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Amazing, creative idea to save world’s fish

In Good News, In the News,

Posted on February 9, 2013
Author: Linda,
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So you’ve been wondering how to save the world’s sea life from being fished to extinction. And maybe you’ve been wondering where to invest some money, what with interests rates practically underwater.

Do I have an answer for you!

Some investors have launched a contest – with real cash prizes – to encourage people in the global fishing industry (which, by the way, annually amounts to some $390 billion) to create ways to make the industry sustainable. Translation: how not to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.

Personally, my contribution to this problem is simply not to eat fish (or any other seafood or landfood animals), but since millions of people do eat fish, I think the story is worth sharing.

The contest is called Fish 2.0 and those who enter get to rub elbows with venture capitalists looking to fund creative ideas at a two-day event this coming November. I’ve been to a similar event held by Slow Money, where creative food entrepreneurs got to pitch their ideas to moneyed folks, and it was inspiring to see ideas that could help the environment develop in front of my eyes.

David Bank, one of the organizers, explains it in more detail in this Huffington Post blog. Fish 2.0 isn’t the only such initiative: the David and Lucile Packard Foundation offers Future of Fish, which also helps entrepreneurs, such as Robert Terry of Palo Alto, whose startup is developing fishing gear that could reduce bycatch (killing sea creatures –including dolphins and turtles –that the fishers don’t want and throw back into the sea dead or dying).

It’s encouraging that some people are seeing the danger and making (and investing in) long-term plans to save the sea life of the world.

Valentine’s Day for earth lovers

In Holidays, Take Action,

Posted on February 7, 2013
Author: Linda,
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It’s not too soon to think about sustainable holidays. Valentine’s Day first. From an article I wrote for Lafayette Today, a local print newspaper, here are some tips I suggested. (The full article can also be found here).

Give time, not things. Take someone you love for a walk outdoors. Offer to help clean up a cluttered garage. Take him or her to a concert of favorite music.

Make a donation to your loved one’s favorite cause.

The classic romantic dinner. A restaurant meal is not guaranteed to be romantic. In the crowd on Valentine’s Day, the restaurant might like you to hurry so they can seat the next diners, or refuse to customize your request. You could create a romantic dinner at home (using sustainably farmed ingredients, of course!), or dine out on the weekend or on February 13.

Having a party? Try alternatives to all those paper and plastic goods that probably came all the way from China, destined for an American landfill. Serve finger foods so that guests only need napkins, or use plates that you can wash. Or rent plates, glasses, and silverware to make an elegant dining experience.

Single? Treat yourself to a massage. Have a day at the spa. Check out the gently used books at your local second-hand bookshop.

This year, make the earth your valentine!

Sustainable food — on the airwaves

In Author Event, In the News,

Posted on February 5, 2013
Author: Linda,
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I recently got a chance to speak to the radio audience of Health Podcaster, on eHealthRadio. The interview is saved, so if you’re interested in hearing an overview of the food and environment issues, go here.

Like you, I feel that promoting sustainable food and agriculture is a mission. If you’re on the busy end of the time spectrum, you support the movement by buying organic when you’re in the grocery story anyway. If you have a bit more time, you frequent farmers’ markets as well. It doesn’t take a lot of time to tend one’s tomato plants, and the really dedicated grow zucchini, lettuce, peas, beans, and more at their residences.

Then there are community gardens. In my town of Lafayette, CA, a new community garden opened up last year. Check it out here!

Fish are disappearing

In Food Politics, Food to Avoid, Take Action,

Posted on February 1, 2013
Author: Linda,
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It’s natural to think that there are always more fish in the sea, but our modern fishing methods – which are more like floating industrial packing factories – are scooping up millions of tons of fish. Did you know that trawlers may use heavy nets that reach the ocean bottom to scrape up everything in their path? Such trawlers have left muddy trails so wide and so long that they can be seen from the International Space Station.

As I mentioned in my book, “Fish aren’t the only ones to suffer. Jobs disappear when fisheries go out of business from overfishing; 40,000 jobs were lost when Canada’s Atlantic cod fishery collapsed in the 1990s, and it has yet to recover. Over 72,000 jobs were lost in the Pacific Northwest due to declining stocks. In 2008 and 2009, the fishing season was closed on the West Coast.”

But the problem now faces New England states. According to John Bullard, a member of the New England Fishery Management Council, “We are headed, slowly, seeming inexorably, to oblivion… It’s midnight and getting darker when it comes to how many cod there are,” he said. “There [aren’t] enough cod for people to make a decent living.” The article describes the anguish of fishers afraid of losing their livelihood, furious that the agency wants to set lower catch limits.

What a dilemma! But should we allow today’s fishers to exterminate the entire stock of fish? I’m reminded of the redwood debate of a decade or so ago, when a wise soul opined: “We’re going to stop cutting down redwoods. The only question is, When shall we do it? Right now, or after they’re all gone?”

What you can do: Go to Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch to see what fish are acceptable to eat, which ones are dubious choices, and which should be strictly off your menu. Better yet: say goodbye to fish altogether.

Good news about BVO

In Good News,

Posted on January 25, 2013
Author: Linda,
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Right after I told you about the untested and possibly harmful brominated vegetable oil (yesterday!) I got a press release from Center for Science in the Public Interest saying that PepsiCo has decided to take BVO out of its popular drink Gatorade. Wonder if Susan Kavanagh’s petition had anything to do with it? Congratulations to her, either way.

Another additive makes headlines – flame retardant chemical in sodas

In Food to Avoid, In the News,

Posted on January 24, 2013
Author: Linda,
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Just when you thought there couldn’t be one more unholy chemical concoction in our food, another one emerges from obscurity. BVO – brominated vegetable oil. It’s found mostly in citrus-flavored sodas, so maybe I shouldn’t say it’s in our “food” – but some of us are ingesting it anyway. And it isn’t even a new invention – according to an article in the New York Times, it’s been in food since the 1930s, and attempts to establish safe levels in humans are inadequate, so BVO has coasted on a grandfathered or interim regulatory status for decades.

And, as we are sadly aware, the U.S. is far behind other countries in protecting its citizens. BVO has not been approved in other countries, or even outright banned: European Union, India, Japan. Could they know something we don’t? One young woman, 15-year-old Susan Kavanagh, investigated this and found that Gatorade has somehow magically found a substitute formulation to sell in those other countries—but doesn’t use it here.

Interested in being heard? Susan set up an online petition to ask Gatorade to stop adding BVO. Your signature would be added to the signatures of 200,000 other people.

Just over a year ago, Scientific American weighed in on the issue and pointed out that BVO was patented as a flame retardant and can be found in 10% of the sodas in the U.S. (including Mountain Dew, Squirt, Fanta Orange, Gatorade Thirst-Quencher Orange, and Fresca Original Citrus). Joseph Mercola, a prominent physician and food activist (he made a major donation to the Proposition 37 campaign) has some eye-opening information. Bromine – the element that chemists bond with vegetable oil to make this concoction – is an endocrine disruptor, and can displace absorption of iodine, which our bodies need.

Soda is my own (very) guilty pleasure but I’ll sure check labels for BVO from now on.