The Plymouth Fish Finger

Co-designing and delivering a healthy and sustainable food product from small-scale fishers to local communities
Plymouth Fish Finger on a plate
Fotonow CIC
Title: The Plymouth Fish Finger
Funded by: FoodSEqual – UKRI (Transforming UK Food Systems strategic priorities fund)
Funding amount: £6 million (circa £750,000 to Plymouth)
Location: Plymouth
Dates: Spring 2022 – present
Project partners: Sole of Discretion CIC; Plymouth Fishing & Seafood Association CIC; CaterEd Ltd; Sir John Hunt Community Sports College, several primary schools, and other national supportive stakeholders
University of Plymouth PI: Dr Clare Pettinger
University of Plymouth staff: Dr Louise Hunt
 

Summary

This exploratory pilot project made use of local community action research intelligence, which led to a 'social innovation' aiming to improve access, affordability, and increase fish intake for local community residents.
Using a culturally appropriate and iconic British product, the Plymouth Fish Finger innovation has been co-designed within the community to be healthy and sustainable. It makes use of low-value and underutilised fish species, such as pouting, dogfish and whiting, caught by local small-scale coastal fishery vessels (under 10m, which minimise environmental damage) and then processed with the intention of finding a way to deliver the product into the local school meals system.
The inclusive vision for the product is that it will improve fish intake in disadvantaged communities, thus promoting health benefits. Furthermore, giving fishers a fair price for their by-catch means reducing fish waste, limiting environmental damage from overfishing, and improving livelihoods in the fishing community.

Objectives

  • Work with local fish stakeholders, schools and communities to plan and deliver a small-scale pilot project to co-design a fish finger for Plymouth
  • Test the fish finger for acceptability among fish stakeholders, schools and community members
  • Appraise approaches used during the pilot by exploring the use of collaborative co-production methodologies to support social innovation and local blue food system transformation
Collage about fish produced by primary school students for the Plymouth Fish Finger project
Primary school students learning about fish
Fish fingers on plates for a tasting session

Inequalities within the 'Blue Food System'

To date, not much research has investigated 'blue foods' (foods sourced from water, including fish) because they are ethically complex.
On the one hand, fish is culturally important and gives us essential nutrients that protect from diseases like cancer and heart disease. In the UK, most people don't eat the recommended amount of fish (two portions per week, one portion of which should be oily fish). A clear health inequality is that vulnerable groups, such as those living in areas of deprivation, eat low-quality diets, have poor health outcomes, and are most likely not to eat enough fish.
On the other hand, eating fish is an environmental 'red flag' because of global overfishing. This creates a paradox, and solutions are needed that fully consider this nuanced discourse.
Fish fingers
 
 
 

The need for food security

Plymouth is a place of rich coastal assets, yet grave inequalities:
  • A city with a Naval Dockyard legacy contributing to pockets of extremely high social and economic deprivation.
  • Up to 11 years of difference in life expectancy between neighbourhoods.
  • Several areas of the city fall within the 10% most deprived areas in England on the English Indices of Deprivation 2019.
  • The city has widespread food insecurity – households have limited or uncertain access to nutritious food due to a lack of money, resources, or other factors denying them a sufficient, varied diet.
Map showing food insecurity in Plymouth

Plymouth communities want change

Our fish finger pilot project has captured intelligence to show that disadvantaged Plymouth communities want:
  • Better access to fresh locally caught fish
  • More education on different fish species and how to prepare/cook them
  • Closer links with the people working in fish supply chains
  • Their voices to be heard by fish policy makers to prioritise system change.
The communities want these things because they have learnt that their ‘food system’ (the complex web of activities involved in food production, processing, transport and consumption) is not fit for purpose. They know that these imbalances are contributing to health inequalities and so must be addressed.
Flowchart showing fish supply chain in Plymouth

I like that this means that this fish actually stays in this area – there are no food miles.

School governer

The fishermen get paid, but there is no economic value thereafter. So we are trying to make more products and add more value on the coast… and that of course creates jobs and everything else around the infrastructure of doing that.

Food producer

I'd eat this fish finger every Friday if I could!

Primary school student

A lot of fishermen will actually throw that low-cost fish away; you'll never hear about it, you'll never see it, but it happens.

Fisher

News

Fish fingers like you've never seen them before (University of Plymouth)
6 June 2025
 

Partnered with

Part of FoodSEqual

FoodSEqual is a five-year research project led by The University of Reading, with four smaller research hubs across the country, including one at the University of Plymouth, led by Dr Clare Pettinger.
The vision is to provide citizens of culturally diverse, disadvantaged communities with choice and agency over the food they consume by co-developing new products, new supply chains and new policy frameworks that deliver an affordable, attractive, healthy and sustainable diet.
Vegetables arranged in a display of baskets
 
 
 

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