Chris Fortune is an award-winning chef who runs a restaurant in Marlborough and when he serves fish he likes to serve that from New Zealand. He informed that the fish caught in New Zealand seas is going all the way to China to be processed. Fortune pointed out that the long processing procedure has marred the quality of the fish. He added that with any seafood product the more times you freeze it or thaw it the quality does deteriorate. It would be a recommendation to any chef who wanted only the freshest of product to by only fresh fish.
United fisheries general manager Andre Kotzikas says the public should not be concerned about Chinese-processed fish. He continued saying that there is no reason to be concerned about the quality and standards that should be imposed in these overseas plants. He exclaimed that there is no difference in quality. United Fisheries has a Christchurch plant which employs 150 locals and the overwhelming majority of its fish for sale in New Zealand is processed here.
United says the compliance and operational costs outweigh the financial return on some species of fish making processing here no longer a good option. The seafood industry is able to say exactly how much fish New Zealand exports and exactly how much fish it imports but no one can tell us accurately how much fish caught in New Zealand comes back to New Zealand after processing.
