Cape Town - Fresh fish is synonymous with Cape Town, but lately the local industry has been taking strain because of cheap imports. Two fishermen are hoping to change that with their new business venture.
Four fresh fish vendors have been stationed at points along Marine Drive from Paarden Eiland to Table View. While selling fish from the back of bakkies along the side of the road is an age-old practice in the Cape, the new carts are somewhat different.
When stopping at one of these, there are three people manning the cart. Charmaine Bezuidenhoudt – an experienced fish scaler and flecker – wears a hairnet, a white coat, gloves and white rubber boots. The operator is Tyrone Berlin, and he is showing trainee Lynnette Jordaan the ropes.
The cart – which resembles an ice-cream cooler box, complete with bicycle wheels – holds polystyrene containers packed with fish and ice. Each container holds a different category of fish. Today they have snoek, yellowtail, hake, angel and jacopever fish.
The cart also has a cutting rack, so that fish can be scaled and cleaned on site.
But, in sharp contrast to the sight that usually greets one when buying from fresh fish vendors, there is not a fly in sight, nor are there any fish guts or scales lying around. This is because the cart is equipped with a drip tray, and a separate compartment for waste which goes back to the factory to be discarded.
Bruce Logan and Robert Wallander are the men behind The Fish Cart, a recently-launched business venture.
Logan, who started selling fish from the back of his mother’s car in 1989, says this business is all about creating opportunities within a struggling industry, and also adhering to the principles of development, sustainability and traceability.
He says in the wake of cheaper imports, fishermen are taking a financial knock, and are struggling to support their families.
Cheaper snoek and yellowtail imports from the Far East and New Zealand are flooding the local market. This has reportedly forced many local commercial fishermen out of business.
Bezuidenhoudt, who has worked at big fish factories, says she was put on shorter hours and eventually spent the past three months at home because there wasn’t enough work.
She came across Logan’s business and was given an opportunity to put her skills to work.
Berlin, who was unemployed and struggling to find work, met Logan by chance. “I knew nothing about fish, and never dreamed I would be selling it,” he says.
But Logan has sent all of his employees on a training course, which includes spending a day at sea, in the processing factories, customer service, and also tasting the product.
Trainee Jordaan worked in the welfare sector for most of her life, but has been unemployed for the past two years. Like Berlin, she has no prior experience in sales or fish, but is learning.
“I’ve been meeting a lot of people and have swopped recipes. Who knows, maybe one day I’ll be able to counsel a customer,” says Jordaan.
Wallander has been in the fish import-export industry for nearly 20 years. Unlike Logan, who is a fisherman by trade, Wallander is not much of a sea man. Instead, he’s the business side of the partnership.
“To me, it’s about job creation… It’s for people who are just looking for a break. We’ve been there, so we know what it’s like,” he says.
The carts are not a franchise, as most of the unemployed can’t afford to pay the fees this would entail. Instead, their salaries are commission based.
Plans are under way to launch 15 to 20 more carts by the end of December, and production of the new carts has started. Each cart will employ two people.
Logan stresses that his carts will not be placed in traditional or existing fish hawking areas. “I will not be competing with them (the traditional fish vendors) at all.”
But an area of interest is the north-west corridor, which stretches from Table View and Monte Vista to Durbanville.
While there are many fish hawkers in the southern suburbs, you’ll be hard pressed to find them along the Main Road stretch between Wynberg and Fish Hoek. Residents who live along that strip – even though it’s in close proximity to the ocean – either rely on supermarkets, or drive out of their areas to find fish sold along the road.
Speaking about quality control and cold-chain management concerns, Logan says all of their fish is traceable. He and his partner own two boats. The catch is taken to the processing factory where they are checked for quality, gutted and immediately packed in ice and loaded on to the cart in the morning.
The fish on the carts have been sold out most days, says Logan.
Wallander says their business exported line-caught fish to Europe but this became volatile during the economic collapse. This is part of the reason for growing a stable, local market.
“We want to do is go back to old-world values like getting to know our customers, but including new-world principles like traceability and sustainability. The reaction to it has been fantastic,” says Logan.
FRESH FISH CHECK
Most people have heard of a pap snoek. UCT fish expert Dr Colin Attwood says that locally, fish aren’t handled properly or hygienically on boats.
This is what leads to a parasite releasing an enzyme just before it dies to protect its eggs. This quickly renders the snoek “pap”, leaving its texture mushy and a noticeable difference in its taste.
How to spot fresh fish on the road:
* The most important test is the smell of the fish. The flesh should smell like the ocean. If it smells like fish, it’s probably not all that fresh.
* The eyes should be clear, not white.
* The gills shouldn’t be brown.
Depending on the type of fish, the texture matters. If you press the skin of a snoek, it should bounce back. If the indent remains, choose another snoek. The same could be said for hake. But this test isn’t always reliable when it comes to firmer fish like yellowtail and tuna, as they could stay firm for several days. - Cape Argus