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Don’t eat Baltic cod, WWF warns

Ten species of fish native to the Baltic Sea are in a critical situation, with cod in particular worsening, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Published: 23 May 2018 16:07 CEST

Don't eat Baltic cod, WWF warns

The situation for Baltic cod is worsening, the WWF warns. Photo: Daniel Nilsson/SvD/TT

The WWF's 2018 Fish Guide looks in detail at the sustainability situation of fish consumed in 25 countries including Sweden, using a green-amber-red scale (from best to worst) to grade them. Of the Baltic fish, only eastern herring, yarn-caught perch from the Gulf of Riga and Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified sprat from Latvia were given the green light by the charity.

The WWF's methodology assesses the species based on how stocks are, how effective stock management is, and the impact of the fish (and by extension, removing it) on its ecosystem.

Several popular species from the Baltic including cod, salmon, pike, and turbot are given red-light status for 2018, while trawled cod from the eastern Baltic joining that group is particularly bad news according to the WWF.

“That means that all Baltic cod now has a red light in the WWF's Fish Guide – with the appeal to not eat it. That's both sad and upsetting, and shows that management isn't working. When large predatory fish like cod disappears it risks changing the entire ecosystem,” WWF senior sea and fish expert Inger Näslund said in a statement.

READ ALSO: Meat consumption in Sweden drops by record amount

The situation for some types of herring has also worsened – with stock from west of the Danish island Bornholm dropping from green to amber – as has that of turbot which dropped from an amber to red light. Difficulties in assessing the quantities and a lack of information about catches are behind those changes.

It's not all bad news however. MSC and KRAV certified coldwater prawns caught off Sweden's west coast continue to have a green light, while witch flounder caught in the Skagerrak and Kattegat straits west of Sweden have gone from a red to amber light.

The charity urged politicians to do more in order to ensure locally caught fish is available in the future, including tighter controls to allow stocks to recover.

Swedes now eat fish around 1.4 times per week, and around 11kg of seafood per person each year, requiring 25kg of whole fish and shellfish, per the WWF.

READ ALSO: Sweden's consumption footprint 'among the worst', WWF says

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OPINION: Are tips in Sweden becoming the norm?

The Local’s guide to tipping in Sweden is clear: tip for good service if you want to, but don’t feel the pressure: where servers in the US, for instance, rely on tips to live, waiters in Sweden have collectively bargained salaries with long vacations and generous benefits.

SEE ALSO: What’s the tipping etiquette in Sweden?

But there are signs that this is changing, and the change is being accelerated by card machines. Now, many machines offer three preset gratuity percentages, usually starting with five percent and going up to fifteen or twenty. Previously they just asked the customer to fill in the total amount they wanted to pay.

This subtle change to a user interface sends a not-so-subtle message to customers: that tipping is expected and that most people are probably doing it. The button for not tipping is either a large-lettered ‘No Tip’ or a more subtle ‘Fortsätt’ or ‘Continue’ (it turns out you can continue without selecting a tip amount, but it’s not immediately clear to the user).

I’ll confess, when I was first presented with this I was mildly irked: I usually tip if I’ve had table service, but waiting staff are treated as professionals and paid properly, guaranteed by deals with unions; menu prices are correspondingly high. The tip was a genuine token of appreciation.

But when I tweeted something to this effect (a tweet that went strangely viral), the responses I got made me think. Many people pointed out that the restaurant trade in Sweden is under enormous pressure, with rising costs, the after-effects of Covid and difficulties recruiting. And as Sweden has become more cosmopolitain, adding ten percent to the bill comes naturally to many.

Boulebar, a restaurant and bar chain with branches around Sweden and Denmark, had a longstanding policy of not accepting tips at all, reasoning that they were outdated and put diners in an uncomfortable position. But in 2021 CEO Henrik Kruse decided to change tack:

“It was a purely financial decision. We were under pressure due to Covid, and we had to keep wages down, so bringing back tips was the solution,” he said, adding that he has a collective agreement and staff also get a union bargained salary, before tips.

Yet for Kruse the new machines, with their pre-set tipping percentages, take things too far:

“We don’t use it, because it makes it even clearer that you’re asking for money. The guest should feel free not to tip. It’s more important for us that the guest feels free to tell people they’re satisfied.”

But for those restaurants that have adopted the new interfaces, the effect has been dramatic. Card processing company Kassacentralen, which was one of the first to launch this feature in Sweden, told Svenska Dagbladet this week that the feature had led to tips for the average establishment doubling, with some places seeing them rise six-fold.

Even unions are relaxed about tipping these days, perhaps understanding that they’re a significant extra income for their members. Union representatives have often in the past spoken out against tipping, arguing that the practice is demeaning to staff and that tips were spread unevenly, with staff in cafés or fast food joints getting nothing at all. But when I called the Swedish Hotel and Restaurant Union (HRF), a spokesman said that the union had no view on the practice, and it was a matter for staff, business owners and customers to decide.

So is tipping now expected in Sweden? The old advice probably still stands; waiters are still not as reliant on tips as staff in many other countries, so a lavish tip is not necessary. But as Swedes start to tip more generously, you might stick out if you leave nothing at all.

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