Perth Voice Interactive

A FREMANTLE business has been nominated for a prestigious Marine Stewardship Council award for sustainable seafood practices. 

In a true David-and-Goliath story, Fremantle Octopus was nominated for MSC’s best sustainable seafood award this week and will face industry giants Birds Eye, Bluewave, Coles, I&J, and Skull Island which is owned by Austral. 

General manager Heidi Woschnak says the company use an “ocean to plate traceability” practice which contributes to its stellar sustainability record. 

“[The traceability] starts on board, where we remove the octopus’ head and put it back into the ocean to be eaten, and the product goes into an ice slurry of sea water and ice to be transported so there’s no preservatives,” Ms Woschnak explained. 

“It’s then transported to our purpose-built octopus processing facility within a day of being caught, and hand-washed, packaged, and stamped [to be sold]. 

“We control the entire ocean-to-plate process.” 

The octopuses are caught using a specially-designed trigger trap, which allows for more accurate fishing and a lower impact on ocean wildlife. 

“It’s the most environmentally sensitive way of catching octopus, because we don’t catch anything else in the midst of that,” Ms Woschnak said. 

“When the octopus goes in and smells the bait, if it’s big enough, it triggers the trap door to come down, so we only catch the large octopus, and nothing else. 

“That all feeds into our environmentally sensitive and sustainable fishing practices.” 

It was because of these practices that Fremantle Octopus received MSC’s Sustainable Fishing Hero Award last year, as well as its Blue Fish Tick recognition, so the most recent nomination is the latest in a long line of accolades for the small business. 

The company is the largest producer of MSC certified, wild-caught octopi in the world – the only MSC certified octopi fishery in the world, apart from a small farm off the coast of Spain. 

Fremantle Octopus has also featured in the WA Export Awards, Delicious Magazine Produce Awards, and the WA Good Food Guide awards. 

It’s “monumental” to even be nominated for the MSC award, according to Ms Woschnak, especially with such heavy competition. 

“We’re certainly the underdog,” Ms Woschnak said. 

“From a WA perspective, it’s even more reason to beat our chest, because this is a national award and we are situated in O’Connor, and it really reinforces that what we are doing is world class and with global best practice. 

“It would be a very humbling thing to receive, because it’s just reinforcement of everything that is at the heart of what we do.” 

Public voting for the MSC Sustainable Seafood Award is open on the MSC website and will close on February 14. 

Winners will be announced in March.

by KATHERINE KRAAYVANGER