Restaurant menus on Canada's West Coast will soon be flooded with squid and sardine dishes, as the popular sockeye salmon fades away. Climate change, it turns out, may have a role to play in this.
Restaurant menus are updated on a regular basis, and diners are often unaware of this. Culinary trends, consumer tastes, and a variety of environmental and socioeconomic factors all influence the availability of foods. We may now add climate change to this list, thanks to a recent study published by my research group.
We discovered that as the temperature of the ocean rises, numerous marine fish and shellfish migrate to the North and South Poles in search of cooler waters. The availability of seafood catch is affected by the movement of fish stocks, forcing chefs on the West Coast of Canada to rewrite their menus.
Our oceans and fisheries are being impacted by climate change
Climate change is affecting the ocean, fish stocks, and fisheries, according to the latest report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. This includes ocean warming, sea ice loss, ocean acidification, heatwaves, ocean oxygenation, and other extreme weather events.
Our fisheries are also seeing the effects of warming-induced ecological alterations. Species that demand warmer water are increasingly dominating global fish catches.
We used an index termed "mean temperature of capture" to track changes in fish species caught throughout Canada's West Coast, and discovered that the catch of warmer-water species has grown in this region from 1961 to 2016.
When it comes to seafood on menus, it's important to remember that climate change is a factor.
But how can changes in fisheries catch influence the food that ends up on our plates? My co-author John-Paul NG and I decided to tackle this subject on our own, focusing our efforts on the West Coast of Canada and the United States, where there are many seafood restaurants.
We looked at current menus from restaurants in these places, as well as menus from historical archives in city halls and local museums, some of which date back to the 19th century.
We determined a "mean temperature of restaurant seafood" after looking at 362 menus using a method similar to the one we devised to evaluate fisheries catches.
This statistic indicates the average recommended temperature for all seafood species on sampling menus from restaurants in a city during a certain time period. This index is a tool that allows us to see how much warm and cold water seafood our restaurants serve.
We discovered that the average desired water temperature of fish and shellfish on our menu has risen to 14 degrees Celsius in recent years (2019-21) from 9 degrees Celsius in 1961-1990.
Changes in seawater temperature and temperature-related changes in the makeup of fish species captured during the same time period are linked to an increase in the preferred water temperature of fish on restaurant menus.
More squid and sardine dishes are on the menu
The type of seafood available is beginning to alter as the ocean warms.
The Humboldt squid — a big, predatory squid species that inhabits the eastern Pacific Ocean — is now making increasingly frequent appearances on modern-day restaurant menus in Vancouver, thanks to higher ocean temperatures in the northeast Pacific Ocean.
A previously economically important Pacific sardine fishery existed in British Columbia, and it was a popular restaurant seafood. Following the demise of the fisheries in the mid-1940s, the fish was rarely seen on our restaurant menus.
Sardines, which prefer warmer water, may soon make a large comeback on the West Coast of Canada, according to research undertaken by colleagues in fisheries research and our team at the Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries. More sardine meals are likely to appear on restaurant menus in the near future.
Adapting to the shifting availability of shellfish
Coastal cities like Vancouver and Los Angeles now offer a broader variety of seafood selections thanks to globalization and cuisine diversity. Seafood, both imported and farmed, is becoming more common on restaurant menus.
We predict climate-induced alterations to seafood menus at restaurants to grow even more dramatic as climate change continues to rearrange species distribution in ocean waters.
The wide-ranging effects of climate change on our food chain are highlighted by our research on restaurant menus. The repercussions on our social, economic, and cultural well-being may be minimal if alternative marine ingredients are available and consumer preferences are flexible. Many vulnerable populations, on the other hand, are likely to suffer significant negative consequences as a result of these changes because they lack the capacity to adapt.
Finally, If we want the ocean to continue to provide food for the people who rely on it for nutritional security around the world, we need to take global and local initiatives to promote both climate change adaptation and mitigation.
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