Could more adventurous fish choices make us more food secure?
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Why does Ireland import 80% of its fish despite being surrounded by fishing ports?
So sticking with our food security theme this morning, not only does Ireland import 80% of the baby potatoes we eat from France, or we did last year anyway, but this island nation, surrounded by fishing ports, imports 80% of the fish that we eat. Yes, of course, a part of that is because fish stocks of some species in European waters are dangerously low. But a large part of it is also because we have very, very conservative tastes when it comes to fish. And if we got a bit braver in what we eat, we could also get a bit more food secure. Lorna Siggins jumped on board this conundrum for us on a recent trip to Hoth Harbour where she met Sean Doran.
So we're just looking out of the harbour here now, Sean, and this would have been full of boats.
Yeah. What I miss more is the people. It used to take me an hour and a half or two hours to walk up and down the harbour because you'd be stopping and chatting to the guys from all over the coast, you know, the Galway lads and the Greencastle lads and the Castletown Bearmen and all that sort of stuff. And then you'd be called about every second boat for a cup of tea and a chat or to give them a hand doing small jobs, holding the net from ending or whatever. And all that's nearly gone.
Sean Doran finds it particularly frustrating to see fish caught in Irish waters being shipped overseas. It is such a feature of fishing in Hoth now that he has renamed part of the harbour the Belgian Pier.
Yeah, the middle pier, the Belgian pier, yeah. It is used by Irish trawlers, but the Belgian boats come in, land over there, and then fish go straight on to Eulalia and straight to Belgium. The logic of air miles and food miles and that sort of stuff doesn't really work out that, you know, in my head anyway. Whereas, you know, we have a fleet of boats. that if we had the quota, we could fish that fishery. The Belgian quota is just over 400 tonnes and the Irish quota is less than 50 for black salt. You know, one of the main fisheries left in the Irish Sea that's fully viable. And we would just like some more of that ourselves. I mean, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask. And, I mean, when we have boats and the men who can go and fish it, why should we be looking out our window, looking at boats catching fish that we could catch and our boats are tied up for lack of quota?
Only part of the problem is quota, though. In Galway Market, at Stefan Griesbach's fishmonger stall, regular customer Liam Caffrey explains that he finds his fish and chips supper just a bit too pricey. But he's not going to be convinced to eat anything other than cod, which is under huge stock pressure.
It's nuts. I went down to McDonald's there actually a month ago now. I just ordered fish for the first time ever. I didn't realise you could do that. Yeah, so I just left out the chips. It was a bit cheaper. I didn't really want a full fish and chips, you know. I just wanted a bit of fish. It was perfect. And I know cod is very badly affected on stocks as well. But, you know, I just prefer cod as a fried fish. I think it's just the one to go for really personally. The way the flakes of the fish, they're quite thick and chunky and meaty. You don't get that with a lot of the other fish.
What challenges do local fishmongers face in sourcing fish?
Liam is the sort of customer that Stefan Griesbach works hard to wean off cod as he believes Irish fish buyers need to be more adventurous if he is to stay in business.
We want to be inclusive so there's a lot of fish that we're selling that are generic fish like salmon, cod, egg. And then we also try to focus as well on other species. Today we would have wool fish on the counter. We have magrum, some fish eggs, cod roe. We have some very small plates here, but they're small, but they're cheap and they're very good.
You have a sign here, Guess Who?
Guess Who, yes. Sometimes we come across a specie and we get it once in a blue moon and we might not have a label for it. We put a label called Guess Who, which catches the attention of the customer. We describe how to cook it, we describe the fish, where it's caught, we just go into detail about the story behind the fish.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
Why does Ireland import 80% of its fish despite being surrounded by fishing ports?
0:00–3:08
2
What challenges do local fishmongers face in sourcing fish?
3:08–6:06
3
How can consumers be encouraged to try more diverse fish species?
6:06–7:07
4
What are the implications of fish quotas on local fishing communities?
7:07–7:47