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Comment by tropdrop | Hacker News Reader

Honestly I've been impressed with their fish sandwich recently – wild caught and actually flaky filet!

I'm no expert, but I thought we should prefer farm raised, no? Seems weird to advertise they are wild caught when that's a big concern with over-fishing in the wild.

My understanding of the situation is that the U.S. federal government has been doing an excellent job of managing fisheries over the past couple of decades — there was an overfishing crisis in the 80’s, but since then we’ve gotten our act together and implemented population monitoring and fishing quotas. There are definitely problems (especially with certain methods of fishing causing bycatch problems or habitat destruction), but researchers and regulators seem to be mostly on top of them. Farm-raised fish have their own set of challenges — mainly health concerns and the potential for environmental disasters [0] — so there’s not necessarily a clear winner between farmed and wild fish. It also depends heavily on the particular species of fish.

My source for this is an elective class I took at Oregon State University a few years ago, taught by a professor who is deeply involved in fishery research and management. So perhaps he was biased, but from what he presented I was thoroughly impressed with the sustainability practices of the seafood industry. One of my big takeaways was that wild Alaskan halibut in particular (which is what McDonald’s uses) is among the best seafoods, and one of the most sustainable foods in existence.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cypress_Island_Atlantic_salmon...

I agree with you broadly, and despite their abhorrent reputation for sourcing unethical animal products, it does seem that you're right about McDonald's fish. However, on a larger scale, one of the hidden ethical pitfalls is that a lot of wild-caught fish comes from international waters, where there are no regulations whatsoever, or are imported from Asian countries with little to no regard for such things. Japan infamously still allows whaling. The global fishing industry is also rife with modern-day slavery.

> or are imported from Asian countries with little to no regard for such things. Japan infamously still allows whaling. The global fishing industry is also rife with modern-day slavery.

Those are very good points that I neglected to mention, and my professor spent a lot of time discussing them. One of the main points of the class is that seafood sustainability is extremely dependent on the species of fish and the country of origin, and so it’s important to do research on where your fish is coming from. I don’t remember a lot of details anymore, but I do specifically remember that most stuff from Alaska is excellent, and shrimp is awful in terms of ethics & sustainability.

Pick your poison. Wild caught can deplete wild fish and farmed fish pollutes the environment. I spring for wild caught whenever possible.

There's a third option...

Literally everything you do has an impact in some way on the environment. If you want to boycott everything, you won't have an existence.

Living is all about understanding trade offs and making informed decisions. Just because plants don't scream when you kill them doesn't mean a plant-only diet is without negative effects as well.

> If you want to boycott everything, you won't have an existence.

And a fourth option, it seems. However dark.

Fish flavoured soylent green?

Not a nutritionally viable one

The new burgers are better as well. It's not in-and-out but they improved the cheese and the patties have gone from "circular cardboard" to "kind of resembles a burger" on the quality scale. For folks that live in Europe and have access to better McDonalds this might not be anything new, but for us it's a big upgrade.

For bulk, sure; for flavour, wild is superior. But it's a finite luxury.

Double-blind tested, of course.

Have you been trying the fish sandwich multiple times over the course of time? I didn't think that was allowed.

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