2011 project development updates 

This page gives project development updates for Sustainable Fish City and Sustain's sustainable fish-related work in 2011. Keep in touch with news from the Sustainable Fish City campaign by signing up to our newsletter at: http://www.sustainweb.org/sustainablefishcity/signup/ or email: fish@sustainweb.org

Winter 2011

In November, Sustainable Fish City joined Oceans 2012, a coalition dedicated to ensuring that the 2012 reform of the Common Fisheries Policy stops overfishing, ends destructive fishing practices and ensures equitable use of healthy fish stocks. The coalition has over 140 member organisations across the European Union, and is coordinated by the Pew Foundation.

In October we met students and staff in universities across London. Aiming to raise awareness of sustainable fish, we handed out thousands of Marine Conservation Society Good Fish Guides and our own Top Ten Swaps.

Greater London Authority’s Food Team generously funded Good Food on the Public Plate and Sustainable Fish City to host a training event for 50 caterers. This aimed to help caterers meet government’s new mandatory rules for sustainable fish for parts of the public sector. Attendees included chefs from the Houses of Parliament, managers from Her Majesty’s (HM) Prison Service, and the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).

The day included a 6am market tour, presentations on some of the issues and guidance for meeting the government’s new rules, identifying more sustainable choices and blind tasting of pouting, dab, Hastings MSC certified herring and Cornish sardines. We also had a blind tasting of battered cod and alternatives – pollock and coley – with coley wining every time!

Following this event the Retail Catering Services team for the House of Commons have signed the Sustainable Fish City pledge. They joined Defra and our first London 2012 sponsor, the John Lewis Partnership in making this pledge for the catering they commission or provide.

Summer 2011

The aim of London becoming a Sustainable Fish City has taken some very significant steps forward over the past quarter. With the great news that Government has adopted sustainable fish standards for its own catering (see Good Food for Our Money campaign report), and 14 leading London universities now involved in Sustainable Fish City, we estimate that 700,000 people are now to be served sustainable fish. This includes 400,000 government employees, prisoners and members of the armed forces, and 188,000 students, plus thousands more London university staff. This total does not include the customers of all the restaurants, caterers and venues that have also joined in, which will add significantly to the total, particularly as the second biggest contract caterer in the UK (Sodexo) is already involved.
 
This quarter, we were delighted to welcome to the campaign the Zoological Society of London (ZSL, which runs London Zoo) as well as the SeaLife London Aquarium. Both run marine conservation and education programmes, and can promote the message of sustainable fish production and consumption to hundreds of thousands of visitors every year. Together with the National Trust and London 2012, who were early adopters of the Sustainable Fish City policy, we are beginning to make inroads with high-profile tourist attractions to adopt sustainable fish buying and promotion to their visitors and communities, and negotiations are well advanced with several more.
 
In related news, one of our Sustainable Fish City partners, the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), announced that it has been working with McDonald’s to ensure that 100,000,000 Filet-o-Fish meals in Europe will be MSC-certified from Autumn 2011. A quick calculation suggests that this equates to 2.5 million McDonald’s fish meals in London every year, another big step towards a sustainable fish city.
 

Spring 2011

Sustainable Fish City
Sustainable Fish City is the campaign to turn London into the world’s first city where businesses, public sector bodies, and citizens buy, sell and eat only sustainable fish. It is a collaboration between Sustain, Fish2Fork, the Marine Conservation Society, Marine Stewardship Council, Seafood Choices Alliance and the Environmental Justice Foundation – among many others.

The campaign received an early and valuable endorsement when European Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, Maria Damanaki, visited London in January. In a speech to fishing industry and government representatives, she said: “Coming to London from Brussels I was informed that London has been challenged to become the first ever Sustainable Fish City. What a challenge! The National Trust, four London Universities, the Metropolitan Police, Transport for London, the Greater London Authority, the London 2012 Olympic Games amongst others have promised to serve sustainable fish. There is a clear message here and I have received it. We need a new European Fisheries Policy and we can have it!”

Since the campaign launch on 11th January 2011, the number of caterers signing the pledge has increased steadily. London’s universities have been particularly keen supporters, with 11 Sustainable Fish City pledge signatories so far. Several have also worked with their student communities to raise awareness about sustainable fish issues. Restaurants have also been keen to sign up, with high street names such as Carluccio’s, Leon and Wahaca and luxury dining such as the D&D London Restaurants group. The second largest caterer in the UK, Sodexo, has also agreed to become a pledge signatory, which is a significant boost to the campaign.

This followed our success at the end of 2010, helping the London Metropolitan Police, Transport for London, the London Fire Brigade and the Greater London Authority to adopt a “demonstrably sustainable fish” policy for their own catering, in line with the policy commitments set out by the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Catering businesses have signed up to a pledge that they will:

• Avoid the worst: Telling their supplier or caterer to remove endangered species from menus and catering – those rated as ‘fish to avoid’ by the Marine Conservation Society: www.fishonline.org/advice/avoid/
• Promote the best: Serving sustainably managed fish – Marine Stewardship Council-certified fish, and those rated as ‘fish to eat’ by the Marine Conservation Society: www.fishonline.org/advice/eat/
• Improve the rest: Telling their supplier or caterer they want to serve only sustainable fish – with the help of organisations such as Good Catch: www.goodcatch.org.uk and the Marine Stewardship Council: www.msc.org

The Sustainable Fish City website has attracted over 10,000 page views since the launch, and has been greatly boosted by links with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Fish Fight campaign and production team. Other press coverage has ranged from trade journals to a feature on the popular Food Channel website. Many of the participating universities have also been displaying bespoke posters supporting the campaign. Project officer, Jon Walker, with support from volunteer David Latto, have also attended events to spread the message to staff and students at Kingston University, City University and the School of Oriental and African Studies (with the Marine Stewardship Council).

Project funding
Jon and Kath are pursuing fundraising options, and in February received the good news that the BBC Wildlife Fund (part of the BBC Wildlife Magazine) has confirmed a contribution to the campaign to build on the work specifically with higher education institutions in London. We have been invited to give a presentation to an event organised by BBC Wildlife later in the year. The Waterloo Foundation has also made a contribution to the campaign to develop a smartphone application and associated communications work.

Sustainable City Awards
Sustain's Ethical Eats team was on the judging panel for the Sustainable City Award 2011, and was delighted when Café Spice Namaste won the overall Leadership in Sustainability award. Jon Walker for the Sustainable Fish City campaign is now working with the awards team to develop a Sustainable Fish City Award for launch later in 2011.

Restaurants and sustainable fish
Sustain's Ethical Eats project worked with Sustainable Fish City, the Marine Stewardship Council and Good Catch to develop a workshop on sustainable fish at Billingsgate Training School. Held in March, this was one of the most successful events we have yet run, with great feedback from the chefs and restaurateurs who attended, and positive media coverage. The event gave chefs ideas and practical experience of using more sustainable fish options on their menus. The blind tasting and market tour were particularly popular. Read a report of the sustainable fish workshop here.Read a 

London Food Link
Sustainable fish was an important topic of discussion at the London Food Link February Soirée, held at the Dalston Farm:shop, a location that intrigued many members.  The Farm:shop was a former disused business premises being converted into an urban farm and includes a polytunnel in the backyard, chickens on the roof and indoor growing by both hydroponic and aquaponic methods. The Soirée was very well attended with over 60 people tastily catered for by member Happy Kitchen, snacks from Vegan Peasant, and a cask of North London's finest beer, from Redemption Brewery. Speakers included a new charity that promotes tap water in restaurants, and a Dalston restaurateur seeking local suppliers. The evening also saw a Farm:shop representative speak about aquaponics, a local fishmonger talk about their buying policy, and Kath Dalmeny from Sustain give an update on Sustainable Fish City. Visit the London Food Link website to find out more.

London 2012 food
Sustain continues to sit on the London 2012 Food Advisory Group, advising the organisers of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) on health and sustainability in their catering policy. Over recent months LOCOG has been negotiating the major contracts awarded to commercial caterers, for Games visitors, athletes, staff and volunteers, journalists and dignitaries. We understand that all of these major contracts - for the 17 million meals to be served within the Games - have now been awarded. Although negotiations were confidential, we understand that the large contract caterers have been demonstrating keen interest in achieving the sustainability standards set out in the London 2012 Food Vision. These include commitments to 100% demonstrably sustainable fish; free range eggs; Fairtrade tea, coffee, bananas and sugar; a proportion of Freedom Food chicken and pork; and aspirational aims to serve LEAF-Marque and organic certified food.
 
Sustain has been busy discussing with LOCOG and the London Food Board the possibility of running a programme of work to promote opportunities for small- and medium-sized food enterprises, and those that can provide sustainable food, targeting the plethora of events and venues that will be hosting London 2012 events before and during the Games. We hope this will also result in a long-term commitment by the catering sector to serving sustainable food, contributing to a positive sustainable food legacy for London 2012. These discussions are going well, and the London Food Board's Executive group and Business & Commerce group, and the London Mayor's food advisor Rosie Boycott and her Food Team, as well as the London 2012 organisers (LOCOG) have expressed keen interested in supporting such activities.
 
As Sustain and its members had done so much of the work to secure the "demonstrably sustainable fish" commitment by London 2012, we chose to crack ahead with launching the Sustainable Fish City, to build on the excellent relationships and momentum we had already built. We hope that work on other sustainable food elements of London 2012 will be pursued with similar enthusiasm and energy, and will do our best to encourage this to happen!
 
We are also participating in discussions and information exchanges with several Sustain members keen to set up 'meet the buyer' type events with London 2012 caterers, and to support high-profile publicity for sustainable food and the various sustainability certification programmes at the Games.

Government and sustainable fish
In December 2010, Defra published proposals to introduce compulsory Government Buying Standards (GBS) for food bought by central government. GBS will apply to food bought by government departments, prisons and some of the armed forces, and extend to approximately only one-third of all public sector organisations in England. At present, the proposals suggest that just 60% of seafood bought by these organisations has to be “sustainable”.

Sustain's Good Food for Our Money campaign judged this standard to be "unacceptably weak", particularly as it was published at a time of growing public awareness about the sustainability of seafood and the plight of many fish stocks, particularly following Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall’s Channel 4 Fish Fight series in January 2011. As a result, we have been running a campaign – with the support of Fish Fight and many others – which calls on Defra to change this standard so that 100% of seafood bought by central government is required meet the Olympic definition of seafood sustainability, which Sustain helped to draft.

Although we are still awaiting publication of GBS, promised by government for May, after repeated delays, we are told that Defra finalised its proposals at the end of March. Up to this time, we organised a lively seafood campaign which included:

Media coverage
We judged that the seafood standard in GBS is weaker than the standards in pet food served to Larry the No.10 cat. This is because leading cat food brands Whiskas and Sheba, which are manufactured by the multi-national organisation Mars Group, now contain 100% Marine Stewardship Council certified seafood. We issued a press release, “Government's fish standards will be worse than for pet food eaten by Number 10's Larry the Cat”, which achieved a lot of media coverage, including in the Daily Mail.

Online actions
We set up a ‘Larry the Cat’ online action which enabled people to email Farming Minister Jim Paice MP (with responsibility for public procurement of food) and Defra officials to demand that they change their seafood buying proposals. Once the furore about Larry the Cat had begun to diminish, we remodelled the online action as a ‘countdown’ to decision day. We based this action on the slogan “Jim’ll Fix It For Fish?” and posted our own online Jim’ll Fix It badge to grab attention. We were helped by many organisations, including Greenpeace, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Fish Fight campaigners, the Seafood Choices Alliance and Fish2Fork in promoting both actions via Facebook, Twitter and in their publications. In total, approximately 1,200 people have taken one of our online actions since the beginning of March.

Postcard campaign
To continue putting pressure on Defra, we also organised a postcard campaign in Jim Paice’s constituency. Alex and Charlie visited Ely for a day to encourage people to fill out a postcard to send to their MP, Jim Paice. On the day we managed to get 103 people to complete postcards which we then sent to Defra, and we subsequently organised the distribution of a further 2,500 postcards to addresses in Ely in the following days.

83p cheques to the PM and Cabinet
Our calculations, using Defra’s own figures, show that changing to sustainable seafood standards in the GBS would cost a mere 83p per person eating food in central government each year. To keep the issue high on the Government agenda, we sent an 83p cheque (from staff members who volunteered to use their personal bank accounts) to the Prime Minister and to each of the other 28 Cabinet members, stating that this would cover the cost of serving sustainable seafood at cabinet meetings. We are tracking and reporting on each Minister’s response on the Campaign’s web pages. This has been an effective way of maintaining interest in the issue and giving us some valuable ‘news’ with which to promote our online actions on Twitter. Read the responses we have so far received at: http://www.sustainweb.org/goodfoodforourmoney/cabinet_83p_fish_payments/

Government and Parliament
We met with Jim Paice at Defra (armed with packets of Whiskas cat food labelled as containing certified sustainable fish) to demand that the Government strengthen the criteria in the GBS and implement a ‘Code for Sustainable Food’ to apply these standards to the rest of the public sector. Joan Walley MP joined us at this meeting to push for the adoption of this Code, which formed an important part of her previous Private Members’ Bill in support of campaign aims.

We met with Willie Bain MP - Labour Party Shadow Food Minister – and subsequently submitted a short report to him outlining why the Labour Party should publicly support the objectives of the campaign. This has already led to some useful developments – for example, he has asked a number of parliamentary questions about public sector food since we met, and also invited Sustain to participate in Labour Party food policy development.

We supported Joan Walley MP in her tabling of Early Day Motion 1452 which calls on the Government to extend Government Buying Standards to all of the public sector, not just parts of it. The EDM states that this would benefit British farmers and we have helped to build support for the EDM, including from the NFU which is specified in the text as a supporting organisation.

We submitted a detailed response (and thanks to the campaign supporters who contributed) to Defra’s consultation about Government Buying Standards in February. To read our final submission, see http://www.sustainweb.org/pdf/11/GFFOM_response_GBS_consultation.pdf

Sustain's coordinator Jeanette Longfield was among the attendees at a meeting hosted by the shadow agriculture minister for the Labour Party, Willie Bain, MP on 14 March. This is part of the Labour Party’s policy review process, and Kath attended another meeting in this series, later in the month, focusing on sustainable fish policy.