sustainability" as its credo. We support local fisheries and communities by promoting responsibly caught and managed local fisheries. At the same time we encourage aquaculture as the highest and most environmentally friendly form of agriculture.
The future is not some globalized food system, it is local people producing food for their communities. We must remain connected to the sea, but we must do so in a non-industrial way that preserves communities and the oceans that constitute the majority of our planet.
Andrea Angera, GM
Litchfield Farms Organic & Natural
www.LitchfieldFarms.net
The facts only support one view, that is, wild marine fisheries are under siege. Any rebound in wild seafood populations reflect only the smallest first steps in what will be a decades long process to rebuild even a shadow of the bounty the seas once held. We must continue to restrict our consumption of wild seafood to rebuild the ocean eco-sytems and begin to better understand the effects of environmental toxins contained in seafood.
Furthermore, I truly believe all evidence is that local and regional sustenance fisheries can exist and are in fact the best way to allow local communities to maintain their cultural connection to the sea while permitting a limited harvest of recovering seafood species.
I was once a big supporter of Tim O'Shea and CleanFish, but when corporate success and meeting investor goals trumps the health of the planet and local communities, we need to question the motivation behind the eco-slogans. We must accept that globalization is rarely virtuous, it is an expression of economic Darwinism that will and does destroy local communities that rely on the sea for their survival.
My company has adopted the principal of "cultural sustainability" as its credo. We support local fisheries and communities by promoting responsibly caught and managed local fisheries. At the same time we encourage aquaculture as the highest and most environmentally friendly form of agriculture.
The future is not some globalized food system, it is local people producing food for their communities. We must remain connected to the sea, but we must do so in a non-industrial way that preserves communities and the oceans that constitute the majority of our planet.
Andrea Angera, GM
Litchfield Farms Organic & Natural
www.LitchfieldFarms.net
