Green Daily

In what Greenpeace is calling a major victory for the oceans, Amsterdam based supermarket owner Royal Ahold, which owns U.S. supermarkets Stop & Shop and Giant Food, announced that they are suspending sales of three overfished "red list" species: shark, orange roughy and the oh-so-delicious Chilean seabass.

Last month Greenpeace issued a report on how we're emptying the seas, and included a challenge to the top 20 U.S. supermarkets to change the way they purchase and sell seafood. Royal Ahold was rated number two on that report, in terms of their purchasing practices, although this move will improve their score considerably.

The list was interesting. All of the supermarkets, even #1 Whole Foods, totally fail in terms of sustainable seafood. Surprisingly, Wal-Mart way outscored feel good Trader Joe's. In fact, Costco and Winn-Dixie were also better! But it's splitting hairs because they all sell fish on the red list. Bad!

I've always said that if Chilean seabass wasn't so delicious it wouldn't be endangered. Since it's not going to start tasting like sand anytime soon, removing the temptation altogether is probably the best way to give it time to recover.

The next question is whether or not the other supermarkets will step up. What's it going to be Price Chopper and A&P? Will you support our attempt to resist the magic flavors of Chilean seabass or will you be evil enablers?