The Longtable Project is a social enterprise that helps restaurants in Cape Town adopt more sustainable practices in line with global trends. This post originally appeared on its website.

On Tuesday we held a Longtable event hosted by Founder Member Shoreline Cafe of the Two Oceans Aquarium. We were privileged to have the Aquarium’s Managing Director, Dr Pat Garratt, speak to us about the state of the ocean and the role chefs and suppliers play in the system.

He drew our attention to a book called Bottomfeeder by Taras Grescoe, which shows how chefs can influence the restaurant system, as well as the valuable role of the Southern African Sustainable Seafood Initiative (SASSI) in educating consumers. He believes chefs are pivotal in swaying consumer tastes, and used the example of monkfish to illustrate.

He highlighted the problem of pollution, with a growing number of dead spots in the ocean, as well as heavy metal pollutants going up the food chain. Acidification of the oceans is a result of carbon emissions and is affected by all our behaviour.

Michael Marriott of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) spoke about the work MSC does globally as an ecolabel in helping fisheries become certified as sustainable. We learned how MSC-certified products are viewed as green by SASSI and how many fisheries could be supported by the Fishery Improvement Scheme. The Shoreline Cafe has been certified by the MSC for the traceability of its fish stock.

Discussions ensued over small fishermen, SASSI’s project in Kleinmond, middlemen and a bigger-picture view of the fish issue. Dr Garratt concluded by highlighting the importance of suppliers, telling us to act now and support fisheries moving to sustainability!

Read more about the Aquarium’s sustainability and conservation efforts.

Stay in touch: for daily Aquarium updates, follow us on Twitter (@2OceansAquarium) and become a fan on Facebook.