Volker Kuntzsch criticises NZ's meat, dairy and plant-based proteins, saying they're not as sustainable as fisheries. Jonathan Milne reports.
The chief executive of the country's biggest independent science organisation has mounted a robust defence of the environmental credentials of the country's fishing industry – by challenging other primary producers.
He acknowledges fishing does need to address its environmental impacts, but says controversial practices like bottom-trawling pale in comparison to destroying biodiversity by ploughing land.
Volker Kuntzsch will speak today at a fishing industry symposium on seafood production. His is one of several voices arguing in defence of the sustainability of seafood, both for biodiversity and managing New Zealand's emissions.
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The Wellington symposium coincides with the annual meeting of the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organisation in Ecuador, at which New Zealand is defending its continued use of bottom-trawling – the only country still doing so in the deep waters of the South Pacific. Oceans Minister David Parker has launched a forum with iwi representatives, environmental NGOs and the fishing industry to recommend next steps on managing bottom trawling.
Karli Thomas, from the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition, is dismayed at the Government and Cawthron Institute's defence of bottom-trawling.
"The fishing industry needs to address its own impacts, not make cynical comparisons to other industries," she says. "Bottom trawling releases carbon from the top metre of seabed, which contains almost twice the amount of carbon as soils on land.
"Bottom trawling also destroys deep sea ecosystems and catches large quantities of sea life, making the ocean less able to absorb carbon emissions – and as one of our greatest carbon sinks, this is a big problem for all of us. If we keep allowing bottom trawling to destroy ocean life, the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss will worsen."
But Professor Stewart Ledgard, a principal scientist with AgResearch, is set to publish research finding that seafood production has lower emissions than food production on land. Globally, he says, food production makes up 30 percent of humanity's greenhouse gas emissions.
Ledgard and his colleague Andre Mazzetto previously made the headlines in 2021, with research finding that the New Zealand dairy industry was the most efficient milk producer in the world, at 0.74 kg CO2-equivalent gases per kilogram of milk. That research was funded by Dairy NZ.
Now the focus is on fisheries. "The main source of carbon usage and emissions is the fuel used by trawlers," Ledgard says, ahead of presenting his findings to the symposium.
"A study of the carbon footprint of New Zealand's deepwater trawl fisheries shows their greenhouse gas emissions are substantially lower than those for beef, sheep, milk and pork production."
It's unclear what, if any, outside funding backed Ledgard's recent research.
Already, there's overseas research to support the fishing industry's view that seafood helps meet nutritional needs at a low climate impact.
Kuntzsch points to findings from the Research Institutes of Sweden, that fishing for hake and mackerel, or farming salmon, generates fewer emissions than pork or beef, and is on a par with chicken, per kilo of food produced. Farming oysters and mussels generates fewer emissions than any of these.
Nutrient density and CO2-e emissions of globally important seafoods
Fishing is much more environmentally friendly than agriculture and horticulture, he says.
The dairy industry has been able to do little to reduce its emissions: "I find it incredibly difficult to imagine how we can turn a cow into a better cow because in the end, a cow consumes a lot of water. We don't produce the highest added value product out of it.
"We are very dependent on our dairy industry, and I value that as being very important for us to sustain our economy. But if we just look at the challenges we face, I think we need to think wider and more creatively about other opportunities that may actually enable us to be more sustainable.
"The big question is, really, in another 30, 40 or 50 years time, do we still want some 7 or 8 million cattle roaming the landscape in New Zealand? Is that really going to be a sustainable outcome?"
Other land-based farming is also problematic, he argues. "Why would we allow ploughing on land, especially across swaths of some 30 percent of our land surface with the resulting loss of biodiversity, but not allow bottom-trawling on say 2 percent of our substrate in the water in areas that are not pristine – that are providing a surface that is in some places, like a desert or a mud flat. Admittedly, in some of those cases, that's because of trawling having happened for decades."
He acknowledges the harmful impact of trawling seamounts. "But we are not trawling across coral reefs – when I say 'we', I mean the fishing industry. And any fisherman out there would always be careful about where they put their trawling gear."
He is similarly sceptical of plant-based protein – he's not convinced vegetarianism provides an answer. "I can't say that to be honest. I'm not sure to what degree soy farms and soy plantations are actually helping biodiversity, which is now seen by science as probably a bigger issue than climate change. So I reserve my opinion there."
Kuntzsch took up the leadership of the Nelson-based Cawthron Institute in 2021, after seven years at the helm of fishing giant Sanford. Together, he and his wife have six children, and he tells Newsroom his drive is to protect the marine environment for them. "The youngest is four. And I want her to one day say to me, thank you dad for what you've done."
Some of his children are vegetarian – but he's not persuaded. "I have come across vegetarians who decided to actually eat fish once they understood the sustainability of that resource, and also the nutritional profile."
He has provided an abstract of his speech to the symposium. "Seafood provides a sustainable protein to a hungry world," it says. "There can be no future without fishing."
The independent Cawthron Institute employs 280 scientists, from 30 countries, and he says they back the view that fisheries are fundamental to New Zealand's future. He obtained sign-off from Cawthron's chief science officer Dr Cath McLeod and chief science capability officer Dr Chris Cornelisen, he says, ahead of this week's symposium.
(Cawthron chair Meg Matthews says she hasn't yet seen her chief executive's comments, so is unable to say if they represent the institute's position).
"I don't mean there are no emissions from fisheries – there are still emissions," Kuntzsch says. "But there's a better chance of actually turning the dial on our emissions profile by looking at how can we support a greater utilisation of our seafood resources, than by trying to figure out how we can feed other land based proteins in such a way that they become significantly more sustainable."
He acknowledges fishing companies' management must be agile enough to adapt to a changing environment – but says other industries are far more harmful to the seas.
"There are other forces at play in the coastal marine environment, in particular, that have a far greater negative impact than does fishing," he says. "They include forestry slash, sedimentation, poor land management, earthquakes, floods and ocean warming. We need to see a bigger picture in taking an ecosystem-based management approach.
"New Zealand has led the way in sustainable fisheries management across its exclusive economic zone, which has been recognised in Marine Stewardship Council certification of major deepwater fisheries. The time is right to again lead globally in oceans management that addresses climate change, biodiversity loss and food systems challenges. Fishing is certainly an essential part of this."
