Choose Wisely Campaign
With the UAE’s appetite for fish, the government has been monitoring fish stocks with the help of the local environmental agency, Emirates Wildlife Society (EWS) in conjunction with the World Wide Fund for Nature.
The EWS views overfishing as one of the biggest threats today to our unique marine ecosystems. Here in the UAE many of our species are being fished well beyond sustainable levels. The EWS reckons the past 30 years could have seen as much as an 80 percent decline in the overall number of commercial fish stocks in the country. And the agency now advocates lowering the demand for overfished species by promoting the eating of lesser known, yet no less delicious, abundant species of fish available in our waters.
The good news is last month the EWS added two new fish species to the Choose Wisely Consumer Guide. The giant catfish and the yellow tail scad are lucky (or is that unlucky?) enough to be considered within sustainable levels, their stock is currently not experiencing heavy fishing pressure and shoppers are being given the green light to go ahead and enjoy. The giant catfish, characterised by its bizarre cat-like whiskers and strong, well developed fins, boasts a mild, slightly sweet taste with a flaky texture and is a favourite cooking ingredient in countries the world over. The smaller yellow tail scad stands out due to its vibrant colouring with a bright olive green body, a silver underside and a series of grey stripes running vertically along its side. This fish is often cooked by steaming or frying and has a light salty taste. Two more we think you should try are the sordid sweetlips (yanam in Arabic), an unforgettable name for a versatile and tasty fish, and the pink ear emperor fish (eshkeli in Arabic) – a firm, non-flaky fish that is ideal for soups and stews.
If you fancy trying some more imaginative dishes using only locally available, non-endangered species the EWS has launched its Choose Wisely Sustainable Fisheries Campaign Cookbook. The downloadable PDF cookbook features recipes which reflect the multi-cultural nature of the UAE by featuring creations from India, Europe and South America as well as the Emirates and is completely free!
Visit www.uae.panda.org for your free downloadable copy.
Choose Wisely’s guide to UAE fish
Go for it
Orange spotted trovally, two-bar seabream, black-streaked monocle bream, yellow bar angelfish, pink ear emperor, sordid sweetlips, Ehrenberg’s snapper, yellow fin seabream, black spotted rubberlip, giant sea catfish, yellow tail scad
Good choice, but there’s better
Long silver biddy, small tooth emperor, black spot snapper, king soldier bream, blue spot mullet
Think again! Overfished
Orange spotted grouper, spangled emperor, painted sweetlips, golden trevally, kingfish, snub nose emperor, white spotted spinefish, goldlined seabream
