Pole and line tuna - sustainable tuna, really?

[Jonny69]

We had a talk on sustainable development and fisheries. Some of you may have seen the film The End of The Line which is a feature length documentary about the state of fisheries worldwide and paints a pretty bleak picture for the future of many species of fish due to overfishing. Many fish stocks are depleted to a level that they will never recover, cod being one of them, blue fin tuna being another and our talk was along the same lines.

There was a degree of ethics in the talk, so it was pointed out that not all fish was being fished unsustainably and while it would be advisable to avoid fish from certain sources it is fine from others. Pole and line caught skipjack tuna was noted as one that was sustainable.

I then noticed in Sainsburys that all their own brand tins of tuna now have this 'pole and line' branding on them. Immediately I was overcome with suspicion. I inherently don't trust supermarkets. I don't trust their marketing and I don't agree with their practices. It's a bit like because their Woodland eggs are Woodland brand eggs. They don't come from chickens that live in woodlands, they are just branded that way which I think is misleading. Same with their free range chickens, just because they meet some minimum basic requirement doesn't make them good. Same with M&S Oakham chickens. They aren't better because they are a different brand, they are still grade A battery chickens.

Rant aside, what's my point? I don't believe one bit that Sainsburys tuna is caught in a sustainable way and I certainly don't believe that each fish is caught with a hook and line. I think it's all a big marketing exercise and it's misleading.

But I have felt compelled to follow this up and I have looked around for more information and it appears I may be wrong. I don't usually use fundamentalist organisations for my research but Greenpeace may have provided the answer in the form of this pdf (http://www.greenpeace.org/raw/content/international/press/reports/pole-line-case-study.pdf).

Page 3 points out that Sainsbury’s has already moved 90% of its canned tuna to pole and line caught methods, and plans to extend this to 100%

So I'll leave you to make your own minds up but I'm thinking I might be wrong here and that Sainsburys might have cleaned their act up.

[LeperousDust]

What so each fish is caught by a person with a rod? Surely not? Have they managed to automate it some way? I can't believe that myself, i'm very similar to you in that respect, my girlfriend (and friends!) seems to hate my distrusting nature of big companies and love living in their own misinformed world...

[Jonny69]

Exactly, hence my suspicions were raised. As I said on OcUK, one of the first things that came into my head was 'I wonder how they are getting around this?'

[LeperousDust]

Haha i'm always the same, it drives friends mad because i'm just so distrusting, how something is worded is always very powerful and too many people take things as they're spoon fed by the person selling it to them!?

[Will]

If you check the fine print on the free range eggs and chicken of different varieties at sainsbury's they actually state that some are from "free range hens reared indoors" whilst the others are from "free range hens allowed to roam free" - it's small print and you have to be careful because the RSPCA freedom food ones are the less "free range" than the other stuff. Sure it costs a bit more, but my conscious is clearer!

[Desmo]

I'm another distrustful one. Adverts are another one where they have to add loads of small print where they have to give the game away. Gets on my nerves and whilst I don't think I'm overly cynical, I most certainly keep my eye out in certain situations.

[Will]

The reason why I read the small print is because I am cynical. We have every right to be imo.

[SCM]

There are also a few Tuna fish farms beginning to be brought into effect now, as seems the problems they had at first with them have now been ironed out.