Fish and Chips anyone?

[Bros]

I see there is a bit on Ch 7's current affairs program next Monday about Basa fillets, pacific dory or any of those other names that are used. May be worth a look.

Don't blame me if you don't eat fish and chips again.

[baitchuka]

mate.... if i dont catch it i dont eat it.........

[yibbiy]

yer i recon ive had the good old "mutton dressed up as lamb" at a few fish n chip shops!!

[Bros]

yer i recon ive had the good old "mutton dressed up as lamb" at a few fish n chip shops!!

This crap is much worse.

[hogesTS]

love the fish and chip shop up here on TI, fresh caught everyday mackerel with homemade beer batter, cannot be beat!! But yeah have had a few ordinary bits from shops down south...

[DICER]

solution - set up your own fish and chip shop!

[Scubaroo]

Was talking to a mate about this at work the other day - for those who don't know, "Basa" is the market name for a variety of catfish from the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, typically raised in cages under houseboats or barges, feeding off the scraps from the houseboat family, or whatever the barge farmers feed them. Banned in several US states from import because of ridiculous amounts of antibiotics in some samples from the farmers pouring wholesale amounts of medication into the cages to keep the fish healthy. Basically if you're a tourist in the region, the local tour operators ban you from swimming in the water - well this guy went for a swim, and reckoned he came out with dried mud and crap on his skin whereever water touched it. One of the filthiest waterways in the world.

And Coles is flogging the stuff to Australian consumers - I reckon a quarter of the fish at the Elsternwick Coles is Basa - either fillets, or marinated pre-prepared skewers for BBQing. I happily tell other shoppers that are checking it out that it's Vietnamese catfish - they switch choices pretty quick ;D

[finga64]

Beauty, another good excuse for me to go fishing ;)
Got to get some fish for the relo's
Mmm me hunter/gatherer

More seriously. it's great that they are showing this to the wider population. If only 30% of people change their mind on buying this crap then the big supermarkets may have to also rethink their situation on buying this crap.
It's sad when they ban the stuff in good ol US of A and in Aussie we (the ever wise Government) welcome it.

Stupid that Aussie has LESS restrictions/inspections/etc on imported food then locally produced food.

Maybe they should serve it up as a Monday thru Friday special on the menu in Parliment house??? Might get something done about it then. But I might as well [smiley=wut.gif]

[MulletMan]

But it gets worse! Being of the opinion that any fish except mullet, tailor, whiting and flatty is CRAP (yeh I love the stuff) many fish & chip shops will only sell the imported stuff. One shop at the coast only offers Pacific Dory, flake and Barra (of dubious origin).
Fish 53 the best place at East brisbane only stock what they call "boutique fish" and all the fish shops in Cleveland no longer sell the stuff I love. All this stinking Nile Perch, cod (?), flake, Wild Barra and the like. Where do you go for a dirty great chunk of snapper or flattie these days. I am so paranoid I think I will take my cam with me to Coles & Woolies and photograph the undersized crap they call fresh local fish. >:( >:( >:( >:( >:(
There, feel so much better now! :'( :'(

[Derek_Bullock]

WHAT FISH IS THAT?

"Things that batter"

23/11/2005

By Anthony Hoy


Australia's appetite for fish and chips is being fed by Pacific dory, aka Mekong River catfish, which is set to dwarf our local fishing industry.

Anthony Hoy reports:

Fish and chips, a wedge of lemon, lashings of batter and salt - a splash of vinegar to dilute the grease, perhaps - and all washed down with a soft drink, a frosty ale or a glass of vino.

December, the start of the long, hot summer. Bring on the lazy weekends and coastal holidays. Forget slaving over a hot stove or a barbecue: dinner is served, at the beach, in cardboard cartons, or parceled up in newsprint lined with greaseproof paper.

But something is missing, and it's not the seagulls or the flies.

The good, fresh, local catch that Australians have for generations associated with their fish and chips - the flathead, snapper, silver and john dory, red fish, bream and whiting - are in increasingly short supply and, as a result, are becoming prohibitively expensive.

In their place in the fish-and-chips pack, like it or not, is "Pacific dory", the so-called "catch of the day" - an innocuous skinless, boneless and bland-flavored fillet.

Pacific dory is now Australia's biggest-selling fish, according to the Master Fish Merchants Association (MFMA).

With sales approaching a staggering 7000 tonnes this year, it is driving a fish shop revolution. Says MFMA chief executive, Michael Kitchener: "Because it is relatively cheap, retailing at around $10 per kilogram, the public love it."

The problem, according to the chairman of the Australian Fish Names Committee, Roy Palmer, is that Pacific dory has never seen the Pacific - or any other ocean, for that matter.

And it is nothing like a dory.

Here's food for thought: the fish you will probably sink your teeth into the next time you are beachside and hungry has been raised in cages suspended under houseboats and barges in the crowded and polluted waters of Vietnam's Mekong River.

The same snap-frozen and imported fish, says Palmer, is being sold as a popular line in Australian supermarkets under the deceptive marketing label, "freshwater fillet".

It is Pangasius bocourti, one of 21 species of freshwater catfish found in the Mekong basin, and - in a move designed to curb deceptive naming practices by fishmongers and supermarkets - last year christened "basa" under Seafood Services Australia's uniform fish names process.

"Basa's success in the marketplace has been a key factor in fish imports from Vietnam doubling in 2002-03 and then doubling again last year," says managing director of the Sydney Fish Market, Grahame Turk.

An estimated 300,000 to 400,000 Vietnamese are involved in the government-owned basa fishery.

It produces more basa than Australia's total seafood production of 550,000 tonnes a year, according to Turk, who is also deputy chairman of the Australian Seafood Industry Council. Vietnam's basa production, Turk says, is expected to reach 1 million tonnes a year within five years.

Vietnam's catfish exports have already decimated the local catfish industry in the US where producers are fighting back.

There is no basa-farming standard among Vietnamese processors, according to the American domestic fishing lobby, thus there is no distinction in the marketplace between professionally farmed product and caged fish from Mekong houseboats and barges.

Sewage systems along the Mekong struggle to keep pace with rapid development, and run-off from the river's hinterland is polluted by fertilisers and pesticides.

American industry sources claim large stocks of basa are fed through holes cut in the floors of houseboats, the human waste from which also goes straight into the river.

Food for the fish includes vegetable and crop waste, rice bran and animal waste.

The Mekong and associated aquaculture ponds have a high silt concentration, say the Americans, and it is common Vietnamese practice to soak the basa fillets in sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP), a chemical used as a preservative and seafood "texturiser".

This means that consumers who purchase basa by weight from Australian supermarkets need to be wary, because fish treated with STPP retain more water.

In August, the American states of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana suspended the sale of all Vietnamese aquatic products, following the discovery of the antibiotics ciprofloxacin and enrofloxacin in basa imports.

Ciprofoxacin and enrofloxacin - prohibited in western countries because of the risk of their transferring resistant micro-organisms to humans - were being used by some Mekong River basa producers to combat salmonella and other disease in fish.

The antibiotics can also lead to the development of the infectious disease campylobacter, which can cause diarrhoea, abdominal pain, fever, nausea and vomiting. Vietnam's Ministry of Fisheries has foreshadowed restrictions on the use of 11 antibiotics in its aquatic products sector.

The use of the name basa in place of Pacific dory is not yet mandatory in Australia, says Roy Palmer, "even though there are a lot of reasons why it should be".

An Australian standard for fish names is expected to be launched early in the new year, as a preliminary step towards legislative controls.

"One of the problems is that every state has different arrangements," Palmer says.

"Until there is uniformity, people can drive holes through these issues.

"And the Australian Quarantine Inspection Service [charged with responsibility for making sure imports meet Australian food standards] does not check fish names. This remains a big problem."


Anthony Hoy

[Derek_Bullock]

Fish, chips, please, but what is on the plate?

By TONY LOVE

14jan06

BUTTERFISH - South Australia's favourite from fish and chip shops - is largely cheap imported species including a Vietnamese catfish banned in three U.S. states because it contained chemical residues.

Because of confusing naming and labelling laws, consumers will never know what they're eating from fast food shops and many budget food outlets, an investigation by The Advertiser has found.

Butterfish, thought by many South Australians to be locally caught mulloway, flake or even a defined species of the same name, in fact is virtually always an ocean fish called hake, caught and processed on giant floating factory ships in South Africa. Other fish to fill our butterfish orders include hoki from New Zealand, while fishing industry experts warn a new Vietnamese import is becoming more common in hotels and budget and fast food outlets.

"Our expectations as consumers is that butterfish is mulloway," says Angelakis Brothers sales manager Tom Palaktsoglou. "But it's not. Not in fish shops."

In an Advertiser survey of fish and chip shops in suburban Adelaide, all reported they sold hake under the banner of "butterfish", and without exception it was the most popular order.

The Vietnamese import, sold thawed in supermarkets and some fishmongers as cheap white fish fillets under the generic name "basa" is, in fact, a Mekong River catfish.

Basa has come into the marketplace as smaller portioned hake fillets decrease in quantity from overfishing.

Local fishing industry experts warn that consumers should be aware of how these fish are farmed and processed.

It is understood the catfish would definitely be treated by chemicals to cleanse, whiten and improve the flesh texture.

"The environment it's taken from is not by any means what we would accept as a reasonable standard," says SA Fishing Council general manager Neil MacDonald. The basa fish has been banned in three U.S. states because of the presence of antibiotics found in food safety tests.

Samples imported into Australia have been found to contain low-level residues of synthetic dyes, but health authorities have assessed the levels too low to pose a health risk. In response to the findings, the Australian Quarantine Service has begun a random testing program of the relevant imported fish.

Australia imported close to 7000 tonnes of basa last year and 8000 tonnes of hake.

Both are begrudgingly accepted by SA fishing industry leaders because we do not catch and process a fish cheap enough or in the quantity needed to supply the domestic market. "There's nothing that can compete in terms of price or amount of product with a fish like basa, which is produced in thousands of tonnes in low-cost aquaculture," says Mr MacDonald.

The cheap imports are not considered to affect the state's own fishery because whiting, garfish and snapper are considerably more expensive to catch and process, while potentially competitive fish from south-east Australian waters are consumed mostly in the eastern states.

SA industry experts, however, are concerned that consumers here are unaware they are buying imported products, some with questionable quality.

Australia-wide labelling standards for imported fish were gazetted only last month after years of lobbying by consumer groups and fishing industry authorities. Current laws require retailers of raw fish to indicate produce is imported, and new regulations will force them within six months to detail the country of origin of imported fish products.

But food sold cooked in venues such as fish and chip shops, budget food chains and restaurants does not have to be labelled in detail.

"Butterfish is used these days as a generic term for low-priced fish - and low-priced fish of current favour is imported hake," said state Department of Health food section manager Brian Delroy.

The Australian Consumers Association believes consumers are left vulnerable to health and safety issues as well as sales deception because of the labelling issues.

"Let's make sure consumers know what they're buying and also the advantages of buying SA produce," said Seafood Council of SA general manager Martin Smallridge.

THE MEKONG CATFISH

* Basa is the name under which the Mekong River catfish (Pangasius bocourti) is sold.

* Basa is reported being farmed in government aquaculture projects as well as in crowded cages suspended from houseboats, fed through deck holes with animal and vegetable waste products while human waste and chemical residue pollute the river.

[rough_shag]

I completely agree that it is terrible accepting this kinda low grade crap in this country but I have to ask-what do we really know about ALL the food we are eating(apart from the good fresh stuff pulled from the bay)??.Who knows what goes into a meat pie or a hot dog?who knows what chemicals go into soft drinks ?what about the detergents used to clean fermentation vats by the beer makers?,the list is endless.
We used to be spoiled for freshness and quality in this country until our incompetent leaders embraced the global economy.Now most of our best produce, including fish,is sent overseas for wealthy foreigners to enjoy while we are left with the substandard rubbish they reject and crap imports like the catfish talked about here.
It seems to me that the majority of Aussies have been duped into believing all the political retoric spewed out by the pollies and big business.Apparently we should all be terribly concerned about our trade deficit etc etc which only affects the profits of big business and their bedfellows-politicians.Personally it doesn't seem to make an ounce of difference to me what the state of our economy is good bad or ugly life doesn't change much but we are all convinced daily that it is so important to us all.
I'd rather have the great fresh produce we had when I was a kid than the crappy leftover reject snap frozen 10 mth old preservative filled rubbish that the supermarkets are allowed to force on us. I have been going back to self reliance-growing my own fruit and veg catching my own fish and bartering for fresh beef from my mate and I can tell you it's like I had forgotten what real food tastes like!.
God help us all once these same big corporations get genetically modified everything on the go!!.Jace. ps:off the soapbox now.

[AussieMozzie]

Its disgusting that the import this crap from overseas thats full of god knows what. Same goes for the fruit and veges that they are importing. >:(

I won't eat fish and chips from the fish shop as I don't think they are going to tell you the truth in what you are actually getting. >:(

[Bros]

I really don't care if people eat Mekong river turds but they should know they are eating Mekong river turds. Last week I saw Basa fillets on sale as "imported freshwater basa" for $9.30 per Kg and they sold heaps. At end of the week I went to the local fish retailer for some Qld cooked prawns (not fish and chip shop) and the cheapest fish on offer was $26 per kg.

No wonder they sell fish for $9.30 Kg

In the fish and chip shops of the past in Qld the stable was Mackerel and the southern states Flake not now. A couple of weeks ago I was on the Sunshine coast and we were working out what to have or lunch so we decided to have fish and chips. To avoid the Mekong river turds I paid top dollar for Barra and it was under size crap proberbly imported.

[chanquetas]

Where do you go for a dirty great chunk of snapper or flattie these days.


Morgans at Scarborough. I would say they have the best seafood in Brisbane, apart from catching it yourself.

Cheers,
Jake

[chanquetas]

This is worth a look.

http://www.bowpanseafoods.com.au/fish.shtml

[Bros]

You can't win can you King Snapper, North West Snapper product of Vietnam. Why can't they call it for what it is and not give it a name to make it sound more acceptable.

I was listening to radio show recently and the marketing people were trying to find a name for kangaroo so they could sell it locally.

[backhoe]

This is worth a look.

http://www.bowpanseafoods.com.au/fish.shtml
That stuff looks pretty awful. The barra doesn't look like any barra I've ever caught. At least we can eat the occasional decent fish that we catch. Pity poor old granny across the road that ends up eating that sh*t. Maybe we should all adopt a granny for a decent feed of fish every few weeks!!!

[wetnwild11]

Hey Guys, Give the ol' fish n' chip near the jetty at Urungan, MATE BL#$DY Beaut!

[snakecatcher]

I read something in the courier mail about "Pacific Dory" a couple of months ago and it put me off eating the crap for life. Nowadays I only get fresh local fish and nothing frozen or imported - you have to pay a little more for it but it is worth it.

Another thing along similar lines is the sale of vanamai prawns (not sure of the spelling) - also imported from vietnam or is it china and I think they are kept caged under chicken pens so their diet consists of chicken shit no doubt laced with a bit of bird flu for good measure. I wouldn't touch em with a bargepole but coles and woolies still sell em but under the name tropical whites.

Lot to be said for catching your own I reckon.

[seatime]

Lucky I hadn't eaten before I read some of this thread.

I was at the Mooloolaba co-op fish and chip cafe in Dec. The woman next to me asked the bloke serving "is this local fish". The bloke threw his arms in the air and said to the woman " look at all the trawlers tied up at the wharf out the back, we'd be mad not to sell local fish and prawns" he then added "everything here was caught off those trawlers".
The woman was very impressed and proceeded to buy some prawns. I was very impressed too as one tray in front of me had crayfish with a sign "Tasmanian Crayfish" next to them were green lipped mussels marked "NZ Green Lipped Mussels" there was swordfish, atlantic salmon, brown trout, Scottish smoked kippers, vanamai prawns, farmed prawns etc. From what I saw the only local produce was the med king prawns they wanted $34/kg for. How dumb do these people think we are, the tosser serving at the counter was cleaning the toilet half an hour later, he was probably the expert on premises.

[rickraider]

ok....never bought these but what is seafood extender....see it at all the big shops :P :P :P
cheers rick

[rickraider]

ok....never bought these but what is seafood extender....see it at all the big shops :P :P :P
cheers rick

[Hoges]

ok....never bought these but what is seafood extender....see it at all the big shops :P :P :P
cheers rick

Hi Rick, I cannot verify this as I just read it on another forum...

Crabsticks are made from surimi, which is made from fish whiteflesh (normally pollack, blue whiting) on huge factory processing ships that can pump out 500+ tonnes a day. The fish are basically filleted, put in a big mo fo of a blender, the fish mince is then rinsed in water, which removes most of the oils freom the flesh, and releases gelling agents which when strained produce the consistency of crabsticks, this can then be flavoured (normally with prawn/crab/lobster oil, and can be extruded in different shapes to produce everything from crab sticks, crab claws, scallops, and the good ol' seafood extender.

Cheers

Peter

::)

[dicko1980]

I live in Townsville and have noticed how many resturants and pubs try to serve this sub standard sh*t for fresh fish. The last time I asked about the Basa fillets on the menu, I was given a piss weak excuse about availability of the local product. I now struggle to find anywhere here in North QLD that doesn't serve this crap. I will give credit to the one of the local fish wholesalers, Ingham Road Seafoods, who does a great job of educating the local community about these cheap imports. If you want to have a decent feed of fresh fish in Townsville I would see the guys there to point you in the right direction for who is buying the local products

:D :D :D

[DICER]

This is despicable! I'm sure our Austrlalian catfish would beat the pants off any type of fish on offer for import. The "B" company even gets the "barramundi" mixed up with what looks to be pearl perch! Not happy Jan!

The name should honestly reflect the fish caught or sold. People should push hard for the point of sale to say what it is and where it is from - either Mekong catfish or whatever. This is the only way for people to realise.

[rough_shag]

I reckon the main problem here is that we have been taken over-hijacked,by giant faceless corporations who's only concern is for their profits.These corporations regard people as the lowest common denominator and will stoop to any low level in the name of profits even if that means our food is pumped full of all manner of crap like preservatives and hormones which no one knows what effect they have in the long term.Some foods are protected by privacy laws because the recipe is considered valuable and therefore can't be disclosed which means they can put everything from carcinogens to deadly poisons into it and the authorities are powerless to prevent it.
The only way to be sure of what you are eating is to grow/catch your own-don't expect supermarkets or anyone else to give a toss about the quality being sold-if they could wrap a turd in x-mas paper and sell it to you to feed your family they would do it have no doubt about that!.Jace.

[rough_shag]

Do they have bag limits for trawlers? and other commercial fishers? years ago my brother worked on a prawn trawler(oh the shame!) and he said that even though the skipper only had a prawn license they often ground fish caught in the nets down into fish paste and sold it as well.
How come I can go to a seafood shop and buy undersized fish which I would be pinged for if I caught?.The recreational boat industry is a multibillion dollar concern-what about our rights?.If you stopped all commercial fishing that would be great for fish stocks wouldn't it?How about stopping the bulldozing of mangrove fish nurseries to make way for new canal estates? Anyone remember DUX CREEK on Bribie?
What is really needed is a truly representative organisation to flex the muscle of the thousands of boaties and fisherman and women who spend a large fortune on fishing related products week in and week out.
Without a loud strong voice they will treat us all like a bunch of dummies!.Jace.

[fish2eat]

I really don't care what the supermarkets and fish shops sell to the public, so long as it is ACCURATELY labelled according to species and origin. Then people can make an informed decision what they eat, knowing that the budget end of the market is likely to be the shit fed rubbish.

It burns me that Joe Blow has no idea what "Pacific Dory" is.....neither Pacific nor Dory......if you sold any other product in Australia with misleading descriptions, the ACCC would fine you hundreds of thousands of dollars.

WHY IS THE SEAFOOOD INDUSTRY EXEMPT ?????????

[Bros]

Yesterday it was choice of fish and Chips or pizza so I went to a fish and chip shop I use in Gladstone. The fish selection was Cod, Mackerel, Sweetlip and Coral Trout. I said to the young girl that I wanted Mackerel and then just as question I asked her if it was Imported or Australian. And with the most innocent look she said it was imported as it was Spanish. Well after those cooking picked themselves up off the floor laughing at the young girl who was extremely embarrassed she said she didn't know as noone had asked her before in the last 2 years she had worked there, at least she was honest.

[szopen]

I am about to throw some gas into the fire.

I see some contradictory statements above.

Biggest is:

We should reduce the commercial fishing around Australia coast as much as possible and reduce the imports of seafood at the same time.

Difficult to see how this could happen.


On the subject of chemical treatment of "pacific dory" fillets I can not comment.

But.

Recently I have been in one of the huge cold storage facilities and there was a lot of that stuff stored. Out of curiosity I had a look in some boxes and all the fillets inside were almost uniform in size.
To a simple person like me that means that they come from a fish farm and not from a cage under a houseboat.
With the amount of mekong catfish (a vegeterian fish I belive) produced in Vietnam it would be impossible to rely on "cage under a houseboat" farming so alhough for sure it happens I would doubt that these make a siginficant percentage of the fish processed for export. This is an industrial scale operation and not a small scale household fish farming.
(Think about a local farmer raising a couple of chickens and the chances of them getting exported).



Regarding prawns raised with chicen cages above the ponds.
This has been explained recently by Tony_N (I belive). Chicken sh!t works as a fertilizer to allow for growth of organizms that the prawns feed on.
(By any standards this can be considered organic farming).

[onerabbit]

Hmmmm, still dont think I'll be trying either. :-/ :-/ :-/

Muzz.

[moreton]

The company I work for sold 2.5 tonnes last month. I am going to suggest we delete it. I have never seen any thing as bad in 31 years of working in the seafood industry - YUK
Moreton

[side_show_cod]

I hear they can purify sewerage water to almost near perfection too, # but I wont be trying it.

I read somewhere it would be similar to eating garbage dump fed rats...

[fish2eat]

After watching the show on 7's Today Tonight and after discounting for journalistic inflation.........I still feel sick that I might have unknowingly eaten it as "fish" and chips.

[DICER]

Why the deceptive name?

Why import?

Is the antibiotic status true?

[al-straddie]

I reckon the main problem here is that we have been taken over-hijacked,by giant faceless corporations who's only concern is for their profits.These corporations regard people as the lowest common denominator #


We, as regular fisherman know that fresh is best, and we catch the fish that appeals to us. For the average joe blow, buying something from the supermarket is the norm. Often these people have little idea of what good fish is, they just buy what looks good. The appaling thing is that misleading labeling/name may damage the reputation of good australian fish, let alone the possible health side effects.

At my local Co-op (before I moved to Qld) they used to sell sweep(Newcastle bream) as Ocean Rock Pearch, and we always considered them as vermin. :-?

Any other industry with shoddy trade practices such as this would get jumped on.( What ever happened to our "Food standards" and similar laws). Lets not deceptively label it Basa, call it Catfish and see how it sells.

You've gaureented I'll never buy frozen fish again! ;)

[darren]

I think that they have part two on this again tonite about the wholesalers what tricks they get up to to disguise what is what from the public

[INDULGENCE]

I am in 2 minds about this talk of fish substitution. The Basa I saw on tele last night would deter anyone from buying cheap fish at anytime. However changing sweeps name to rock perch in an attempt to market it I dont think matters that much.Sure we as anglers can choose what fish we keep and eat but there is a lot of joe public out there that would like to eat more fish if they could afford it.
I look at my neighbours and think back to some of the fish they have gladly taken from me only to come back for more anytime I go fishing.
When I fished in Comps at 1 point per fish and 10 points per kilo we kept what you and I would class as rubbish fish, instead of wasteing these I generously gave them to my neighbours. The neighbours would wait for me to come home for more.
Fish as sweep ,mullet trevally etc have less than good reputations however when prepared properly and of course freshly prepared are acceptable to most non fisherpeople.
I can remember when the first Royal Red prawn came into the Co-Ops and the re-action from the majority of people,where are the Royal Reds now. They like the cocktail bug,trawl whiting fillets and red mullet are all consumed by the Asian communities within our cities. Not available to the general public mainly due to the bad name given them by those who knocked cheaper product in the market.
There are some operators who will take advantage of the situation but I think our commercial fishery have been conditioned to fish for top end product and why not if its available but dont knock someone who is satisfied with a lesser product that is affordable

I think its the larger wholesalers who should be critised for bringing this basa and nile perch by the tonne into our country for no other reason but profit. Whilst the supermarkets continue to sell at low prices they need supply and these larger wholesalers are making money easily without trying to sell up our local fish (by any name)

Wally

[MulletMan]

I sent the link of this topic to my sweetheart Naomi Robson :P :P :P :P :P of Today Tonight on Ch 7 and they were very appreciative of the comments from all the readers. Maybe we can get something going to get rid of this crap fish!
People power eh?

[PAYNE]

After getting food poisoning from eating fish and chips purchased from the pink take-away shop south of the Bribie bridge next to the boat ramp about a year ago, I refuse to buy seafood.
(And the worst thing was, I hadn't purchased fish and chips for about 15 years.)
There's something to be said about catching and preparing your own catch!!!

[bigmack]

We are lucky here at Mooloolaba - if you go to MRF at the end you will get a choice of Mahi, Snapper, Kingfish. Mackerel as your main choice of fish in the Fish & Chip deal. The other guy was pretty silly in saying that everything comes off the trawlers tied up at the back - its obvious the greenlips come from NZ, scallops with roe on come from tassie etc.

The only way to deal with this - vote with your dollars and do not buy it and tell all your friends.

Can anyone tell me why we dont farm fish more intensively in Australia - for goodness sake we have our own catfish! and other fish that breed and grow very quickly (naturally).

I know they were trying to farm snapper at Port Stephens ??? but the fish kept getting sunburnt because they were exposed to shallow water pens and turned balcket than a black bream. Somehow Australia seems backward in this department - In NZ all the snapper spawn from the underwater worlds etc are harvested and hatched by MAF and then grown out in pens like salmon - they harvest at about the 1.5 kilo and send it all overseas for high value trade -

Anyone on the boards involved in aquaculture and can give us some educated feedback on whats going on -

Pink Panther - good on you fro sending the thread to main stream TV. Lets see what happens.

As the other guys said - i wouldnt touch Vanameie Prawns or any kind of imported fish.........we have plenty of our own.

Cheers
Phill

[kc]

About time the sh^%$ hit the fan over this rubbish....the Basa fishery?? is set to produce 1 million tonnes next year....more than the entire commercial fishing industry in Australia and yet "we" inport (& more disgustingly) consume 70,000 tonnes of the stuff.

One of the chemicals used to "treat" this fish...a "texturisor" just makes the fish absorb water...swells the weight & this water is from the "pristine" Meekong river.

Sadely however, it is consumer driven and while our Government encourages our commercial fisheries to export this at the same time encouarges imports.

TFPQ has long had a policy of split commercial quotas with 50% staying at home and only 50% going overseas. This is not so "radical", it is already done in other countries. The Halibut fishery in North America is regulated and NO halibut is allowed to be exported.
Supply and demand would rapidly reduce domestic prices for "our" fish and Vietnam can shove their catfish up their "meekong delta"

I am actually in the "fish shop" business............something more I have in common with Pauline!!

I stick rigidly to an "Australian Fish Only" policy but it means I run at about twice the price of the fish shop down the road....my choice and bit by bit (or should that be bite by bite) the customers come around.

KC

[bigmack]

Snapper farming - interesting read

http://www.pir.sa.gov.au/byteserve/aquaculture/species_profiles/snapper_fs.pdf

[ROB80]

I had been eating "pearl perch" for years bought from local Fish and chip shop and only realised October last year when Pual took me out to the Barwon Banks and bagged out on real pearl perch, that the shop shite was at best frozen for a very long time if it was pearly at all. it was bland and pastey compared to the fillets in my freezer. Won't be eating from there again.

[bungie]

What gets me is paying good money at a fish and chip shop, like my local in kenmore, and getting basa fillets instead of what we asked and paid for

[rickraider]

my daughter used to work at the local fish and chippery. their selection was barra..cod and perch and surprise surprise it all came out the same box ...wonder what it was? :P :P :P

[johnnytheone]

A good start with all of this crap would be to make it MANDATORY for all fish, whether imported or local, to be named correctly according to an accepted reference source (say Grants' Guide or similar). Half the problem is when the sellers "rename" something so it sounds more palatable or worse, so that it appears related to a species everybody knows is nice to eat. There are probably about 5 - 10 Aussie fish species that almost everyone (talking non fishos here) knows are good to eat so obviously sellers will try to relate other products to them and then charge accordingly. How many inaccurate uses of "snapper" and "emperor" have you seen? Maybe there is a code of practice, but I'll bet it's hardly policed. Mind you, maybe if people don't bother to educate themselves a bit about fish, it leaves a few more for us to catch!