Which of these statements is true?

Eating Chilean sea bass is an act that could lead to its extinction.

Fish that are bred in a fish farm are nowhere near as healthful as the line-caught version of the species.

People who cooked or ate swordfish in the 1990s were committing an environmentally reprehensible act.

The answer in each case is: It depends. It depends where the fish comes from, and how it was caught and whether government quotas were abided by. But finding out for certain can be difficult.

Yet every day -- particularly in the Washington area -- chefs are expected not only to cook to perfection but also to know if the fish on their menus is endangered, caught in an environmentally sound manner or raised according to politically correct standards. If they don't, the chefs risk being labeled profligate and insensitive to the needs of the planet.

This is the world of fish politics, and if you're running a restaurant, it's getting more complicated every day.

You have to know the law (or rely on your supplier's information and honesty). You have to be up to speed on the issues. And you have to please your customers.

Chefs have had to respond to the "Give Swordfish a Break" campaign, which started in 1988 and urged chefs to boycott North Atlantic swordfish. And the striped bass ban. And concerns about red snapper. Halibut. Cod.

This year, the hapless Patagonian toothfish (rechristened more temptingly Chilean sea bass) has been targeted by the National Environmental Trust (NET) as a fish no environmentally right-minded chef would even think of serving.

And this fall, the Center for Food Safety, Clean Water Action and Friends of the Earth asked chefs, grocers and seafood distributors to sign a pledge not to buy or sell fish that was altered by genetic engineering. And those fish aren't even on the market yet, so chefs couldn't buy them if they wanted to.

Why focus on chefs?

Which message would attract your attention: an environmental group's statements about dwindling fish populations or a group of chefs in battle positions brandishing their knives?

"Chefs are sexy," says Ellen Gray, general manager of Equinox in downtown Washington, and co-owner of the restaurant with her husband, Todd, the executive chef. "It's marketing. We get contacted [on these issues] about once a month."

Most of the fish agendas emerge from real and serious concerns. Overfishing. Health and safety. Conditions at fish farms. Fish kill from unknown causes. It's all a little overwhelming for people who want to be responsible citizens but also have to think about running a restaurant.

"Our job, always, is to find the best product," says Jeff Tunks, executive chef and co-owner of DC Coast and Ten Penh downtown. "We don't want to rape the seas."

Focusing on the Issues

The issue that has received the most attention is overfishing, the situation that takes place when fish populations shrink dramatically as the demand for them and man's ability to fish more efficiently increases.

No chefs want to help a species vanish. But how can they find out the facts? Consider the current hot topic, the NET's "Take a Pass on Chilean Sea Bass" campaign, which, concerned about the declining annual catch, urges chefs not to serve the popular fish.

An easy fish to cook, and a popular one on the banquet circuit, it's been a staple of many menus.

Hundreds of chefs across the country have signed a pledge not to serve it. "If I know a fish is endangered, I'm not going to serve it," says Robert Wiedmaier, executive chef at Marcel's on Pennsylvania Avenue NW.

Some, like Rob Fleming, the executive chef at McCormick & Schmick's at Reston Town Center, have taken the fish off their menus but haven't been willing to sign the pledge. "I was seeing problems with quality," he says. "And when all the propaganda was coming in, what I heard from guests was that they would rather not purchase Chilean sea bass at this time. Not everybody had the same opinion. But my answer is that the quality isn't there. When it is, I'll put it back on the menu."

Other chefs, however, have resisted taking public positions. Tunks is one of those. "I went to press meetings and did research, and saw that many chefs continued to have it on their menus," he says. "We were interested in researching responsibly. We refused to be pressured into it. If there's no federal boycott, and we're purchasing from responsible purveyors, I think we're doing what we can."

Chef Bob Kinkead, whose Foggy Bottom restaurant, Kinkead's, specializes in seafood, also wouldn't sign up. "If a bunch of people say 'Ban,' I have to look at the issue very carefully, because they're usually wrong," says Kinkead. "And chefs shouldn't be the people who are the spokesmen or are determining policy. Swordfish was tough -- I spent a whole lot of time reading everything I could about it and talking to fishermen and wholesalers, and we cut it back but we didn't ban it. But [Chilean sea bass] is a no-brainer because I don't like the fish. Any fish you can overcook for an hour and still serve is probably not something I want to serve to my guests. It got popular because it gives a not particularly skilled chef a whole pile of leeway between underdone and overdone. It's impossible to ruin."

Taking an Active Role

At Equinox, Todd and Ellen Gray took another approach. Outdoor types involved in environmental issues, they're frequently asked to endorse one cause or another. Often these requests are accompanied by a list of other well-known food professionals who are also being asked to participate. That can be flattering. But the Grays don't like to take positions they haven't researched. Eventually they signed the pledge. ("We have a big heart when it comes to any environmental issues, and they presented some compelling evidence," says Ellen Gray.)

But they also sponsored a forum in June on sustainable seafood issues and invited environmentalists, seafood buyers, seafood sales representatives and other restaurant people. "We're activist-oriented," she says. "We feel we need to do more than cook. That's why we took the lead on the panel."

"We needed to know more [about Chilean sea bass]," he says. "We don't want people to think we support causes we don't know about."

Besides, it's not good business to construct a menu solely around environmental issues. The Grays run a fine dining establishment. His culinary decisions also have to suit his needs as a chef and a businessman. "It's difficult," he says. "You don't want to support something with a negative environmental impact. But people want tuna, salmon and white fish like halibut, grouper and striped bass. Monkfish won't sell like grouper."

Not to mention crab. "What will sell better,'" he asks with a shrug, "lump crabmeat or sardines?"

Down on the Fish Farm

The Chilean sea bass issue is currently the most publicly talked about aspect of fish politics. But there are other hot buttons, most prominently fish farming (as opposed to catching fish in the wild). A burgeoning international industry and subject with worldwide implications, fish farming has passionate antagonists but also passionate defenders.

"Farm-raising fish is the most economical way of feeding the world's hungry people with healthy animal protein," says Dun Gifford, president of the Oldways Preservation & Exchange Trust, which last winter held a conference examining the pros and cons of fish farming. "It's more sustainable and environmentally friendly than land farming, and the cost of producing healthy farmed fish is substantially less than the equivalent weight of farmed beef."

Most chefs, however, agree that fish caught in the wild taste better and are more natural and free from the antibiotics endemic to fish farms. But chefs rely on farmed fish every day -- especially when they want reliable quantities, or out-of-season fish, or often less expensive fish.

"I'm not for or against farmed fish," says Kinkead. "I think they're an inferior product to free-caught fish. However, we'd better get used to them because they're going to be a huge part of our diet. They're a good nutritious source of food. Farmed salmon is not as good as wild-caught salmon, but it's readily available. We use a lot of it. You can only get wild-caught a couple of months of the year."

Trusting Sources

Then there's the question of how restaurants get their fish, and who they rely on for information. Good relationships with vendors are essential. Some of the swordfish problem was the result of fishermen catching fish that were too young to spawn, and once caught, never would, thereby reducing the swordfish population. "You need to do responsible purchasing,'' says Tunks, who wants be sure the fish he buys are in line with government regulations, come from certified fishing boats, certified waters and are a certified size. In other words, no back-door purchasing from people trying to peddle a load of red snapper or some other fish to a chef.

With all that to balance, where does that leave the customer? Some restaurants, like McCormick & Schmick, identify how and where the fish on their menus were caught. And many restaurants provide their staffs with as much information (about all the food served) as they can handle. Legal Seafood, a chain with 26 restaurants, four of them in the D.C. area, even stages "fish school" for the staff several times a year. "They see what we go through, how we test the product, why we do what we do, the fanaticism we go through," says Legal's CEO Roger Berkowitz. "And they take tests on what they've learned."

At the end of the day, whatever the issue, and however careful restaurants and chefs are, they're a logical target for lobbyists for environmental and ecological issues. And that's not necessarily bad, though it can make running a restaurant increasingly challenging.

"We get requests constantly -- not to serve veal or lamb or shellfish or certain fish," says Gus de Millo, a co-owner of DC Coast and Ten Penh. "And there's always some fact or truth to every position. But organizations can manipulate things for their own ends, and there's always a personal agenda you have to be leery of.

"But it got my attention," he says. "I've gotten really interested in the problems of overfishing and involved in the issues. How do we fit the needs of everybody and not harm species to extinction or genetically alter them to produce more? We need to think in terms of sustainable development. Every voice matters in everything you're concerned with these days. You try to do the best you can."