Saving Seafood

ISSF Annual Report Focuses on Tuna Fishing Best Practices and Participating Company Conformance with Science-based Conservation Measures

May 23, 2017 — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) released its 2016 annual report today, Best Practices, Better Solutions, which outlines tuna sustainability achievements and argues for continuous improvement of global tuna fisheries through collaboration and advocacy.

“ISSF marked its seventh anniversary in 2016, and I’m proud to have been part of this unique organization from the beginning,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson in her opening letter. “Through our many activities and partnerships over the years — made possible by progressive tuna companies and other funders — we have deepened our understanding about what it takes to ‘be’ sustainable, and to advance the cause.”

Best Practices, Better Solutions focuses on ISSF’s collaborations on “best practices” in tuna and ocean conservation sustainability with fishers, tuna companies, retailers, regional fisheries management organizations (RFMOs), and other governing bodies, working closely with nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), scientific agencies, and charitable foundations.

Report Highlights

The report offers these special features:

  • Spotlights on fish aggregating device (FAD) management, electronic monitoring and reporting, and harvest control rules — including timelines that track best-practice milestones 2009-2016 as well as graphics showing RFMO proposal activity
  • Graphics documenting skipper acceptance of best practices, including bycatch mitigation techniques
  • Charts showing tuna stock status based on catch and abundance
  • Table with Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) performance indicator averages for global tuna fisheries
  • Summary of ISSF advocacy efforts, including joint letters, blogs, and RFMO side events
  • Graphic showing how RFMO proposals track with ISSF advocacy priorities
  • Reflections from outgoing ISSF Board chair Juan Corrales

It also covers these notable ISSF achievements:

  • Five new tuna companies joined as participating companies in 2016.
  • ISSF Skippers Workshops were held in China and Vietnam for the first time; a record 343 vessel crew were trained in 2016 workshops.
  • In North America, Europe, and Africa 32 retailers that purchase tuna have incorporated ISSF guidelines in their procurement policies.

Conservation Measures & Commitments Compliance Report

ISSF’s annual report also serves as the platform to share the organization’s annual Conservation Measures and Commitments Compliance Report. The report shows a conformance rate of 97.5 percent by 28 ISSF participating companies as of March 31, 2017 — up from 95.6 percent in November 2016 — across 21 ISSF conservation measures in effect in 2016. Twenty-two of 28 companies were fully compliant across all measures.  

The report tracks ISSF participating companies’ progress in conforming with measures like these:

As part of its commitment to transparency and accountability, ISSF engages third-party auditor MRAG Americas to audit ISSF participating companies — assessing their compliance with ISSF’s conservation measures. MRAG Americas conducts independent auditing based on a rigorous audit protocol.

In addition to a summary report, MRAG Americas issues individual company reports that document in detail each organization’s compliance with ISSF’s conservation measures. ISSF publishes these individual company compliance reports on its website.

ISSF Participating Companies account for about 75% of the global canned tuna market.

New tuna measures target IUU, bycatch

May 19, 2017 — New conservation measures from the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation aim to reduce incidental capture of sharks and marine turtles and reduce illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing.

Two of the new measures are the first to affect longline vessels, since longline fishing accounted for 12 percent of the tuna catch globally in 2015, according to ISSF.

The new measures go into effect on 1 January, 2018.

ISSF-participating seafood suppliers include Thai Union, Bumble Bee Seafoods, Chicken of the Sea and Starkist.

“With about 75 percent of the world’s canned tuna processing capacity conforming to multiple ISSF measures for sustainability best practices, and with major tuna companies being transparently audited against those measures, we have a real opportunity to make changes on and off the water,” ISSF President Susan Jackson said.

Moving forward, tuna companies that do business with large-scale longline vessels must conduct transactions only with long-liners whose at-sea transshipment activities are 100 percent monitored by human observers, either onboard the main vessel or onboard the transshipment vessel.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource.com

Corporate and Social Responsibility Leader Luciano Pirovano to Chair Sustainability Group Board

May 4, 2017 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation:

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) announced today the appointment of Luciano Pirovano as Chair of its Board of Directors. Mr. Pirovano, International Marketing & Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Director at Bolton Alimentari, succeeds Juan Corrales, CEO, Grupo Conservas Garavilla, in the role.

“I would like to thank Juan for his many contributions to ISSF. Under his leadership, ISSF has grown from 17 to 28 participating companies. We’ve also made strides to achieve, in his words, ‘a transparent, traceable, and fully compliant tuna industry.’ Last year, ISSF began publishing detailed audit reports evaluating each participating company’s compliance with our conservation measures,” said ISSF President Susan Jackson.

“I know Juan joins me in applauding the appointment of Luciano to this dynamic and important position. As we near the close of our 2013-2017 Strategic Plan, with more momentum, partners and progress than ever before, ISSF is well poised for our future. We are confident in Luciano’s abilities to take us there.”

“As a founding participating company with ISSF, Bolton Alimentari has been invested in and committed to the Foundation’s cause since day one,” said Mr. Pirovano. “I am proud to honor and extend that commitment by taking on the role of Chair of the ISSF Board. I look forward to working with my esteemed colleagues on the Board toward our shared vision of sustainable tuna fisheries – for the ultimate protection of this important natural resource and all those that depend on it.”

On the ISSF Board, Mr. Pirovano joins a diverse group of leaders from non-governmental organizations, marine science, government agencies, and the seafood industry, representing several countries. In addition to fiduciary and governance responsibilities, ISSF Board members advance the mission of the Foundation, including through the adoption of ISSF conservation measures, to which ISSF participating companies commit to conform. Other ISSF Board members are:

  • Dr. William Fox, Vice Chair and Vice President, Fisheries, WWF-US
  • Dr. David Agnew, Standards Director, Marine Stewardship Council
  • Dr. Transform Aqorau, Pacific Fisheries Expert and former CEO, Parties to the Naura Agreement (PNA)
  • John Connelly, President, National Fisheries Institute
  • Javier Garat, Secretary General, Cepesca
  • Susan Jackson, President, ISSF
  • Ichiro Nomura, Fisheries Policy Advisor, Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, Republic of Indonesia
  • Dr. Victor Restrepo, Vice President, Science, ISSF
  • Alfred Schumm, Director, WWF Global Fisheries Program, WWF International

A long-time advocate for sustainable seafood, Mr. Pirovano has spent nearly 15 years at Bolton Alimentari. In 2007, he took over the role of International Marketing Director, developing Bolton Alimentari’s canned fish business abroad. In 2009, Mr. Pirovano took charge of Corporate Social Responsibility, having been involved with ISSF since its founding. As CSR Director at Bolton Alimentari, he has launched the “Responsible Quality” project, Rio Mare’s Corporate Social Responsibility strategy. Mr. Pirovano is based in Milan, Italy. ​

 

JAPAN SET TO REACH ITS PACIFIC BLUEFIN TUNA FISHING QUOTA TWO MONTHS EARLY

April 26, 2017 — Japan is on track to meet its annual Pacific bluefin tuna quota two months early, frustrating activists trying to protect the species from overfishing.

Japan, where bluefin tuna is considered a delicacy, consumes significantly more of the fish than any other country. But its quota for the year ending in June 2017 is likely to be reached as early as this month.

Despite the country’s aggressive approach to fishing, bluefin tuna isn’t cheap. At Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish auction, a 467-pound bluefin tuna sold for 74.7m yen ($700,000) in January.

The seemingly insatiable appetite for the tuna is causing concern among conservationists. Amanda Nickson, director of global tuna conservation at Pew Charitable Trusts, said Japan is irresponsible in its approach to bluefin tuna fishing, The Guardian reported.

“Just a few years of overfishing will leave Pacific bluefin tuna vulnerable to devastating population reductions. That will threaten not just the fish but also the fishermen who depend on them,” Nickson told The Guardian on Monday.

Overfishing has already caused the Pacific bluefin population to fall by 97 percent.

In 2015, Japan and other members of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission agreed to reduce their catch of immature bluefin.

Read the full story at Newsweek

“No tuna disaster” as global stocks deemed healthier than expected

April 25, 2017 — Fishing effort in most tuna fisheries has grown steadily in recent years, a trend that has been largely led by the constantly increasing purse-seine harvest. At the same time, these stocks remain in a healthy state and are much less overfished than many other coastal resources, delegates heard at the sixth European Tuna Conference in Brussels, Belgium.

Speaking at the biennial forum, held on the eve of the 2017 Seafood Expo Global, Alain Fonteneau, a renowned tuna fisheries scientist from the French Research Institute for Development (IRD), confirmed that the total global tuna catch has grown to a level of around five million metric tons (MT), with skipjack accounting for around 66 percent the total.

Fonteneau highlighted that the purse-seine fleets’ heightened productivity – averaging 2.5 percent annually over the last two decades – was chiefly responsible for this growth and that their improved efficiency was directly due to the increased number of fish aggregating devices (FADs) deployed in recent years.

Over the last 10 years, FADs have been responsible for approximately 50 percent of the total purse-seine catch, including 53 percent of the skipjack that has been caught during this period.

“If we were to lose all of the FAD fisheries tomorrow, we would lose most of the skipjack catch,” he said.

While the amount of skipjack caught in most fisheries has continued to increase – a trend that Fonteneau said is indicative of healthy stocks – most of which are still not yet exploited to their maximum sustainable yield (MSY), including the 2 million MT currently coming from the Western Pacific. He is, nevertheless, pessimistic about the Indian Ocean’s stock, despite it currently being in “good shape,” as his “personal feeling” is that the next stock assessment, expected in October, will suggest its over-exploitation.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource.com

Worldwide Industry, NGOs Advocate for Policy Changes in Tuna Fisheries in 2017

March 24, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — A diverse, global group of commercial and non-profit organizations has joined the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation’s (ISSF) call for immediate improvements on tuna management, including developing harvest strategies, strengthening monitoring, control and surveillance tools, and improving the management of fish aggregating devices (FADs).

A March 21 outreach letter to four tuna Regional Fishing Management Organizations (RFMO) was co-signed by 83 nongovernment organizations, tuna processing companies, fleet associations, retailers, importers and food service operators. The RFMOs are IATTC (Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission), ICCAT (International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas), IOTC (Indian Ocean Tuna Commission), and WCPFC (Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission).

These groups manage tuna fisheries in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. In 2015, more than 4.8 million tonnes of tuna were harvested, as reported in ISSF’s recent Status of the Stocks report.

Harvest strategies are based on science-based frameworks that include guidelines and limits for fishing vessels. The tools for monitoring, control, and surveillance include human observers, satellite vessel monitoring systems, electronic monitoring systems on vessels, and data collection and dissemination.

The ISSF-coordinated joint outreach letter urges the RFMOs to:

  • Develop precautionary harvest strategies, including specific timelines to adopt target reference points, harvest control rules and other elements
  • Where it is not already in place, require 100%observer coverage for all purse seine fishing vessels and all at-sea transshipment activities
  • Identify and sanction non-compliance with the existing mandatory 5% observer coverage requirement for longline vessels
  • Develop and adopt standards for electronic reporting and electronic monitoring, for all major fishing gear types, and modernize vessel monitoring systems
  • Develop science-based recommendations for managingFADs (fish aggregating devices), including for stock assessments
  • Adopt measures for using non-entangling FAD designs, to protect sharks and other non-target species

The letter requests that the above points are addressed in 2017.

The letter’s 83 signatories are:

Ahold Delhaize (Global)

Aldi North (Global)

Aldi South (Global)

American Albacore Fishing Association

American Bird Conservancy

American Tuna

ANABAC

Anova (US)

Anova Seafood, BV

AP2HI

Atunlo

Auchan Retail (Global)

BirdLife International

Bolton

Bumble Bee Seafoods

Carrefour (Global)

Casino (FR)

Caterers Choice (UK)

Chancerelle

Client Earth

Conservation International

Co-op (UK)

Coop Italia (IT)

Coop Trading (All Scandinavia)

Davigel

Edeka (DE)

Environmental Defense Fund

Eroski (ES)

Fishwise

Frinsa

Greencore (UK)

Grupo Conservas Garavilla (Isabel)

Grupo Maritimo Industrial (Grupomar)

Herdez del Fuerte

Horizon Fisheries

IPNLF

ISSF

IUCN SSC Tuna & Billfish Specialist Group

Jealsa

Kroger (USA)

Lidl (Global)

Loblaws Canada

M & J Seafood (UK)

Marks & Spencer (UK)

MDPI

Mercadona (ES)

Migros (CH)

MMP

Monterey Bay Aquarium

Morrisons (UK)

New England Seafood International (UK)

Ocean Brands

Ocean Harvesters Operative

OPAGAC

Orthongel

Pacific Alliance for Sustainable Tuna (PAST)

Pesca Azteca

Pick N Pay (South Africa)

Princes

Procesa

REWE GROUP (Global)

RS Cannery

Sainsbury’s (UK)

Salica

SEAPAC (a subsidiary of Kingfisher)

Sodexo (Global)

Spar (Austria)

Spar (South Africa)

Subway

Sustainable Fish Cities

Sustainable Fisheries Partnership

Tesco

Thai Union/COSI

Thai Union Europe

The Nature Conservancy

Thunnus Overseas Group/Conserveries des Cinq Océans

Tri Marine

Tunago Fishery, Ltd.

Warenverein (DE)

Wegman’s (USA)

Woolworths (South Africa)

Worldwise (UK)

WWF

The International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF) is a global coalition of scientists, the tuna industry and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) — the world’s leading conservation organization — promoting science-based initiatives for the long-term conservation and sustainable use of tuna stocks, reducing bycatch and promoting ecosystem health. To learn more, visit http://iss-foundation.org/.

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

Love Canned Tuna? More Grocers Want To Make Sure It Was Caught Responsibly

March 24, 2017 — For the last 20 years, Americans have been having a conversation about sustainable seafood that was largely focused on fish purchased at restaurants or fresh seafood counters. Armed with seafood guides, thoughtful customers were encouraged to pose questions about where their fish was caught and what type of gear was used — questions that are far trickier to pose in front of a wall of canned tuna in the middle of a supermarket.

While tuna poke may be winning over American palates today, our consumption of fresh tuna is still dwarfed by our collective appetite for the canned stuff. According to the National Fisheries Institute, Americans ate more than 700 million pounds of canned tuna in 2015. That’s 2.2 pounds per person, enough to keep it firmly among the top three seafood items Americans consume, a ranking held for more than a decade.

Unlike the sustainability conversations we tend to have over farmed vs. wild salmon — or on issues like bycatch, mangrove destruction or human slavery that swirl around shrimp — the hand-wringing over canned tuna has largely been focused on contaminants like mercury, rather than fishing methods or the health of fish stocks.

A handful of retailers are about to change that.

Last Wednesday Whole Foods Market announced that by January 2018, all canned tuna sold in its stores or used in its prepared foods departments will be sourced from fisheries that use only pole-and-line, troll or handline catch methods that eliminate bycatch (accidental harvest of other fish, birds or mammals) because fishermen are catching tuna one at a time.

The new Whole Foods’ policy also requires canned tuna products to come from fisheries that are certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) or are sourced from fisheries rated green (best choice) or yellow (good alternative) by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and The Safina Center. And Whole Foods has included a traceability requirement as well.

Read the full story from NPR

Whole Foods’ New Canned Tuna Policy: Only Pole-and-Line, Troll, or Handline Caught Tuna By 2018

March 20, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — By January 2018, all canned tuna sold at Whole Foods Market must come from fisheries using only pole-and-line, troll, or handline catch methods, all of which take fish one by one, preventing bycatch and creating more jobs in coastal communities.

Whole Foods Market is the first national retailer to create such stringent standards for canned tuna, which is among the three most consumed seafood items in the United States.

The policy’s aim is to reduce overfishing and bycatch, and support fishing communities. The new sourcing policy includes canned tuna items sold in the grocery aisle as well as the prepared foods department.

Whole Food’s new canned tuna policy requires that the fisheries be certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council or rated green or yellow by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and The Safina Center.

Every supplier must also use Trace Register, traceability software that tracks each lot of tuna at every point from vessel to can. The traceability data are continuously crosschecked to help verify sourcing and prevent illegally caught or unauthorized fish from entering the supply chain.

“We created this new policy for canned tuna because we want to lead by example in sourcing only the highest quality, sustainably caught tuna,” said Carrie Brownstein, global seafood quality standards coordinator for Whole Foods Market.

“Combined with better international fishery management, overfishing and bycatch can be greatly reduced when tuna is caught by these low-impact fishing methods. We are honored to be working with suppliers and partners who are driving positive change.”

Leading brands that already source canned tuna from one-by-one fisheries, including 365 Everyday Value®, American Tuna, Pole and Line, Henry and Lisa’s, and Wild Planet, are updating their operations to meet the policy’s traceability requirements. These measures will also help importers get ahead of the traceability provisions in NOAA’s Seafood Import Monitoring Program, which has a deadline for mandatory compliance by Jan. 1, 2018.

Over the coming months, remaining suppliers will shift their operations and fishing practices to use the approved one-by-one catch methods, which are more environmentally friendly and offer more employment opportunities for fishermen worldwide.

“Since America is the largest canned tuna market in the world, shifts toward greater sustainability in this category can create a meaningful, positive impact on our oceans and our global fishing communities,” said Adam Baske, director of policy and outreach for International Pole and Line Foundation. “In some cases, these one-by-one fisheries are one of very few sources of local employment. The boats also make relatively short trips, enabling crews to return home frequently, compared to large industrial tuna vessels that may spend multiple months or even years at sea.”

Whole Foods Market’s new canned tuna policy expands on the retailer’s existing sustainability standards for fresh and frozen seafood, which also require that all seafood must either be certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council or rated green or yellow by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and The Safina Center. Additionally, all of the retailer’s farmed seafood must meet its industry-leading aquaculture standards, which include third-party on-site audits.

In 2016, Whole Foods Market introduced the retailer’s first Fair Trade certified yellowfin tuna, a designation which ensures better wages and working conditions for fishermen, and provides additional funding to their communities for improvement projects and investments. Fair Trade certification also verifies full supply chain traceability.

These continual advancements in policies and sourcing are part of Whole Foods Market’s mission to create a model that moves the seafood industry toward greater sustainability.

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission. 

Fish fight: Scientists battle over the true harm of mercury in tuna

March 6, 2017 — Molly Lutcavage thought she had a deal. For more than a decade, she had collected hundreds of tissue samples from bluefin tuna in hopes of settling a question that has long vexed pregnant women and the parents of young children: Should they eat the big fish, a beneficial source of protein and fatty acids? Or did mercury contamination make them too dangerous?

Lutcavage hoped to test the theory that selenium, a key chemical found in tuna, prevents mercury from being transferred to the people who eat them and that, therefore, the fish are safe to eat. So she gave her hard-won samples to a colleague, Nick Fisher, to analyze in his lab.

But Fisher, it seems, didn’t have as much interest in Lutcavage’s selenium theory. Two years later, he produced a study focused almost exclusively on his own hypothesis: that lowering pollution emissions from power plants reduced the levels of mercury in bluefin tuna.

Lutcavage was furious, and the two scientists went to war.

“We kept fighting on this,” said Lutcavage, a researcher at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. “I feel that the paper didn’t advance the issue whatsoever on this divide between scientists over methylmercury. I can’t tell you how much [my colleagues and I] agonized over taking our names off the paper.”

Read the full story at the Washington Post

American Samoa Longline Fishing Industry Had Record Revenues In 2015

February 28, 2017 — While revenues for commercial landing of tuna species in American Samoa were down in 2015, revenues were at an all time high for the longline fishery, according to the 2015 Stock Assessment and Fishery Evaluation (SAFE) Report for Pelagic Fisheries of the Western Pacific Region released this month by the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council.

Council’s executive director Kitty M. Simonds says the report represents a major advance in the monitoring and evaluation of the pelagic fisheries in the region.

“Besides the usual complement of fishery modules found in previous reports, the 2015 report has in-depth chapters on protected species, stock assessment summaries, socio-economics and human dimensions of pelagic fisheries, climate and oceanic indicators, essential fish habitat and marine planning,” she said in a news release earlier this month.

Not included in the SAFE report is data on purse seine and non-U.S. vessel landings. According to the more than 250 page report, the largest fishery in American Samoa is the American Samoa longline fishery and a majority of these vessels are greater than 50 ft, and are required to fish beyond 50 nautical miles (nm) from shore, and sell the majority of their catch, primarily albacore, to the canneries.

Read the full story at the Pacific Islands Report