How Sustainable Is Your Meal?

Your food choices have an impact on the environment. This year, commit to make more sustainable choices.

Go Green. You may have noticed the Club’s ever expanding list of vegetarian options which are now set out on the first page of the menus at the Bistro, Shelter Cove Clubhouse and Middle Island Clubhouse. Give it a go! A plant-based diet has a smaller environmental footprint than a meat and dairy heavy diet.

Choose sustainably wild-caught seafood.

Sustainably caught seafood needs to be traceable from catch to plate, come from healthy fish populations, be caught in season (so as to allow fish stock to replenish and sustain future fishing) and should not be captured using destructive fishing methods. Unfortunately, trawling – a non-selective fishing method that involves dragging a net behind a boat – which has been banned in Hong Kong since 31 December 2012 remains all too prevalent in the adjacent waters of the South China Sea. Wild caught seafood served at the Club has either been sourced from suppliers that are MSC (Marine Stewardship Council) certified or is of a type and is sourced in a manner “recommended” by WWF-Hong Kong. If you are not dining at the Club, you could either look for the blue MSC label (which is the most well-known certification for wild caught seafood) or check it against the WWF-Hong Kong Seafood Guide which is also available as a mobile app. Other mobile resources include the Good Fish Guide by the Marine Conservation Society.

CREDIT: THINKING GREEN – GIBRALTAR

Choose responsibly farmed seafood.

Aquaculture accounts for more than half of all the seafood that humans consume. But what might seem like a sustainable alternative to wild caught seafood comes with its own risks. As with wild-caught seafood, the Club sources farmed seafood from suppliers that are ASC (Aquaculture Stewardship Council) certified or is of a type that is recommended by WWF-Hong Kong.