The shocking depletion of the world's fisheries over the last century and a half is one of the great tragedies of our modern civilization. We're causing mass extinction on a level we have to go back to the fossil record to see. We're eating fish that was previously thrown back or used as bait, often just giving it bogus pretty names (like Chilean Sea Bass).
I live in the US for now but having grown up in Europe I understand the situation there better. Nationalistic arguments resting on protecting 'traditional' livelihoods and preserving centuries old fishing villages have been used to continue subsidizing an industry with much larger collective fishing fleet than is possibly justifiable. Of course nowhere in this "tradition" argument is it ever acknowledged that traditionally we used vastly less sophisticated machinery and mechanisms so catches per fisherman were obviously dramatically lower - and we were STILL depleting stocks.
This is no different to any of our resource extraction industries sadly. Give rights to extract resource. Rights holders make tons of money. Use money to pervert political process and buy protection against breaches of law and regulation. Deplete resource. Move on.
The biggest challenge with fishing is the ocean is largely a shared resource. The incentive to preserve and protect is much smaller, because you can just fish in international waters or sneak over to somebody else's waters to fish, and conserving in your own waters may be fruitless because other people will come a'fishin!
Basically, one giant global tragedy of the commons.
I attribute the tragedy to the fact we farm the soil for ages, grow cattle for as much as long, but fishing was always considered cheap, given the sheer size of the ocean (we're far past the regeneration point), when in fact, fish has the biggest potential of all for intensive farming.
Fish farming already is a booming industry in some countries, and the tendency is to double in the next decade. There's a lot to improve yet, specially on small scale and associated with hydroponics, only now we are seeing research into that. If you want to invest, this a good area to put your money.
A great example is slimehead (Hoplostethus atlanticus), known in the US market by the more familiar name orange roughy. H. atalanticus is very long lived (up to ~150 years) and has a low reproductive rate. Forty years ago orange roughy was not commercially harvested. Today, the species has been so effectively harvested by bottom trawling that in most fisheries, the species has crashed.
This is the primary reason that I think that restricting commercially farming Tilapia on-land, in large scale closed systems, in states like California is ridiculous.
I have been looking at all the amazing open space on the Island of Alameda - where the old Navy base was; I think that a company using the warehouse/open space to create an industrial sized version of Gardenpool.org's closed loop Tilapia setup would be an amazing opportunity.
The renaming trick is also done for meat. The horse/beef meat scandal in Europe shed a little bit of light on what we now call 'meat' which is remains that would have been thrown away before.
The group tested 114 tuna samples. Of those 114, 66 were of a fish that the vendor was calling "White Tuna". Have you ever eaten something called White Tuna? Neither have I. It's a fairly unpopular sushi fish sold sparsely around the country.
Why does it make up more half the sample, you might ask? Well, it turns out there is essentially no such thing as White Tuna. Hence 94% of the samples are "mislabeled." [the authors assert that a certain type of albacore tuna sold in a certain form counts as 'white tuna', which accounts for the 6% of correct labels] If your goal was to achieve a result which shows lots of mislabeling, a good strategy would be to considerably oversample 'white tuna'.
They took 48 more samples of tuna other than 'white tuna'. Notably, that didn't include anything from a can, which is by a WIDE margin what most americans think of when they think of tuna. Nevertheless, of those 48, they determined that five were "mislabeled" due to the tuna actually being a substituted variety of tuna. In other words, all 48 were 'tuna', though perhaps not 'albacore' or the specific type it claimed to be.
So where does that leave us? More than half of the samples were of a fish known to be commonly "mislabeled" by standard industry practice, and the rest of the mislabelings were substitutions of one type of tuna for another. In no universe does that lead to the conclusion that 59% of the tuna Americans consume is not actually "tuna". I would venture that no one reading this comment has ever eaten a piece of tuna that was not actually from a tuna fish (though _maybe_ they lied about which specific variety you were eating).
This organization has a history of running biased studies and then churning out ridiculous charts and headlines to push on local newspapers. They ran with a version of this story in New York City around a year ago. It's nonsense. Eat your tuna and enjoy it.
"White tuna" is actually canned albacore. As the article says, "All 16 grocery store samples were labeled correctly." So tuna bought in a can from your local store is Albacore legally and "accurately" named "white tuna." That stuff is ok.
The study goes on to say sushi restaurants are the problem, where escolar is sold as "white tuna."
"The majority of the tuna samples in this study were labeled as “white tuna.” Of the 66 white tuna samples, 62 were mislabeled (94 percent). Eighty-four percent of the white tuna samples were actually escolar (52 of the 62) (Figure 10). The remaining white tuna mislabeling (16 percent) came from the substitution of one type of tuna for another or the use of a non-acceptable market name. A fish product referred to as “white tuna” is only acceptable as a market name when sold in a can."
In restaurants and stores, tuna sold as "tuna" ended up being... tuna.
To be honest, I don't know the prevalence of "white tuna" in sushi restaurants, but a google search of "white tuna sushi san francisco" returns dozens of menus with white tuna on them.
I also don't understand why they chose the misleading "tuna" headline rather than focusing on snapper, of which 100% of sushi restaurant "snapper" was not snapper, as was a large percentage of other restaurants' and grocery stores' supplies.
"More than nine out of every 10 snappers sold
in sushi venues were mislabeled (92 percent). Eighty-nine percent of the snappers sampled from grocery stores were found to be mislabeled as were 77 percent from restaurants."
TLDR: Don't eat anything in a sushi place called "white tuna" and your "snapper" is probably not snapper.
Terrible headline for sure. But in sushi restaurants, this mislabeling is actually very common. More often than not, escolar is labeled white tuna. You know it is escolar when it's a pure white and opaque fish with a buttery taste, which although mislabeled, is not at all unpleasant. Rumor has it that of you eat too much, it also gives you diarrhea but fortunately I've never had enough of it to test that theory.
As for real white tuna, there is such a thing and it's called albacore. Aside from being found prevalently in cans, it can also be had at many finer sushi restaurants and it's delicious. White but lightly translucent and often served with a bit of horseradish.
Thanks for this response; I don't have to read the article now. One thing about the "White Tuna" sashimi, almost every sushi place around me has it, North Jersey, NYC included.. I've had it.. but now know its not real tuna as it seems. Just FYI.
So are you saying that the researchers went to Sushi shops and only tested sushi that was labeled as "white tuna" and deliberately avoided samples that were just labeled "tuna"?
The study claims that 95% of tested sushi places were selling mislabeled seafood, but you claim that selling "white tuna" is not common. Can you give us a bit more to go on here?
I really wish tacking CSV files of the raw data onto the end of papers was more of a thing... Charts are such a royal pain in the ass if you are trying to find information that the authors aren't intentionally spoon-feeding you with them.
I don't each much sushi, but in the grocery store "White Tuna" is common. However, it's usually marked "Albacore White Tuna" to signify that it is not escolar but in fact albacore tuna.
Several years ago, every sushi restaurant I frequented (in South Florida) stopped mislabeling Escolar as "White Tuna". I thought it was a legal crackdown since I'd already read about the fact that "there's no such thing as White Tuna".
Personally, I don't care what it's called, it's still my favorite (raw). The name Butterfish is new to me, but it makes sense as I always thought it tasted like Mozzarella! (my sister agrees)
Thankfully, I've never suffered from eating it either, but then I never have meals with more than a few ounces of it (I typically have at least 3 different fish when I have sushi or sashimi).
Albacore, for comparison, is only white after it's cooked. Before that it's more translucent and slightly pinkish (Escolar is opaque white).
Oddly enough, I've never had cooked Escolar. I wonder how it is. :)
This whole thing reminds me of the Basa/Tra thing (real Basa is so much better than Tra, but they were selling the latter as the former to get a higher price for years).
Perhaps, given the dire state of tuna supplies and consumers who apparently cannot tell the difference without resorting to testing, we should be encouraging mislabeling.
Insisting on a particular rare fish while another more common fish satisfies you just as well is exceptionally silly. Of course it is near impossible to convince consumers of this, but business owners have apparently figured out a solution themselves.
(To keep it safe, the FDA could create lists of fish that may be substituted and labelled as each other.)
This happens with "bacalhau" (norwegian codfish). It's appreciated by the europeans for ages, but overfishing made it prohibitively priced.
Now you have 5 or 6 different fish sold under this name at markets, fished on Alaska and China, but they taste all the same so it makes no difference (only on the price).
The word "bacalhau" now refers more to the kind of preparation (dried fish) than the species itself. It could be the same with tuna ("tuna" being, any red meat fish with the same consistency and similar taste).
> Perhaps, given the dire state of tuna supplies and consumers who apparently cannot tell the difference without resorting to testing, we should be encouraging mislabeling.
Yes, because fighting ignorance with lies that cater to it is much better than fighting it with information.
This idea is particularly interesting to myself considering my vegetarian girlfriend just made me a "Tuna Sandwhich" where the meat was substituted with soaked almonds, which actually tasted quite good and similar to the Tuna I know and love.
Around Chicago we have problems with Asian carp making their way closer and closer to the great lakes. I've often suggested they be renamed 'river tuna' and our problems will be solved.
Not the explosive diarrhea fish. That's cruel, and wrong. Maybe we should just encourage people to eat the fish we have, but be honest about the label.
White Tuna has always been Escolar. There is no such thing as a "white" tuna. Even albacore is not white until cooked. Saying that white tuna is not tuna, is the same as saying Chilean Sea Bass is not a bass. While true, there is no conspiracy.
> Escolar's wax ester content can cause keriorrhea (Greek: flow of wax), gempylotoxism or gempylid fish poisoning.[4] Keriorrhea is similar to diarrhea, only the body will expel yellowish-orange drops of oil instead of liquid bowel movements.
I've always wondered - at what level is a person contributing to the Tuna shortage? I rarely eat fish to begin with, have yet to go to a sushi place. But I do have a can of Tuna on Pizza about every month. Is that already too much?
Yeah - but it doesn't unless you it quite a good bit of it. And of course it's super yummy. It would of course be better if it was just labeled as escolar (as it is at my local sushi joint)
I've had Escolar before. Like, went to the supermarket, bought a few pounds of big ol' chunks that were labeled "Escolar," and served said fish as the main entree for dinner. I do not recall anal leakage.
They're fatty. That's it. A cooked Escolar will taste like it was fried in butter, even if you put it in the pan totally dry. Absent food sensitivities (which probably exist), I doubt it causes any leakage beyond that caused by any other source of the same amount of fat, oil, or grease.
> To be frankly and bluntly specific - and I'm sorry for this - consumption of escolar causes explosive, oily, orange diarrhea. People have reported that the discharges are often difficult to control and accidents can happen while passing gas.
If I received sushi or maki that claimed to be tuna but looked like a ghost I would send it back. Is the use of escolar as tuna a regional thing, or is some escolar a pink/red color?
For an article waxing on about the mislabeling of tuna, it should do a better job not generalizing facts about different species of tuna with all tuna.
> given the dire state of the world's tuna supply
Only some species are overfished. Albacore tuna, for example, are not threatened at all. In fact there's no limit in the US on how many you can catch (non-commercially).
My family has been part of the seafood business in North America for almost 30 years, and I definitely have the ability to distinguish between fish species just by looking at flesh.
This article makes no attempt to distinguish between what sushi bars label as 'tuna' and 'white tuna'.
Order 'tuna' and you're almost always going to get tuna.
Order 'white tuna' and you're almost always going to get escolar/albacore.
So my dad grew up in Bangladesh, a country of rivers with a strong tradition of eating fish. He told me that when he was growing up, there were hundreds of different kinds of fish in the market and even the local river. Today, as a result of run off from intensive agriculture, that variety is almost totally gone.
i knew it! i stopped eating white tuna a while back because i felt it tastes weird, and went to yellowfin instead, but recently i went back to germany and had a tonno pizza and realized just how much different it tastes
As long as the fish is not dangerous (often not the case here apparently), I'm okay with not eating tuna. It's just a real shame they try to fool diners. It's time for the FDA to get involved.
Probably around 82%. I imagine grocery store sushi has more in common with the rest of grocery store fish than it does with sushi shop sushi. The grocery store probably buys the fish for both from the same chain of suppliers.
I've defended all kinds of threads from the "Why is this on HN?" whiners. I'm having a a little trouble with how the choice between yellow waxy buildup in your asscheeks and mercury dementia is an issue. Is sushi that big a Silicon Valley thing?
[+] [-] richardjordan|12 years ago|reply
I live in the US for now but having grown up in Europe I understand the situation there better. Nationalistic arguments resting on protecting 'traditional' livelihoods and preserving centuries old fishing villages have been used to continue subsidizing an industry with much larger collective fishing fleet than is possibly justifiable. Of course nowhere in this "tradition" argument is it ever acknowledged that traditionally we used vastly less sophisticated machinery and mechanisms so catches per fisherman were obviously dramatically lower - and we were STILL depleting stocks.
This is no different to any of our resource extraction industries sadly. Give rights to extract resource. Rights holders make tons of money. Use money to pervert political process and buy protection against breaches of law and regulation. Deplete resource. Move on.
[+] [-] sliverstorm|12 years ago|reply
Basically, one giant global tragedy of the commons.
[+] [-] hcarvalhoalves|12 years ago|reply
Fish farming already is a booming industry in some countries, and the tendency is to double in the next decade. There's a lot to improve yet, specially on small scale and associated with hydroponics, only now we are seeing research into that. If you want to invest, this a good area to put your money.
[+] [-] whyenot|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] samstave|12 years ago|reply
I have been looking at all the amazing open space on the Island of Alameda - where the old Navy base was; I think that a company using the warehouse/open space to create an industrial sized version of Gardenpool.org's closed loop Tilapia setup would be an amazing opportunity.
[+] [-] chourobin|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] agumonkey|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] acslater00|12 years ago|reply
This is a link to the actual study. Page 16 is relevant.
http://oceana.org/sites/default/files/reports/National_Seafo...
The group tested 114 tuna samples. Of those 114, 66 were of a fish that the vendor was calling "White Tuna". Have you ever eaten something called White Tuna? Neither have I. It's a fairly unpopular sushi fish sold sparsely around the country.
Why does it make up more half the sample, you might ask? Well, it turns out there is essentially no such thing as White Tuna. Hence 94% of the samples are "mislabeled." [the authors assert that a certain type of albacore tuna sold in a certain form counts as 'white tuna', which accounts for the 6% of correct labels] If your goal was to achieve a result which shows lots of mislabeling, a good strategy would be to considerably oversample 'white tuna'.
They took 48 more samples of tuna other than 'white tuna'. Notably, that didn't include anything from a can, which is by a WIDE margin what most americans think of when they think of tuna. Nevertheless, of those 48, they determined that five were "mislabeled" due to the tuna actually being a substituted variety of tuna. In other words, all 48 were 'tuna', though perhaps not 'albacore' or the specific type it claimed to be.
So where does that leave us? More than half of the samples were of a fish known to be commonly "mislabeled" by standard industry practice, and the rest of the mislabelings were substitutions of one type of tuna for another. In no universe does that lead to the conclusion that 59% of the tuna Americans consume is not actually "tuna". I would venture that no one reading this comment has ever eaten a piece of tuna that was not actually from a tuna fish (though _maybe_ they lied about which specific variety you were eating).
This organization has a history of running biased studies and then churning out ridiculous charts and headlines to push on local newspapers. They ran with a version of this story in New York City around a year ago. It's nonsense. Eat your tuna and enjoy it.
[+] [-] bicknergseng|12 years ago|reply
>> Have you ever eaten something called White Tuna? Neither have I. It's a fairly unpopular sushi fish sold sparsely around the country.
Well. Not really. One or two people might eat this:
http://www.bumblebee.com/products/1/bumble-bee-solid-white-a...
"White tuna" is actually canned albacore. As the article says, "All 16 grocery store samples were labeled correctly." So tuna bought in a can from your local store is Albacore legally and "accurately" named "white tuna." That stuff is ok.
The study goes on to say sushi restaurants are the problem, where escolar is sold as "white tuna."
"The majority of the tuna samples in this study were labeled as “white tuna.” Of the 66 white tuna samples, 62 were mislabeled (94 percent). Eighty-four percent of the white tuna samples were actually escolar (52 of the 62) (Figure 10). The remaining white tuna mislabeling (16 percent) came from the substitution of one type of tuna for another or the use of a non-acceptable market name. A fish product referred to as “white tuna” is only acceptable as a market name when sold in a can."
In restaurants and stores, tuna sold as "tuna" ended up being... tuna.
To be honest, I don't know the prevalence of "white tuna" in sushi restaurants, but a google search of "white tuna sushi san francisco" returns dozens of menus with white tuna on them.
I also don't understand why they chose the misleading "tuna" headline rather than focusing on snapper, of which 100% of sushi restaurant "snapper" was not snapper, as was a large percentage of other restaurants' and grocery stores' supplies.
"More than nine out of every 10 snappers sold in sushi venues were mislabeled (92 percent). Eighty-nine percent of the snappers sampled from grocery stores were found to be mislabeled as were 77 percent from restaurants."
TLDR: Don't eat anything in a sushi place called "white tuna" and your "snapper" is probably not snapper.
[+] [-] jsherry|12 years ago|reply
As for real white tuna, there is such a thing and it's called albacore. Aside from being found prevalently in cans, it can also be had at many finer sushi restaurants and it's delicious. White but lightly translucent and often served with a bit of horseradish.
[+] [-] Tyrant505|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jlgreco|12 years ago|reply
The study claims that 95% of tested sushi places were selling mislabeled seafood, but you claim that selling "white tuna" is not common. Can you give us a bit more to go on here?
I really wish tacking CSV files of the raw data onto the end of papers was more of a thing... Charts are such a royal pain in the ass if you are trying to find information that the authors aren't intentionally spoon-feeding you with them.
[+] [-] nostromo|12 years ago|reply
For example, from Trader Joe's: http://yeastfreeliving.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/4-8-10...
[+] [-] glabifrons|12 years ago|reply
Personally, I don't care what it's called, it's still my favorite (raw). The name Butterfish is new to me, but it makes sense as I always thought it tasted like Mozzarella! (my sister agrees) Thankfully, I've never suffered from eating it either, but then I never have meals with more than a few ounces of it (I typically have at least 3 different fish when I have sushi or sashimi).
Albacore, for comparison, is only white after it's cooked. Before that it's more translucent and slightly pinkish (Escolar is opaque white).
Oddly enough, I've never had cooked Escolar. I wonder how it is. :)
This whole thing reminds me of the Basa/Tra thing (real Basa is so much better than Tra, but they were selling the latter as the former to get a higher price for years).
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] jlgreco|12 years ago|reply
Insisting on a particular rare fish while another more common fish satisfies you just as well is exceptionally silly. Of course it is near impossible to convince consumers of this, but business owners have apparently figured out a solution themselves.
(To keep it safe, the FDA could create lists of fish that may be substituted and labelled as each other.)
[+] [-] hcarvalhoalves|12 years ago|reply
Now you have 5 or 6 different fish sold under this name at markets, fished on Alaska and China, but they taste all the same so it makes no difference (only on the price).
The word "bacalhau" now refers more to the kind of preparation (dried fish) than the species itself. It could be the same with tuna ("tuna" being, any red meat fish with the same consistency and similar taste).
[+] [-] dragonwriter|12 years ago|reply
Yes, because fighting ignorance with lies that cater to it is much better than fighting it with information.
[+] [-] GigabyteCoin|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jbattle|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fnordfnordfnord|12 years ago|reply
Not the explosive diarrhea fish. That's cruel, and wrong. Maybe we should just encourage people to eat the fish we have, but be honest about the label.
[+] [-] richardjordan|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] noonespecial|12 years ago|reply
I can't tell the difference. To me tuna is a taste, not a species. For the poor overfished creature that is tuna, maybe it's better this way.
[+] [-] Tyrant505|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcampbell1|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fatjokes|12 years ago|reply
w. t. f. O.O
[+] [-] otterley|12 years ago|reply
http://oceana.org/sites/default/files/reports/National_Seafo...
[+] [-] skore|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bostonvaulter2|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mh-|12 years ago|reply
84% of fish samples labeled "white tuna" were actually escolar, a fish that can cause prolonged, uncontrollable, oily anal leakage.
oh.
[+] [-] nmcfarl|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lmkg|12 years ago|reply
I've had Escolar before. Like, went to the supermarket, bought a few pounds of big ol' chunks that were labeled "Escolar," and served said fish as the main entree for dinner. I do not recall anal leakage.
They're fatty. That's it. A cooked Escolar will taste like it was fried in butter, even if you put it in the pan totally dry. Absent food sensitivities (which probably exist), I doubt it causes any leakage beyond that caused by any other source of the same amount of fat, oil, or grease.
[+] [-] mmariani|12 years ago|reply
> To be frankly and bluntly specific - and I'm sorry for this - consumption of escolar causes explosive, oily, orange diarrhea. People have reported that the discharges are often difficult to control and accidents can happen while passing gas.
Ewww!
[+] [-] reddit_clone|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] biot|12 years ago|reply
https://www.google.com/search?q=escolar+vs+tuna&tbm=isch
Particularly this image:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_7tZTQT-lBpA/TJARkX5NXeI/AAAAAAAAAg...
If I received sushi or maki that claimed to be tuna but looked like a ghost I would send it back. Is the use of escolar as tuna a regional thing, or is some escolar a pink/red color?
[+] [-] fnayr|12 years ago|reply
> given the dire state of the world's tuna supply
Only some species are overfished. Albacore tuna, for example, are not threatened at all. In fact there's no limit in the US on how many you can catch (non-commercially).
[+] [-] ktran03|12 years ago|reply
My family has been part of the seafood business in North America for almost 30 years, and I definitely have the ability to distinguish between fish species just by looking at flesh.
This article makes no attempt to distinguish between what sushi bars label as 'tuna' and 'white tuna'.
Order 'tuna' and you're almost always going to get tuna. Order 'white tuna' and you're almost always going to get escolar/albacore.
[+] [-] jonahx|12 years ago|reply
on a similar subject, this is an excellent (and depressing) fresh air episode: http://www.npr.org/2010/07/19/128512740/paul-greenberg-the-f...
[+] [-] rayiner|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rjzzleep|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fatjokes|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] frankblizzard|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] elliott34|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jlgreco|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mje|12 years ago|reply
I agree this is important but I already saw it my feed and is not hacker related
[+] [-] Zigurd|12 years ago|reply