Highlights and low blows
Communication is core for often maligned marine ingredients sector, writes Dr Neil Auchterlonie, the outgoing technical director of IFFO
IT HAS been a tremendous honour to work as technical director for IFFO for the past four and a half years, certainly the highlight of my career to date. IFFO is an organisation that would be categorised towards the small end of the SME definition, but it is one which has influence well beyond its size, playing an important role in representing and supporting the fishmeal and fish oil industry, predominantly, but also a whole range of other members.
It has been in existence in some shape or form since 1959, so there is a great deal of history behind IFFO’s work, and that legacy is always something that I have been conscious of in the role for a body that represents a truly global membership of marine ingredient producers and other interests.
IFFO has always been at the forefront of defending the marine ingredients industry, and by extension, the aquafeed and aquaculture industries, against the tediously regular criticisms of using fish to feed fish.
For those who are open to taking on new information and understanding concepts, once explained there is little debate on the use of whole fish as raw material for fishmeal and fish oil (FMFO).
Where fish are not used for direct consumption, the next best thing is to use that resource to manufacture high quality feed ingredients that support the production of fish that people do want to eat.
The readers of Fish Farmer, however, will know that when it comes to aquaculture, the critics of the industry are not known for their possession of the traits of openness and understanding, so this has remained, and will surely remain, a challenge for some time to come.
When it comes to raw material supply for FMFO, however, the one topic that has shown up with increasing regularity is that of the importance of capture fisheries and aquaculture by-product (heads, frames, viscera, trimmings) as the base for production.
Currently, at least 33 per cent of global production comes from this raw material, and the trend is for increasing utilisation. This uses material that would carry both an economic and environmental cost for removal, and transforms it into a societal benefit.
There is still a lot of material available that isn’t collected (mostly for practical reasons), as was confirmed by a desk study by Dr Richard Newton of Stirling University, but changes in technology and seafood operations- such as the increasing adoption of smaller, concentrated fishmeal plant on pelagic fishing vessels- will change this over time.
In addition, the continued increase in aquaculture production ensures that this will also provide an increasing volume of raw material over time, often in a readily available format due to the often centralised nature of aquaculture product processing.
This is a great story for the FMFO industry and one which is often overlooked. This material, essentially a waste stream from seafood processing, can be utilised as a resource to manufacture a high quality feed ingredient.
As an aside, I have been struck by how often I have read articles about seafood waste, or even been involved in meetings where the discussion is about how to make good use of the material, adding value and contributing more to fragile coastal communities and economies – ignoring the fact that the fishmeal industry has been achieving this for decades.
Yes, there may be products to manufacture from specific seafood waste streams, and there is a need for further research to support this, but those products- especially those for the nutraceutical, functional food or feed, or even fashion industries – are comparatively low volume and will not achieve the high utilisation rates that are seen with FMFO production.
The lack of acknowledgement about the role that FMFO production has achieved in seafood processing waste management over decades highlights one of the biggest issues that the industry faces.
This is a success story that is often ignored, as are many of the other key benefits of FMFO. IFFO has worked hard on this since its inception, and will continue to do so for many years to come, but it is a challenge that continues to materialise, no matter how often the organisation refutes many of the claims with data, evidence and information.
This is core IFFO business, facing up to a general lack of knowledge and understanding by many in the public domain and, consequently, the recurrence of a batch of arguments that appear based on science but are, in fact, spurious.
Effective communication is at the heart of this work, and the IFFO team does a great job, but the rise of social media provides a large echo chamber which often departs from factual debate and, within which, the arguments are often emotional rather than scientific.
The FMFO sector is not alone in having to deal with this, as I am sure many of us are aware, and all those working in aquaculture are equally conscious of this challenge.
Speaking of challenges, my time at IFFO also coincided with the rise of several of the so
One does not have to venture too far in the media to find negative press about the use of fishmeal and fish oil in aquafeeds”
called F3 Challenges.
The F3 prefix was originally a reference to ‘fish free feed’, but subsequently was amended to the much more appropriate ‘future of fish feed’.
The F3 Challenges have encapsulated what have been many of the issues around the rise of the novel ingredients from the laboratory to reality.
At IFFO, we have been very clear in our statements regarding the importance of these new feed ingredients coming online in support of growing aquaculture’s continually increasing demand for feed volume.
Unfortunately, IFFO’s perspective of working together for the future of feed has so far not always been shared by some in the sector, resulting in a flurry of media articles about fishmeal replacement, zero fish feeds, and similar.
Initially, this provided plenty of scope for work in defending the fisheries that supply much of the raw material for FMFO.
Early on, many of the novel ingredients placed their products in complete juxtaposition to FMFO, arguing that choosing their product would improve feed sustainability credentials by requiring less FMFO and reducing fishing impacts.
This was flawed logic since, as many will know, the small pelagic fisheries that provide the bulk of the raw material for FMFO are actually relatively well managed, as confirmed independently by organisations such as the Sustainable Fisheries Partnership.
Certainly, the early marketing of some of the novel ingredients’ production was not aligned with the vision of working together. But to be fair, much of it was probably set to attract the interest of investors rather than to promote the products themselves as the production volumes at the time were extremely low, at best.
It is notable that we are now seeing the rise of some workable commercial scale volumes of these materials, with the introduction of algal oils in particular, but with the prospect of more products to come in the near future.
One of the great things about working in IFFO is the wide network of experts that the organisation engages with around the world. For several years we have been describing IFFO as an evidence based organisation and there is a lot of science behind that statement – both internal IFFO projects, and external peer reviewed publications.
One of the highlights for me, personally, has been engaging with key fisheries scientists such as Prof Ray Hilborn of the University of Washington, and Duncan Leadbitter of FishMatter Pty (a consultancy based in Australia).
I have learned a great deal from both about fisheries management in relation to raw material supply for FMFO production.
Duncan’s project work in South East Asia was a highlight and the region represents a particularly complex set of circumstances when it comes to fisheries, seafood and the fishmeal industry. The fisheries are targeted for food, and the material used for fishmeal tends to be bycatch in the main, very different to the majority of the fisheries supplying raw material for FMFO.
There are some very real challenges in the region with regard to fishery management but the trend is for some improvement, with various initiatives such as, for example, the Seafood Task Force. The fishing industry has grown over time in many of the countries in the region, and making change is an enormous challenge because a large number of people rely on fish for food and commerce.
Improving fishery management implies restrictions, such as the reduction of catch, or the reduction of effort (through reducing the number of boats fishing, for example), or the adoption of different gear (for example, net mesh sizes), all of which ultimately have implications for local food security, health and income.
These are tough challenges for national, regional and local governments to face up to, and so sometimes the pace of change may be understandably slow.
One mechanism that supports this trend for positive change is the increasing adoption of the Fishery Improvement Project (FIP) approach. FIPs are a practical means of improving fishery management where perhaps there may be weaknesses in regulation or enforcement.
Their success in improving fisheries has been confirmed by peer reviewed science (Cannon et al., 2019), and they are based on the application of good fishery management principles to a target fishery.
As well as the obvious improvements in the fishery itself, there are also socio-economic advantages in FIPs, that may provide benefits such as in relation to product supply and price, or to working conditions for employees.
Another possible benefit goes wider than just the fishery itself, where with improvements to the management of a target stock, there are very likely also benefits to the wider marine ecosystem as well.
Good FIPs can be ways of improving fisheries where national governments may lack the resource for effective management, and their application therefore provides an upward trend of improvement across the fisheries which, to date, may have been underperforming.
The application of FIPs to the world of fishmeal is very interesting, and for reasons of biology many of the fish species that are used as raw material for fishmeal can respond quickly to changes in management practices.
That is something that makes the fishmeal world so exciting to be involved with. A large proportion of the fish species that are utilised as raw material for FMFO are the small pelagic fish species, which typically mature young (within one to two years), grow fast, and produce a large volume of eggs.
When environmental conditions are conducive, stocks of these fish species can be highly productive. The implementation of management controls via FIPs, where previously these may have been lacking, can see fisheries improve in relatively short timescales of three to five years.
This is great news for the communities that are dependent on these stocks, as well as for the sustainability of FMFO production, aquafeed and aquaculture.
The concept of FIPs also fits into the IFFO Responsible Supply standard, where it is the foundation of the standard’s Improver Programme, helping to improve from the already impressive figure of more than 50 per cent of global annual fishmeal and fish oil being provided as third-party, independently certified, product into global supply chains.
This is just a flavour of some of the subject matter covered by
IFFO, and the breadth of the work undertaken by the organisation is truly remarkable.
As I move on to a role in consulting and contracting, I am sorry to leave a fantastic team of people, headed initially by Andrew Mallison and latterly by Petter Martin Johannessen. It is a team that carries influence well beyond the sum of its parts, one which it has been both a pleasure and an honour to be part of for the last few years.
We are now seeing the rise of some workable commercial scale volumes of these novel materials”