Boston seafood show 4

Bye Boston. How charming to leave downtown in a water taxi that gets to the airport cheaper than a car taxi.

I rode Alaska flight 15, loaded with Seafood show people. I sat ina middle seat between a person from Trident Seafoods and a person from Icicle Seafoods, two of the really big northwest seafood businesses with more than a $1 billion per year in combined seafood sales (according to Seafood Business Magazine).

That pretty much tells the story of the seafood show. Can a conservation group find common cause with big seafood businesses? I think so. They didn't try to throw me off the plane.

We had a meeting today that proves the point. It was a group of shrimpers from the Guf of Mexico, shrimp buyers, and fish conservation NGOs, all of us working together on finding ways to improve the shrimp fishery. Improve the business of catching and selling shrimp while also lowering the environmental impact of shrimping. And there were no big arguments, we have shared goals and we're pretty much agreeing on the steps we're going to take together to move in the right direction.

Bye, Boston, see you next year.

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Boston seafood show 3

Day 2 of the Boston Seafood Show, and my stamina is wearing out. Meetings, meetings, and new people to meet and talk to about fish and seafood and conservation.

Is there a recession? You woudn't know from the size and grandeur of some of the seafood displays here. Maybe it's whisting through the graveyard, but there seems to be plenty of money being spent to sell seafood.

Sustainability is everywhere, in word if not in deed. People promise they have sustainable products, and that's a good sign. It's no longer difficult to get seafood business people to talk about sustainability. Now comes the hard part, making all those promises real.

One issue that is looming bigger and bigger in my mind is illegal, unreported, and unmanaged fishing (IUU fishing). It will matter more and more, and efforts to stop it are going to change the seafood business.

I think currents will come together to make seafood safer, better, and more transparent, so that people will know what they're eating when they eat seafood. Seafood fraud has got to end, and the industry seems aware and active on this serious problem. It will help sustainability as well, by allowing people to know what they're buying.

Now for some sights and sounds and tastes. First, the shrimpster, a custom motorcycle that mimics a--you guessed it--shrimp:


Then there's the polar bear booth:


The vulnerable species booth:


And finaly, Boston Harbor, where blogfish was drawn for a bit of rest. It looks peaceful and it's nice to know that the cleanup project is helping what was once one of the most polluted places in the US.


Hopefully tomorrow I'll get to take a water taxi to the airport on my way home. I love the water taxis and they're cheaper than a taxi with wheels.

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Boston Seafood Show

I'm excited to be heading to Boston today for the annual Boston Seafood Show. I'm on a panel tomorrow, discussing how to fix unsustainable fisheries. The panel deals with the larger topic of illegal, unregulated, and unreported fishing, and "red list" fish. Red list includes the IUCN global red list of endangered fish and red lists of unsustainable seafood.

I guess I should figure out what I'm going to say. I have some ideas, and 6 hours on 2 airplanes today with an layover in Chicago. That should be enough time. Any suggestions? No kidding, I'll listen if you post suggestions in the comments here.

I'll explain my work and the broader issues as I see them. Then I'll duck the flying rotten tomatoes and fish.

I'll do my best to blog the show, hope I'm not too busy eating seafood.

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