Shem Creek - A seafood-lover's paradise!

Workers in Hong Kong sort shark fins destined for dinner tables.
Credit: NYT

Sharks have been around for millions of years, but like all things at the top of the food chain that we consume, our insatiable appetites will get the best of us in the end if we don’t practice some good conservation techniques.

We already know from the WWF that bluefin tuna will be extinct by 2012. Now we have another big problem: sharks are being killed by the millions — 100 million a year according to the NYT!

Click on those piles of shark fins. Notice the guy in the back hiding his face? Yea, he knows scalping sharks just for their fins is wrong, but one way or another, the industry flourishes.

Their specialty: Double Boiled Superior Shark’s Fin w/Seawhelk 响蜾炖鸡鲍翅

As a matter of fact, American owned Citibank has been using shark fins for marketing; their website is currently advertising a 15% discount at Singapore’s Imperial Court Shark’s Fin Restaurant.

Thanks to public awareness from conservationists though – most notably Hong Kong’s Shark Saver’s campaign – the word is finally getting out. Maybe now, sharks will be left alone and allowed to continue their important job as a top-level predator.

Here’s a short teaser of Shark Saver’s Hong Kong campaign highlighting several people taking a stand, vowing not to eat shark fin soup, and asking others to join in. It’s the first in a series of several films from their Hong Kong filming project launched in conjunction with the “Pledge Not to Eat Shark Fin Soup” campaign and Shark Savers Hong Kong. Take the pledge now!

Dr. Maurice Kemp hopes to start a whole new shrimp farming industry, and has purchased worldwide rights for the shrimp farming technology to do so.

As President of Royal Caridea, LLC, they are setting up bio-secure, closed-system, super-intensive, shrimp farming facilities to produce fresh 30g shrimp.

Large fresh shrimp are always in high demand at upscale restaurants everywhere you go, but right now, there’s no market for live shrimp, or any other seafood, since transportation costs are too high. Dr. Kemp says that if indoor shrimp farms were built close to major metropolitan areas, it’d drastically reduce the distribution costs, and Royal Caridea would have a good shot at supplying a whole new market.

Like any distribution business, it’s economies of scale; if Royal Caridea, or anybody else, can deliver live shrimp on a consistent basis at a reasonable cost, markets would grow quickly and significantly.

Maurice Kemp’s Summary

Background is multidisciplinary, with much of career directed towards preventing microbial induced disease and/or development of pharmaceuticals to alleviate clinical symptoms or signs associated with a disease state. Most recently, he has worked on the development of methods to detect pathogens and development of chemical methods to eliminate food & airborne pathogens. He also developed methods to inhibit mold & fungi associated with building products and participated in the interdisciplinary development of pharmaceutics for veterinary & medical applications.

Royal Caridea, LLC (currently under construction)