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The term “green economy” has been in play for a while now, and we have a pretty good idea what it means at least in the abstract; an economy that builds jobs and prosperity while keeping environmental impact in mind, reducing or even reversing damage.
Of course how it translates on the ground and on the water, the real tradeoffs and specific measurements, is another matter and worth a long discussion that could begin with coffee and end with beer.
When we launched our “Small Boats Big Taste” program soon after COVID struck, we had clear goals but no idea if we could realize them:
Help independent small-boat fishermen and the fishing industry navigate past the pandemic’s new barriers.
Feed growing numbers of people facing food insecurity that comes when money shrinks.
Build local demand for local fish and keep it going and growing after start-up philanthropic support ends.
One of my most frustrating moments in many years working on fisheries issues arrived a few months ago, when a federal judge overturned a hard-fought reform that would have kept giant mid-water trawlers out of local waters, allowing herring and other crucial forage fish to return, school, and rebuild.
Five years ago no one had heard of COVID, there had not yet been a deadly shark attack on Cape Cod, and fish prices (to the fishermen anyway) were just as unpredictable and fluctuating as they are today.
Meanwhile, in January 2018, we first published this emagazine, using “Small Boats, Big Ideas” as our flag.
We are now witnessing the bitter, devastating impact to our fishing community and ecosystem caused by a single federal judge who overturned years of effort to protect our small-boat fishery and small fish crucial to the ocean’s health.
After years of effort by Cape fishermen, our community, and like-minded interests across the region, last year the National Marine Fisheries Service approved a 12-mile buffer zone, with a 20-mile bump off Cape Cod, to protect ocean herring, a vital forage fish, from mid-water trawls. This was a huge victory that many of you helped make possible with your support and public advocacy.
The ocean doesn’t subdivide and segregate, that’s not nature’s way. Mixing and mingling, coursing and combining, always is the default.
But that fact of life can drive fisheries managers crazy. If everything always is in flux, interconnected in the complex play and way of life, how can we be smart and responsible, know what we’ve got and what to do, keep commercial fishing strong while thinking ahead and protecting both habitat and fishing for the future?
By John Pappalardo Monterey Bay Aquarium, located on the Pacific edge of the continent, has a program called “Seafood Watch.” They call themselves “a global leader in the sustainable seafood movement” and issue reports and recommendations about what fish people...
For a long time, there has been a collective idea that bluefin tuna are endangered, something like the white rhinos of the sea.
The truth is very different, and much more encouraging:
Bluefin tuna are plentiful, in large part because of national and international efforts to rebuild stocks, and harvest in appropriate amounts.
That’s not to say conflicts and problems have vanished.
How many bluefin is the right number to land, while maintaining a healthy population, remains a big question.
One of our great, fun community successes in recent years has been regular “Meet the Fleet” events, when we pull together fishermen and chefs to share the experience of being on the water, offer insights into different species landed locally, and present a creative transformation of work and fish into beautiful cuisine.
That got me to thinking:
How about we grow the concept, and create a second ongoing series that tries to do similar things but this time with amazing people who explore the biggest ideas of the ocean world, and how they apply to our small corner of it? Put Cape Cod and the fisheries into scientific context, this time with plates full of ideas?
e-Magazine PDF’s