The fallout continues from Paul Greenberg’s New York Times Magazine article, “Tuna’s End.” Seafood restaurant owner Michael Cimarusti has written a thoughtful piece for TheAtlantic.com.
I stopped serving bluefin about five years ago. In the face of so much irrefutable science calling attention to its disappearance, how could I not? Bluefin is easy to covet for a chef. But as a chef who has coveted it myself, I think it is time we all said enough is enough.
Bluefin tuna is not a staple. There is no one nation or group of people who will starve if bluefin are no longer commercially harvested. Bigeye and yellowfin—tuna species that mature faster and reproduce more readily—are fine substitutes for those who need to eat red-fleshed fish. Bluefin, in contrast, is a luxury. I would hope that at some point we afford the bluefin the same sort of respect we offer animals like pandas and mountain gorillas. We have pushed those species to the point of extinction, and now we are helping them come back.
And:
It seems within our abilities to manage the resources that remain in our oceans. Bluefin conservation is a global issue that would require cooperation from nations who fish and those that simply consume. But here in the U.S. we could put our foot down and simply say we are through fishing for them. The bluefins of the Western Atlantic are ours to save. And if bluefins are able to breed in the Gulf of Mexico in spite of the mess that BP has created, and if we allow them to migrate up and down the Eastern Seaboard unfettered, then perhaps we will have given them a chance. Carl Safina, marine biologist and President of the Blue Ocean Institute, wrote this in December 2008: “The United States could immediately fix this problem. It has full control of the west Atlantic population’s Gulf of Mexico spawning ground. Yet the killing continues, while U.S. fishery managers stonewall all criticism on the matter.”
Any approach that puts any country but Japan in the driver’s seat just might work. Link.
