Thursday, July 2, 2009

"Green" Krill Oil?

I came across a very interesting press release claiming that a certain company has developed environmentally friendly krill harvesting methods. Often, I'm happy to hear about developments that help obviate the reasons for eating a healthy diet of whole, natural foods. Why waste time purchasing and cooking real food when you could just swallow an overpriced capsule along with your takeout*? Especially now that it's environmentally sound? The ridiculousness of nutritionism aside, the idea that it's only the harvesting methods that make krill oil un-green is completely false. It's very nice that this company's methods reduce bycatch of other marine species. The bycatch problem plagues the entire fishing industry and constitutes a serious threat to many marine species. Their other methods also are probably better for the environment than those previously used. Yet no amount of green harvesting techniques can erase the fact that increased krill harvesting is likely to have serious consequences for the Antarctic food chain. If you really want "green" Omega-3s, read this book and research local, sustainable sources of the foods recommended therein. Guranteed to taste better than krill!

1 comment:

Ziesemeister said...

You failed to acknowledge that the new process eliminates the use of ethyl acetate and acetone - dangerous solvents that wind up in the atmosphere, water and may even exist as residue in the final product. You ignore the fact that the omega-3 are bound to phospholipids in krill oil instead of triglycerides as in fish oil. You also omit the fact that fish oils need to be "purified" to remove toxins, whereby krill are relatively pollution-free.

Krill oil is superior to all other sources of omega-3 oils and as far as the danger of overfishing krill, there are literally miles of krill in the Antarctic.