RED SNAPPER, blue eye cod and deep sea perch will be extinct within the next two months. The demise of hundreds of other varieties of fish will also take place over the coming months - but in name only.
After 20 years of research and negotiation, the seafood industry is in the final stages of standardising the names for almost 3000 commercial species of fish. By the end of the year, consumers - regardless of their state - should be able to sort their skate from their flake and their hake.
Ted Loveday, the managing director of Seafood Services Australia, says the confusion over fish names, which began as early as the 1920s, is threatening consumer confidence in the multi-billion dollar seafood industry, and impeding Australia's participation in the international market.
By midyear blue eye cod will no longer be a cod, nor will red snapper be a snapper: blue eye trevalla and Bight redfish will make their debut instead. Mahi mahi will replace the difficult-to-market dolphin fish, while deep sea perch will be officially known as orange roughy.
Mr Loveday said the industry had finally reached a "99 per cent agreement on 99 per cent of the names". But he conceded re-educating the public would be a gradual process.
Fishmongers at the Sydney Fish Market yesterday were less enthusiastic about the new standard names.
"I will keep selling this as deep sea perch, not orange roughy, because this is what my customers know it as," said Tony Tsiklas, manager of Claudio's. "Sure, people can get confused sometimes, but why should we confuse them further?
"Snapper is snapper, no matter what the colour and we're not going to change that," said Marcus Deposito, manager of De Costi Seafoods.
Gesturing to a haul of red spot whiting, Mr Deposito said he was sceptical that the fish's new name - eastern school whiting - would catch on. But he conceded that the industry would eventually have to comply with the new name standard.
"We haven't got a choice, we'll have to change," he said. "We'll probably put the old name in brackets … bring it in slowly, and make sure it's user-friendly."
The Sydney Fish Market's supply manager, Gus Dannoun, said a lot of the names had "just been given by locals or by very creative retailers over the years".
Can't find deep sea bream? Try looking for morwong instead. And jewfish? Only if it's been caught in northern Queensland, Mr Dannoun said. "If it's local, then it's probably mulloway."
Source: The Sydney Morning Herald
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