James Chubb

Reform and Rethink

Hot on the heels of the Food 4 Thought project, the next food and countryside resource I am producing will look at the world beneath the waves. Think Deep will investigate how people’s food choices influence how our seas and oceans are managed – or mismanaged, and investigate some local examples of good fresh seafood we can all enjoy with a concious as clear as the waters which lap East Devon’s shores. Which is why I headed off to the Devon Maritime Forum recently, on a fact-finding mission to underpin the film’s science.

Fishing is an emotive issue. It’s been really badly handled in the past, and not so distant past, which was why it is so important that the film’s content is scientifically squeaky clean. Even more importantly the audience will be school chidlren, in a formal educational environment so there can be no possible excuse for bias in favour of any point of view which cannot be emprirically supported. 

There were a number of very interesting speakers at the Forum Conference, industry leaders and conservationists alike, including a live link to Brussells to hear from two European scientists tasked with the wholesale review of the Common Fisheries Policy. Heavy stuff.  

Most of the discussion and qustioning of the day centred on this high-level review, but it was the local context which I found so interesting and how these EU edicts will filter down to influence the lives of people in our community.

Two out of the last three weeks of these countryside articles have featured marine life, and it is often these ‘fishy’ stories which generate the most feedback and interest from readers, so to say that the marine world is of no interest to the average ’man in the street’ (apologies for the patronising and vulgar cliche) I think would be misleading. I think the trouble stems from quite the opposite – most people feel totally removed from the managerial decision making and can’t see how to make a difference.

Please notice I have not once named fishermen as a ‘problem’ here. The fault lies squarely at the door of fisheries policy and to spend time arguing with the people who carry out this policy, the fishermen, just wastes more time.

My worry is that no matter how sensible, scruitable, and scientific the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy is, if the fundenmetnal issue is not addressed there will be little difference made. And that issue?

At the industry level the talk is of quotas and catches, of target species and costs. I thin this misses the point in a subtle but critical way. Fishermen simply want to catch what is going to fetch the best price at the market, currently within the set quota available to them through some clandestine horse-trading. The fish price is set by the market, and that market value is set by you and me, the fish-buying puiblic.

Brixham fish market lands about 40 species of fish every year. Forty species! I challange you to name five species of sea fish let alone nearer fifty. Most of us will ramble down the fish and chip shop menu board, some of us will be able to pick one or two other types, but I’d be hard-pushed to name forty ‘commercial’ species and i have studies marine zoology. How I would go about cooking the little devils is another thing all together.

So here’s my challenge to you, if you are a fish eater. Visit a fishmonger one day this week and buy a type of fish you have not heard of before. If you can’t find anything on the slab other than cod, haddock and salmon – find another fishmonger! If the fish is locally caught, all-the-better, but one step at a time eh? Ask the fishmonger how they would prepare the fish and if you are not taken with the recipe they give you, then contact me via the Countryside Service and I will talk you though a dish over the phone – that’s a promise.

Our fish-eating habits in the UK are so spartan, we are missing out on some of the most interesting, enjoyable and sustainable local produce; and that is the problem I would like to start looking at. If by the time the EU Fisheries Policy reforms are in place the local seafood scene is a vibrant and buzzing affair with people as keen to try witch, winkles or whiting as they are cod, tuna or swordfish then we are well on the way to an important and lasting change.