American Catch: The Fight for Our Local Seafood
Written by Paul Greenberg
Narrated by Christopher Lane
4/5
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About this audiobook
Bestselling author of Four Fish Paul Greenberg looks to New York oysters, gulf shrimp, and Alaskan salmon to tell the surprising story of why Americans no longer eat from local waters
In 2005, the United States imported twelve billion dollars' worth of seafood, nearly double what we had imported ten years earlier. During that same period, our seafood exports rose by a third. In American Catch, our foremost fish expert Paul Greenberg looks to New York oysters, gulf shrimp, and Alaskan salmon to reveal how it came to be that 91 percent of the seafood Americans eat is foreign.
As recently as 1928 the average New Yorker ate six hundred local oysters a year. Today, the only edible oysters lie outside city limits. Looking at the trail of environmental desecration, Greenberg comes to view the New York City oyster as a reminder of what is lost when local waters are not valued as a food source. To understand the complications of our current moment, Greenberg visits the Gulf of Mexico. He arrives expecting to learn of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill's lingering effects on shrimpers, but instead finds that the more immediate threat to business comes from overseas. Asian farmed shrimp-cheap, abundant, and a perfect vehicle for the frying and sauces Americans love-have flooded the American market.
Finally, Greenberg visits Bristol Bay, Alaska, home to the biggest wild salmon run left in the world. A pristine, productive fishery, Bristol Bay is now at great risk: The proposed Pebble Mine project directly endangers the sockeye salmon's habitat. In his search to discover why this precious renewable resource isn't better protected, Greenberg discovers a shocking truth: 70 percent of all Alaskan salmon is sent out of the country, much of it to Asia. Sockeye salmon is arguably the most nutritionally dense animal protein on the planet, yet Americans are shipping it abroad.
Despite the challenges, hope abounds. In New York, Greenberg connects with an oyster restoration project with a vision for how the bivalves might save the city from rising tides; in the gulf, shrimpers band together to offer local catch direct to consumers. And in Bristol Bay, fishermen, environmentalists, and local Alaskans gather to roadblock Pebble Mine. In American Catch Paul Greenberg proposes there is a way to break the current destructive patterns of consumption and return the American catch back to American consumers.
Paul Greenberg
Paul Greenberg is founder & Managing Principal of The 56 Group, LLC, an advisory firm, focused on customer-facing strategic services, including CRM, customer experience and customer engagement strategies. His book, CRM at the Speed of Light now in its 4th edition, is in 9 languages and been called "the bible of the CRM industry". It has been used by more than 70 universities as a primary text. Currently, Paul sits on the Global Advisory Board of the SEAT Consortium as the only non-sports professional of a sports business professionals organization. Prior to this, Paul has been the EVP of the CRM Association, the Chairman of the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management CRM Centre of Excellence Board of Advisors, a Board of Advisors member of the Baylor University MBA Program for CRM majors, & co-chairman of Rutgers University's CRM Research Center. Paul works both with customer-facing technology vendors and practitioners to craft go-to-market strategies, engagement programs, product development road maps, marketing/messaging & outreach among other things. Paul is considered a thought leader in CRM and often called "The Godfather of CRM." He has been published in numerous industry and business publications over the years. He was elected to CRM magazine's CRM Hall of Fame in 2010 - the first non-vendor related thought leader in its history. He also writes on customer-facing matters for CBS's ZDNet high profile tech media property (www.zdnet.com/blogs/crm). He has won dozens of industry awards over the years in CRM, marketing, sales, and customer service as an influencer and thought leader. He has just released a book on customer engagement entitled "The Commonwealth of Self-Interest: Customer Engagement, Business Benefit" (He also recently launched a new blog in addition to his ZDNet blog, called "The Science of Business, the Art of Life and Live from NY..." and a podcast "The Commonwealth." Paul currently lives in Manassas, Virginia with his wife of more than 35 years and 7 cats (yes, 7) - and to be entirely clear - is a HUGE New York Yankees fan.
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Reviews for American Catch
26 ratings5 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a very important book with messages that need to be heard by everyone interested in local food, the quality of our environment, and the quality and quantity of our food sources. Although I felt I was knowledgeable and careful in buying/eating seafood, this book was full of surprising and scary facts. Great narrative non-fiction writing. It would be a good book club selection. SRH
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a very important book with messages for everyone interested in local food, the quality of our environment, and the quality and quantity of our food sources. Although I felt I was knowledgeable and careful in buying/eating seafood, this book was full of surprising and scary facts. Great narrative non-fiction writing. It would be a good book club selection.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I wondered why so much of the seafood I see in local markets comes from overseas when the US has the largest commercial fishing territory and one of the best fishing fleets in the world. Thanks to Mr. Greenberg's well-researched book, I now know the answer and it is both terrifying and maddening. I read an average of 2 food-related books and 4 food-related periodicals monthly and I've never heard of Community Supported Fisheries (CSFs)--like a CSA except instead of kale and squash you get salmon and trout--but I'll be joining one as soon as I can locate it. Skip that shrimp dinner date night out and read this book with your sweetie instead.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A clarion call to mend our nation’s relationship with its oceansPaul Greenberg's "American Catch: the Fight for Our Local Seafood" is an entertaining, and compelling natural history and social commentary on the history and current state of seafood consumption and fisheries in the United States. It’s the story of America’s century-long “self-inflicted destruction” of its domestic seafood production followed by “a reckless and giddy outsourcing to Asia.” The author tackles the tale by focusing on three iconic American local seafoods: Eastern Oysters, Gulf shrimp, and Alaska salmon. “Each fishery is representative of a specific American seafood era, and together they offer a view into the mistakes of our past, the complication of our present, and the hopes for our future.” The book is packed with fascinating technical, scientific, social and historical details, but at no time was it overwhelming. In fact, just the opposite: once I started the book, I didn’t want to put it down. As far as nonfiction goes, this book was pretty much a page-tuner. I finished it comfortably in one afternoon even though I’d planned to read it more slowly over several days. The author's writing is easy-going and personal. Reading the book felt like sitting down with a brilliant, enthusiastic buddy and listening to him tell you about the subject that commands his greatest passion. It’s full of delightful stories based on the fascinating and colorful people who Greenberg interviewed and observed during the course of researching this book. Much of the scientific and technical information is passed on to the reader through this pleasant true-to-life storytelling. His stories unfold naturally and often contain humor and wit. There is a comfortable balance between stories and factual discussions. The later contain detailed facts, thoughtful philosophical, ethical, and personal reflections, and heartfelt recommendations.This book should appeal to a wide audience of readers with diverse backgrounds and motivations. I am not a fisherman and have no connection to the fishing industry. My interest in the topic derives entirely from my love of eating fish and my concern about the future of our oceans. This book has a great deal to recommend it. I sincerely hope it succeeds. American citizens and policy makers need to understand that the fish we eat and the local environments they hail from are fragile and in need of help. As a country, we need to mend our relationship with our own coastal waters and rebuild our formerly impressive American seafood economy.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5"All that the sea asks of us is that we be wise in our harvest, recognize the limits of its bounty, and protect the places where seafood wealth is born. In return the sea will feed us and make us smarter, healthier, and more resilient."
What makes for great nonfiction writing, in my opinion, is passion. Greenberg is a hands-on researcher and environmental advocate, but he's also a fisherman. His texts ring with authenticity and true appreciation for his subject matter, making him one of my favorite environmental/nature nonfiction writers. Greenberg's writing is engaging and fluid, his research thorough without dragging. Additionally, he introduces me to spectacular new words like "nadir", "milquetoast", and "Pollyanna".
American Catch is divided into three primary segments, which cover the current state of and rehabilitation efforts of the oyster beds along the New York coastline, the Louisiana shrimp industry and, finally, the sockeye salmon of Alaska and its respective fishing enterprise. In particular, Greenberg is interested in the potential role revitalized oyster beds could play in a human/ocean symbiotic relationship and environmentally responsible future of coastal living, the impact of overseas shrimp farming and oil spills on the local industry, and the potential of the Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay to singlehandedly destroy the most productive and self sufficient remaining wild salmon run in the U.S.
"Whether we choose to embrace the ocean or not, it is coming to embrace us, faster than many of us can believe."
Oysters are one of my favorite sea creatures, both from a culinary and ecological standpoint. Unassuming in appearance and nature, they are little powerhouses of the sea, filtering gallon after gallon of water, providing ideal habitats for other ocean dwellers, and protecting our coastlines from natural disasters and rising sea levels. I particularly enjoyed Greenberg's brief but intriguing segment on oysters as coastal architecture/infrastructure ("oyster-tecture"), which envisions the idea of shaping oysterbeds into a natural combatant against rising tides and environmental disasters such as hurricanes. While only a third of the meat of Greenberg's second text devoted to the state of the fishing industry is focused on wild oysters and oyster farming in the Northeast, it was the strongest portion of the read for me, an unabashed oyster enthusiast.
Also of great interest in this particular narrative is what lies at the root of the problem. While oil spills and mining and poor sewage systems of course are a major factor in the rather abysmal state of our waterways, the major culprit of a struggling once core industry is the American consumer. Specifically, the reality of American seafood consumption. The average American consumer hates the taste and smell of fish and wants to be able to serve it on the dinner table with as little direct contact with the fishiness of seafood as possible. Therefore, the most healthful, environmentally responsible of our seafood is shipped abroad in favor of farmed flavorless and odourless fish, such as the bland suburban favorite tilapia. These foreign aquaculture varieties flood the American markets despite minimal inspection and lack many of the vital nutrients that has people turning towards seafood in the first place. A disheartening and rather disturbing affair.
Despite the potential for 300 pages of doom and gloom regarding the current state of our waters, Greenberg does an impeccable job of presenting the facts with clarity, but also enough positivity to show that hope still exists and that with enough dedication and elbow grease, change is possible. This is a conscious approach he addresses in American Catch, as he outlines not only his desire to present readers with a positive narrative but his own infallible hope for the future of American waterways and their inhabitants. An informative, absorbing read; rich with storytelling.