SINGAPORE — The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has said more than 87 per cent of the world’s oceans are fully exploited or overfished, with Singapore averaging one of the highest rates of consumption in the Asia-Pacific region.

What’s more alarming is that the comparatively tiny island nation imports more than 90 per cent of its seafood for domestic consumption from the neighbouring Coral Triangle — the world’s most diverse but also fragile marine environment.

Collectively, stocks of all species currently fished for food, shared WWF-Singapore chief executive officer Elaine Tan, would collapse by 2048 if we continue consuming the ocean’s resources at the current rate. Despite this morbid certainty, efforts to make sustainable consumption of seafood a necessity and not merely a necessary indulgence are slowly bearing fruit.

“Since the sustainable seafood concept is relatively new to Singapore, there are a few challenges now, such as identifying the right seafood, sourcing for the right supply and having enough consumer demand,” said Tan, adding that Singapore’s inaugural WWF Sustainable Seafood Festival in June was aimed at addressing these challenges by working with businesses every step of the way and increasing consumer awareness.

While Tan said the sustainable seafood movement in Singapore is in its early stages, she added that you can still find a small range of MSC (Marine Stewardship Council for wild-caught seafood, arguably the best-known certification agency for seafood) and ASC (Aquaculture Stewardship Council for farmed seafood) certified products in the frozen section of most supermarkets.

Cold Storage, which rolled out a sustainable seafood initiative in 2011, has been making steady headway, with approximately 5 per cent of its selection of fresh fish certified sustainable by Friend of the Sea (FOTS) and 10 per cent from fisheries that practise responsible farming or line-caught, while around 15 per cent of its range of frozen fish are certified sustainable by both the MSC and FOTS.

“There is no visible trend of more Singaporeans switching to sustainable alternatives at the moment. However, with increasing emphasis on educating consumers about sustainable seafood, it may be a trend to watch,” said its spokesperson.

Some of its more popular varieties such as hake, pink salmon and sutchi (a type of shark catfish) are part of the frozen fillet range “as they are easy to prepare” — even if sustainable seafood can be 10 to 15 per cent more expensive than seafood from non-sustainable sources.

It boils down to basic economics. To tackle the root of the problem, agencies are focusing their efforts on education, which is part of the reason one would struggle to find certified sustainable seafood at wet markets.

“Currently, the supply chain of local wet markets is complex and highly dependent on the range of seafood that comes through the ports with little traceability on fishing methods and origins, which makes certification difficult,” Tan explained. “Consumers can start by asking fishmongers where and how their seafood was harvested to foster a culture where such information and traceability are the norm.”

The staff at the popular Greenwood Fish Market, for example, appeared more than happy to fill customers in about where in Norway or the Kenai River in Alaska their salmon came from. And if you are wondering how a restaurant like Oceans Of Seafood is able to serve a controversial catch such as the Northern bluefin, TODAY understands it is farmed in sophisticated facilities such as the one on Amami-Oshima Island in Japan. Farmed bluefin costs almost half the price of a regulated line-caught variety, but can still fetch around S$350 a kilogramme, depending on the cut.

But how concerned are consumers with ensuring their seafood is sustainably sourced? Arthur Ter, general manager of Majestic Seafood Restaurant, said most consumers aren’t too bothered. The restaurant serves a locally farmed variety of the popular dragon tiger garoupa.

“We do sell sustainably harvested fish, but we are not really marketing them,” he added.

Nevertheless, there has been a steady rise in the number of restaurants — including Absinthe Restaurant Francais, Gattopardo Ristorante di Mare, il Cielo (Hilton Singapore), The Pelican Seafood Bar & Grill and Halia (at Raffles and the Botanic Gardens) — that are more proactive in working to promote sustainable seafood, independently or via related events. And it is not a passing fad.

“Many restaurants are more supportive of the idea of creating more environment-friendly menus and a more responsible process to source for their produce,” said Konstantino Blokbergen, director of Singapore-based hospitality and lifestyle consulting company, Gastro-Sense.

He added that the main constraints are the costly set-up of sustainable farms and time. “It takes time and patience for farmed species to grow in a commercially sustainable cycle and until supply can match the demand in a country,” he said.

“Unless our health calls for it, we (rarely) consider changing our diet for other purposes,” Blokbergen continued. “Globalisation and the increasing market penetration of famous retail brands across international markets have made consumers in developing countries more aware of the variety of protein in their daily diet, which has resulted in a drastic increase in global consumption of livestock in general.

“But I feel there is hope with the younger generation who are better informed ... and become aware much earlier of some of the big threats our planet is facing.” Don Mendoza