After years of negotiation a new European rule to ban discarding unwanted fish overboard was agreed upon in May this year. Dutch fisherman and fish dealer Jan Geertsema wants to change the system by promoting fishing in a much more durable way, decreasing the number of non-commercial discard of fish to a minimum. For the rest he sells and promotes the fish surplus, extra caught fish and unknown sorts of fish to exclusive restaurants and he sells fish on organic markets. Geert Buruma, chef cook and owner of restaurant Merkelbach in Amsterdam, loves to work with the special surplus fish from Geertsema.
Both Jan and Geert strive for durable changes in fishing which actually would make the new European discard rules unnecessary to implement. In his kitchen Buruma shows what you can do with fishery discards and underlines how important it is to eat and work with durable food. A durable fisherman in the Dutch harbour of Den Over states that bringing discards ashore is bad for the system because young fish that would have survived is taken out of the system. Jan Geertsema uses ancient fishing techniques with large-mesh nets, so young fish can escape. To promote durable fishing he established the ‘Goeie Vissers’ (Good Fishermen) organisation.
The fishermen that joined the ‘Goeie Vissers’ group also use more durable nets and techniques. According to Jan, a follower of the Slow Food movement, people should really be conscious about what they eat, where it is coming from and how it is produced or caught. Many colleagues think Jan is crazy to work with large-mesh nets, but he just does not want to catch the young fish. Within the Slow Food organisation he now founded the Slow Fish movement, to spread his durable fishing philosophy around the world.
For this background reportage Featurez gave advice, did the research, the set-up and planning of the filming, accompanied the filming and booked a cameraman for some extra filming and did the direction and interview.