Yesterday Greenpeace released its updated seafood sustainability retailer rankings. On its Web site and in its press release it was surprisingly muted in its efforts to claim it had successfully and directly influenced grocery stores to change their seafood sourcing policies based on its demands. In fact, it did not even overtly make that assertion, it just re-ranked the stores,posted the list and as its first campaign did quietly began to fade. But behind the scenes it wasn’t quite the shrinking violet. In fact in an email to its supporters it claimed to have “already made a major impact on grocery retailers” influencing “8 major grocery chains.” But it doesn’t provide a shred of evidence that any of the changes made at even a single store were in any way related to Greenpeace’s efforts. It then slips into its familiar radical eco-speak, telling supporters it has “decided to make YOU the industry’s worst nightmare.”

Facts are facts, no matter how or where you hide them. Not a single store has come forth to say they were and have been working with Greenpeace in order to more closely mirror the group’s seafood sourcing demands, in fact just the opposite– quotes like “none of this is in reaction to the Greenpeace retailer rankings” are most often associated with this campaign.

On a slightly different Greenpeace note, the erroneous TV ad that it aired in Seattle and Anchorage is of course perpetually available on its Web site and on You Tube. So, NFI put together our own video rebuttal which can also be seen here on You Tube. It should be noted that we submitted our video as an official rebuttal and asked that it be grouped with the Greenpeace ad so viewers could decide for themselves whether they should rely on independent ground truth science for their facts or Greenpeace’s fanciful manipulations and distortions– Greenpeace has not allowed our rebuttal to be grouped with its original ad, perhaps afraid it might not fare so well in a side-by-side comparison.