Leading chefs pledge to save the oceans and feed the world

Chefs from 20 of the world’s best restaurants have today pledged to serve the “perfect protein” in order to save the oceans and feed the world. They have joined Oceana’s campaign to serve and highlight anchovies and other small fish at their restaurants on World Oceans Day, June 8 2015.

The chefs will help Oceana to inspire and empower more consumers and individuals to get involved in supporting Oceana’s policy campaigns and to help restore the world’s oceans to levels of biodiversity and abundance that can survive on and support a planet forecasted to grow from 7 billion people to 9 billion by 2050.

The chefs, who include Andoni Luiz Aduriz (Mugaritz, Spain); Juan Mari and Elena Arzak (Arzak, Spain); Alex Atala (D.O.M., Brazil); Massimo Bottura (Osteria Francescana, Italy); Brett Graham (The Ledbury, UK); René Redzepi (Noma, Denmark) and Ashley Palmer-Watts (Dinner by Heston Blumenthal, UK), will cook these small fish to encourage diners to seek out and enjoy this delicious, healthy seafood and to support Oceana’s campaign to save the oceans and feed the world.

“It is remarkable that so many chefs - who are so busy – came together in support of ocean conservation and to take this joint action together. Most of us already love anchovies and other small fish,” said event co-hosts Andoni Luiz Aduriz and Joan Roca; “it will be a pleasure to share them with our diners and to help Oceana in its campaign to get more people to enjoy them and to help save the oceans and feed the world.”

The small fish the chefs pledged to serve – species like anchovies, sardines, mackerel and herrings - are known as “forage” fish because they play a crucial role in food webs in some of the most productive marine ecosystems in the world.

Forage fish form massive shoals that are targeted by some of the largest fisheries on earth, but are rarely seen on restaurant menus. This is because forage fish are mainly used to make fish meal and fish oil to feed farmed fish like salmon as well as chickens, pigs and other livestock.

“Small fish like anchovies are generally the best fish for you,” commented Patricia Majluf, Oceana’s Vice President for Peru and a leading expert on anchovies and other similar fisheries who spoke at the gathering in San Sebastian. “They have very high levels of nutrients like Omegas, Vitamin A, Zinc and Calcium and are low in toxins like mercury present in other longer lived, larger fish.”

At the historic event – the first time so many leading chefs have come together in support of marine conservation - the chefs viewed the premiere screening of the short film documentary “The Perfect Protein” which is part of this campaign for Oceana – which also includes a website and other actions- designed and directed by the Spanish creative Jorge Martínez.

“The Chefs’ commitment to Oceana to help get people to view small fish as delicious is going to help us save the oceans and feed the world,” added Andy Sharpless, Oceana’s CEO and author of The Perfect Protein. “We can feed tens of millions more people if we simply eat anchovies and other forage fish directly rather than in form of a farmed salmon or other animals raised on fish meal and fish oil. Eating more forage fish – along with scientific management of the world’s fisheries - will enable us to ultimately feed more people from the oceans and to be less reliant on getting our animal protein from livestock in the future. This means we will put less pressure on the planet in the form of demand for fresh water, use of arable land, and emission of climate changing gases.”

For more information about the event, the documentary and the new digital version of the book, please visit perfectprotein.oceana.org