June 19, 2017 — The 2017 SeaWeb Seafood Summit, which took place 5 to 7 June in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A., brought together more than 580 global representatives of the seafood industry, the conservation community, academia, government, and the media for in-depth discussions, presentations and networking around the issue of sustainable seafood.
Here’s a review of the news that was made at this year’s summit:
A major topic of discussion at the conference was pre-competitive collaboration, with several panels and keynotes approaching the issues from different angles. In the pre-conference on Sunday, 4 June, attendees heard from Nira Desai, the director of strategy and learning for the World Cocoa, a key player in the development of CocoaAction, a sustainability movement in the cocoa industry:
Cocoa industry offers seafood a crash course in pre-competitive collaboration
Pre-competitive collaboration will also play a key role in the future of global aquaculture, according to experts at the conference:
In other big news for aquaculture, on Monday, 5 June, Seafood Watch upgraded farmed salmon certified by the Aquaculture Stewardship Council to its “Good Alternative” rating, marked “a watershed moment for the sustainability credentials of farmed salmon”:
Seafood Watch upgrades ASC-certified farmed salmon to “Good Alternative”
Later on Monday, 5 June, the 2017 Seafood Champion Awards were handed out at a ceremony in Chihuly Gardens in Seattle. SeafoodSource profiled each of this year’s winners: