Saving Seafood

Assessing El Niño’s impact on fisheries and aquaculture around the world

April 27, 2020 — While considerable resources are invested in seasonal forecasts and early-warning systems for food security, not enough is known about El Niño’s impact on the fisheries and aquaculture sectors, even though its name was given in the 1600s by fishers off the coast of Peru.

To remedy that, FAO is publishing, in partnership with French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development (IRD France), the report El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) effects on fisheries and aquaculture. This report captures the current state of knowledge on the impacts of ENSO events across sectors, from  to safety at sea, from fish biology and fishing operation to management measures.

El Niño is widely known as a climate pattern that begins over the Pacific Ocean but wreaks havoc on ecosystems in land and water far away from its origin. Its consequences include droughts and major harvest shortfalls in large swatches of Africa and Indonesia, forest fires in Australia, and serious flooding in South America.

ENSOs are often simplified to reflect two main phases: El Niño, an anomalous warming phase in the central and/or eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, and an opposite cooling phase called La Niña.

Read the full story at PHYS.org

Small-scale fishermen suffering significantly from COVID-19 pandemic

April 27, 2020 — The COVID-19 pandemic has shaken the entire seafood industry. Demand for fresh seafood has plummeted as restaurants, hotels, and catering businesses shutter. And trade has faltered as transportation restrictions prevent supply chains from moving product.

But while businesses in the developed world can apply for social safety provisions and major seafood companies’ balance sheets give them a fighting chance to weather the storm, small-scale fishermen face severe risk. Especially in the developing world, where a day’s catch buys that night’s meal, fishermen’s prospects are bleak.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

WTO fishing subsidies deal pushed to end of year as discord divides main players

April 23, 2020 — Discord amongst the world’s major fishing powers is continuing to hold up a World Trade Organization agreement on fishing subsidies.

A WTO ministerial meeting set for June in Kazakhstan was seen as the deadline for a deal, but that has now been postponed after a WTO staff member tested positive for COVID-19, and also due to travel restrictions imposed as a result of the coronavirus crisis.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Danielle Blacklock, director of NOAA Fisheries’ Office of Aquaculture, discusses future of U.S. industry

April 21, 2020 — Danielle Blacklock took over as director of NOAA Fisheries’ Office of Aquaculture in mid-March, just as the COVID-19 pandemic began to come to a head in the United States. Over the past decade, Blacklock has served in multiple positions at NOAA, most recently as a senior policy advisor for aquaculture. In that role, Blacklock completed a six-month assignment at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, focused on aquaculture sustainability globally. She also served as the acting deputy in the office for several months.

Blacklock is charged with overseeing the aquaculture component of NOAA’s sustainable seafood portfolio and providing the strategic vision for developing a stronger aquaculture industry in the United States. Nearly a month into her appointment, SeafoodSource connected with Blacklock to discuss her goals as director, the office’s response to COVID-19 complications and what the future of U.S. aquaculture looks like.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

New company offers social responsibility benchmarking for seafood industry

April 15, 2020 — Seafood companies looking to demonstrate their commitment to environmentally sustainable fishing can choose from an array of assessments, audits, and certifications. But when they decide to show their dedication to treating workers well, they’re left with few options.

Poor working conditions at sea are rampant, and numerous reports have emerged in recent years of labor abuse and human rights violations, spurring a reckoning within the industry.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

US politicians call for shutdown of wet markets in China

April 14, 2020 — A group of more than 60 U.S. senators and representatives have signed a letter calling for China and other countries to shut down so-called “wet markets” where live wild animals are sold for human consumption.

Wet markets are found in many cities in China, and often feature seafood and other animals being sold alive to customers. A wet market in Wuhan is believed to have been the source of the COVID-19 virus that has killed more than 100,000 people globally since December 2019.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

FAO’s guidelines for human rights in fishing delayed after pushback

April 10, 2020 — Baseline international standards for human rights, labor conditions, and social responsibility in the seafood industry will have to wait.

Countries pushed back against draft guidance on social responsibility in fish value chains developed by the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) when it was first officially presented in November in Vigo, Spain. As a result, FAO is spending the next year-plus creating a scoping paper that will more explicitly spell out what should be included in the guidance.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

GSSI AND IDH launch Seafood MAP program to accelerate sustainable seafood

March 30, 2020 — The following was released by the Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative & The Sustainable Trade Initiative :

On March 30 2020, at a SeafoodSource webinar, the Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative (GSSI) and IDH, the Sustainable Trade Initiative, launched Seafood MAP – a new market and investment program, supported by leading seafood companies, to accelerate sustainable seafood worldwide.

Seafood MAP – Measuring and Accelerating Performance of global seafood supply – responds to an urgent need to drive more responsible practices across the sector. It provides global guidance and incentives to seafood producers that are not yet certified to become more sustainable and profitable. This will create investment opportunities for financiers to support the supply of sustainable seafood to fast growing consumer markets in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

In 2020, Seafood MAP will develop a responsible roadmap and framework, based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals and FAO Guidelines. The first pilots are due to go live in mid-2020 in regions worldwide, following the latest assessments in light of the global pandemic.

Read the full release here

ILO finds improvements in Thailand’s seafood sector

March 13, 2020 — A new report released in March by the United Nations’ International Labor Organization (ILO) has found improvements in working conditions in Thailand’s fishing and seafood processing sectors. However, there remain problems with forced labor in the industry, the organization noted.

Despite the finding, a group of human rights-focused NGOs are calling on the U.S. government to downgrade Thailand in its annual report on human trafficking, according to Reuters.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

ILO Says Working Conditions Improve in Thai Seafood Sector

March 10, 2020 — A report issued Tuesday by the U.N.’s International Labor Organization credits Thailand with improving working conditions in the fishing and seafood processing industry, but says that serious abuses including forced labor remain.

The report is a follow-up to one published in 2018, and compares the workers situations from earlier surveys to one conducted last year.

Thailand’s seafood sector accounts for billions of dollars in export earnings annually and employ more than 350,000 workers.

However, the industry began facing the threat of trade sanctions from Western nations after media exposure in 2014 of poor working conditions and especially the exploitation of ‘fishing slaves’ — forced labor.

In response, Thailand’s government began instituting reform measures, most effectively by strengthening its legal, policy and regulatory framework, the report says.

But the measures have failed to substantially cut the use of forced labor, it says. Extrapolating from the 2019 survey of workers, it estimates that 14% of those engaged in fishing and 7% of those in seafood processing were subject to some form of forced labor.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the New York Times