The vacuum system has also proved highly efficient for the production of cod-liver oil. The temperature of rendering being low gives an oil of superior colour and odour, two factors of vital importance when the oil is being extracted for medicinal purposes. This is a somewhat delicate product to manufacture, especially when the livers are in a state of partial decomposition, because in this instance colour and sweet taste are particularly vital and difficult to assure.
I have referred to the circumstance that fish oils commercially rule low in the scale of industrial oils. But even fish oils possess one feature common to the highest grades of oils. They carry a certain proportion of glycerine. During the war the oil extracted from fish-scrap and offal was subjected to further treatment to swell our domestic supplies of this indispensable commodity. Even under normal conditions the reclamation of oil from fish waste to secure this glycerine offers further inducement to this phase of industry, and is also capable of considerable development.
Fish oils are also destined to play a more prominent part upon the table than has been the case heretofore. Their inherent fluidity and refusal to solidify, except at low temperatures, have hitherto reacted against their use in this direction. But the increasing demand for margarine as a substitute for butter, and the discovery of the hydrogenating process for eliminating the two outstanding defects, have invested the future for fish oils with additional significance, more especially as by the hardening process, as it is called, the pungent taste and aroma so distinctively of the sea and its inhabitants are removed. By virtue of this discovery fish oils are entering more and more extensively into the manufacture of margarine. The circumstance that they yield a product so closely allied to the genuine article from the dairy as to be difficult of detection, except by elaborate investigation and specialized methods, has served to accentuate this tendency.
We must derive far-reaching benefits from the utilization of our fish waste of every description—not only the offal arising from the preparation of the foodstuff for the table either in a fresh, kippered, cured, or canned condition, but the inedible contributions from the trawls. Those members of the sea’s vast and varied population, such as the whale, which are trapped for certain highly-prized portions of their bodies, must be fully exploited. For decades the whale fishery has been conducted along the most wickedly wasteful lines for which we are paying to-day. The Scandinavian whalers have been among the worst offenders in this respect, but they are now being compelled to turn from the folly of their ways and are endeavouring to utilize the whole of the carcases of their prizes.
So far as the average member of the community in these islands is concerned it is a moot point whether he, or she, has any tangible idea of the magnitude of the British sea-fishing industry. From the abundance and cheapness of the food a vague notion obtains that it must certainly be somewhat impressive. To obtain a graphic idea of its enormous proportions we must venture beyond the limits of domestic consumption and see how we help to feed the foreigner. Under normal conditions we ship approximately 1,250,000,000 lb. of fish every year, representing in value a round £7,750,000—$38,750,000. Of this huge total the humble herring represents nearly 1,120,000,000 lb., valued at approximately £6,000,000—$30,000,000. Of the total herring catch about one thousand million—1,000,000,000—lb. are subjected to curing or salting for the foreign markets, the value of those exports being £5,350,000—$26,750,000—so that the herring may truly be said to form the backbone of the British sea-fisheries. In these circumstances, and bearing in mind the huge quantities handled, the item of waste must necessarily loom heavy. It cannot be avoided. Therefore it behoves us to turn our harvest from the sea to the utmost advantage and to eliminate the item “loss” from our operations.
As the by-products from fish-waste become appreciated we may even proceed to the lengths pursued along the northern Atlantic seaboard of the United States. There the harvest of the menhaden, a fish totally unfit for human consumption, is carried out expressly for the oil obtainable therefrom. It has become a flourishing trade—one which is steadily expanding—special vessels being engaged in the fishery. While it is questionable if much fish of a comparative character and totally unsuited to the table is to be caught in the waters around our coasts, Farther Britain can point to a different state of things. Our Dominions should find it profitable to emulate the American example and exploit adjacent waters essentially for inedible fish to extract the oil and to convert the residue either into fertilizer or poultry food. There is a lucrative and developing market for all three commodities.
But the problem of to-day, in so far as it particularly affects Great Britain, is to solve the issue incidental to the glut catches, so as to prevent the wasteful distribution of the raw fish over the land as the easiest way out of a perplexing dilemma. If we can divert such unwanted hauls from the sea to reclamation factories, confident in the knowledge that there they will be worked up to their utmost in the interests of commerce, we shall be able to record an industrial and economic achievement of incalculable consequence to ourselves. To dump newly-caught fish upon the land merely because it cannot be absorbed by the community as a foodstuff constitutes one of the most deplorably wasteful, if not actually criminally extravagant, charges ever levelled against contemporary civilization.
CHAPTER VII
WINNING WEALTH FROM SLAUGHTER-HOUSE OFFAL, CONDEMNED MEAT BONES, AND BLOOD
Undoubtedly one of the wonders of civilization is the ability to preserve and transport such a readily perishable foodstuff as meat in a chilled and frozen condition for an indefinite period of time. By this means cattle roaming the extensive ranches of North and South America, Australia and New Zealand, are rendered available in a fresh form for presentation upon the tables of Britain to supplement the severely limited domestic supplies. During recent years the growth of this traffic has been remarkable, and it will not be long before we touch the million-tons-a-year mark for imported beef, mutton, pork, exclusive of ham and bacon.
Yet the development of this trade has reacted directly against our own interests. The dispatch of the carcases to these islands in the dressed condition has deprived, and still is depriving us, of much valuable raw material to which we should have access were we to raise sufficient meat to satisfy our own needs. This is the exploitation of the offal or inedible portions of the beast, the products obtained from which are not only of marked intrinsic value, but enter into so many other and varied industries. From this statement it must not be imagined that we are entirely prevented from establishing a meat-waste industry, since our domestic killing trade is of distinct significance and is supplemented to a certain degree by the “home-killed” business. The latter, as is well known, represents the shipment of cattle to this country in the live condition to be slaughtered upon landing.