Endangered fish causes a stink on Facebook

A fresh food retailer caught selling an endangered fish species has Facebook users’ emotions running high.

Facebook user Cameron Johnson posted a photo of a large fish in one of South African retailer Fruit & Veg City’s stores.

Johnson claims that the fish in the photo is a Garrick, which is on the South Africa Sustainable Seafood Initiative‘s (SASSI)’s “No Sale” list. The list separates fish into three lists: Green — which is sustainable, Orange — which includes species that are vulnerable for a variety of reasons, and Red — which are unsustainable.

Fruit and Veg City continues to sell Red Listed, (endangered,) fish species in their stores!

This is the third store caught with illegal fish in just over a week, and their attitude is far from contrite. They are sheltering behind a 2 year grace period allowed by SASSI to come in line with legislation while they do their best to make as much money from the situation as possible.

PLEASE BOYCOTT ALL THEIR STORES!

This is Garrick, on the SASSI Red List as a NO SALE species, labelled as Dorado at their Rynfield store. Do they really believe their consumers are so stupid? It seems so!

Please leave a message on their Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/fruitandvegcity

Do something to stop them raping our oceans.

The retailer responded to the accusation on its own Facebook page:

To all our concerned customers,

We’re on the case and will get back to you shortly…

At Food Lover’s Market we support sustainable fishing and are in the process of implementing a sustainable procurement policy. It’s taking a little while as it involves liaising with SASSI, our various seafood suppliers and store managers. You have alerted us to the fact that a few SASSI listed fish may have slipped through the nets – we’re taking this very seriously. Food Lover’s Market values your feedback and will respond to each individual enquiry shortly.

The FVC Team

This wan’t exactly greeted with any kind of sympathy by the general public:

“F**k you,you cowards!own up and be accountable!people like you give us commercial fishermen a bad name.i hope you get media coverage,lets see if you can make fools of yourselves nationwide,” one person wrote below the post.

“‘Will respond to each individual enquiry shortly.’ What, with that ‘copy & paste’ thing again. I do hope you understand what impact your ignorance has had & is having on our ocean! Think about the future!!!” said another.

The retailer attempted to do some damage control:

We understand and hear all of your concerns, they are completely warranted. This is an issue we are taking very seriously. We have launched investigations into each and every allegation of Red or Orange Listed seafood on sale. It has taken a while to respond as we are in the process of finalizing our new partnership with SASSI and our enforced policy going forward. Please bear with us while we collect the necessary information and implement the necessary steps so that this is enforced. We will then liaise directly with all our concerned customers to let them know the actions we have taken. The FVC Team

This was once again treated with scepticism:

FVC you have know about this for sometime now you statments are nothing more than drivel and quiet frankly the anglingers , commercial fisherman are gatvol let alone the public who you are bullshitting with your made up names, do something now today , before afternoon tea.

Thanks guys but that is a poor excuse. If there is a massive public outcry over your practices, which you have repeatedly fallen foul of, you do not carry on doing it! You make the moral decision to take those red fish off your shelves immediately, or stop selling fish all together until you have your policy sorted out. What you are saying above is that you have continued to sell fish you know are illegal for profit rather than have the ethics to remove endangered fish until you get your shit sorted at your leisure. Totally excusable. Seriously guys is this the way you do business?

For now there doesn’t seem to be any real resolution sight.