Profiles In Fishing

What does the word "sustainable" mean to you?

As an inspector of fishery products, to me sustainable means the restoration of species that we have seen in decline for many years. During my career of 31 years, I have observed the decline of the resources available to the public at a level that has been quite disturbing. Now, having the first hand opportunity to see some of those stocks rebound and become commercially available for processing and distribution is incredibly rewarding. It proves, even for those of us not working the research vessels, that fisheries management works.

What is your role in the sustainable management of U.S. Fisheries?

My role in the sustainable arena is best characterized by my contacts and discussions with industry regarding specifications, processing, and species utilized. In the above paragraph I referred to us as fishery products inspectors rather than seafood inspectors. We inspect all types of fishery products from the sea of course, but more and more of our work has been with farm raised products, both from salt and fresh water. The catfish, tilapia and fresh water shrimp industries are producing much of the fish we are processing and consuming, and I expect that process to continue. Add salt water fish that are farmed, and it is clear that the industry, and the public, are moving solidly in the direction of farmed fishery products. Naturally, there is absolutely no problem with the harvesting of fishery product from recovered wild stocks. That is the whole idea behind sustainable fisheries. Another area where we work with industry to promote sustainable products is in the preparation of buyers specifications. We strongly encourage companies that use or require our inspection certification to include size limits for a species to be sufficient to not include smaller sizes that would target juveniles. Our industry and their retail customers seem to appreciate our input and tend to include our thoughts in their purchasing specifications. We work tirelessly on this in cooperation with our partners in NOAA.

Why is your role so important?

The importance of my role is difficult to assess. I think that the continuous effort by our staff to ensure that the fishery products consumed by our public is of high quality and economic integrity is the central theme in what we do. Our work with industry and retailers to encourage the use of sustainable wild stocks and farm raised products forms the basis for the industry - the assurance to the public that fishery products will always be available and the optimism that we can leave things a little better than before. We, in partnership with scientific research and informational support from NOAA, can make it happen. And we will.