April 18, 2014 — University of New Hampshire Dining is the largest food purchaser in New England. While UNH is the first campus in America to sign on to the “Slow Fish Principles,” it was the effort of several groups of people and long hours of planning that attracted people to the Sustainable Seafood Dinner at Holloway Commons Wednesday night.
UNH senior Spencer Montgomery reached out, with Brett Tolley from Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance, to UNH Dining and fishermen about the idea for sustainable seafood in the dining halls. As a former president of Slow Food UNH, Montgomery said the idea didn’t originate with him.
“My first semester as President of Slow Food UNH, at the end of the semester, I distributed a survey to 44 students in the group, basically trying to identify their interests and to guide our movement as a whole, as a group, into the next semester,” Montgomery said.
“Sixty percent of the students showed a strong interest in seafood sustainability,” he continued. “I remember being completely fascinated that [60 percent of the students] were interested in that, but also being completely intimidated by having to learn more about it myself because I knew absolutely nothing. So that’s what really inspired me to approach fishermen and learn more about these concepts—was that single survey.”
Montgomery has worked long hours to collaborate with fishermen, UNH Dining and Slow Food UNH, as well as some other businesses interested in the project. While he has taken on a lot of responsibility, he doesn’t think it is wearisome.
“I love it, I haven’t been tired yet,” Montgomery said several weeks before the Seafood Dinner while plans were still underway.
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