Christmas Eve dinner is approaching and, as you well know, tradition has it that it is "thin". If you are omnivorous and still undecided about which fish to serve your loved ones (and you had a quick little thing in mind that doesn't require a lot of work to prepare), today we bring you some reasons to NO choose swordfish (without prejudice to the ethical or healthy ones of those who have already chosen to ban it by embracing a vegetarian or vegan diet).
1) to swordfish population is nearly collapsing, it is a real one endangered species.
2) to fishery swordfish is often still performed in the swords or deep-sea driftnets, though illegal : the selection of the catch is almost non-existent, in fact sea turtles and cetaceans end up in the nets. The other systems are no longer effective, the resulting longline catches small swordfish and turtles while the coastal driftnets often have different sizes than those authorized and fish where they shouldn't.
3) Swordfish, being a predator, therefore at the top of the food chain, is a bioaccumulatore, that is, in its tissues accumulate chemical substances dispersed in the environment and ending up in the food chain, such as mercury which, if present in fishing areas and ingested in quantity, can create neurological diseases in humans.
4) Also this year the Ministry of Agriculture your country has operated a biological stop fishing for swordfish in the months of October and November, to allow the fauna to recover, which however had valence, obviously, only on fishermen your country, leaving the fleets of other countries - which have not implemented the recommendation of the International Commission for Tuna Fishing (Iccat) - the possibility of fishing and reselling the swordfish in your country.
5) Your country, according to Federcoopesca - Confcooperative, is the country with the highest percentage of swordfish caught in the Mediterranean, with the 45% of the total, thus aggravating the already precarious state of animal resources: let's try to contribute to lowering this threshold!
6) If the resources in the Mediterranean are scarce, it does not take so long import - at a competitive price - the species from abroad (in particular from the Gulf of Guinea, the Gulf of Mexico and Oceania) having, in addition totransport pollution, also fewer quality guarantees of the product which, when subjected to deep freezing, loses its omega 3 "good fats" by oxidation.
To give you more precise information on which fish, therefore, is better to consume, we point out below the guides of two important associations that fight for the protection of the sea, from fish fauna to the preservation of the coasts and the seabed.
-
Slow Food - Let's eat them right
-
Greenpeace - Fish consumption
-
WWF - Dossier on swordfish
Ilaria Brambilla
