World Wildlife Fund

Meredith Lopuch

Posted 29 May 2008, 10:30 AM

I'd like to take my turn on this blog to talk about how WWF's Community Fisheries Program is helping small-scale fisheries through the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification process and what this means for creating sustainable seafood.

Small-scale fishers comprise approximately 94% of the world's fishers and produce nearly half of the global fish supply for human consumption. This is an incredible statistic. Since 1999 WWF has been working on small-scale fisheries certification, successfully emphasizing the participation of local fishers and the recognition of traditional knowledge in the certification process.

MSC certification is an environmental standard for sustainable and well-managed fisheries, the MSC seeks to harness consumer purchasing power to generate change and promote environmentally responsible stewardship of the world's fisheries. WWF wants to ensure that small-scale fisheries have the same opportunities to participate in the MSC certification scheme as large-scale fishing interests.

We are currently working on more than 15 projects worldwide and most recently we were integral to achieving Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certification of the American Albacore Fishing Association (AAFA) 'pole and troll' fishery in the Pacific Ocean, the world's first certified sustainable tuna fishery.

Unlike more common methods of fishing for tuna that threaten the survival of tuna populations around the world and endanger wider marine ecosystems, AAFA's fishing methods avoid bycatch. This certification is already playing an important role in the global seafood marketplace, as AAFA demonstrates the market benefits of sustainably harvested tuna. The AAFA fishery is also enticing interest in certification-or at least sustainable fishing-from other tuna fisheries around the globe.

Posted 29 May 2008, 11:05 AM

Lily M. wrote
What is the Marine Stewardship Council?

Meredith's response:
The MSC was initiated in 1996 by WWF and Unilever, at the time one of the world's biggest buyers of frozen fish. It was created as a means to change the way fish are caught, marketed, and bought, harnessing consumer power to change fisheries and ensure the future of the world's fisheries.

Now an independent, non-profit organization, the MSC works with fisheries, retailers, and other stakeholders to identify, certify, and promote responsible, environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial, and economically viable fishing practices around the world.

The MSC developed a standard for assessing and certifying fisheries and is the only internationally recognized set of environmental principles that is FAO compliant to assess whether a fishery is well managed and sustainable. It is based on the best scientific data and the latest knowledge about the marine environment, and was developed in conjunction with relevant stakeholders in a two-year global consultation process.

Some exciting news - just yesterday, 28th May, the MSC announced their "100 Fisheries Milestone", as twenty five fisheries around the world are now certified and seventy five fisheries are currently in assessment.

Posted 29 May 2008, 1:55 PM

Tim K. wrote:
How do I know if my fish is from a MSC certified fishery?

Meredith's response:
You can determine if a fish is from a MSC certified fishery by looking out for the MSC logo - the logo appears only on products from fisheries assessed by independent certifiers as meeting the MSC standard.

This is an easy way for us all to identify fish and other seafood from well-managed sources. You can help make a difference by looking out for the logo at the fresh fish counter, on the frozen fish and canned fish packaging.

Hopefully these products shouldn't be hard to find as there are now close to 1,500 MSC-labeled product lines in 36 different countries!

Posted 29 May 2008, 4:17 PM

Susie G. wrote:
I've been seeing a lot of farmed seafood in stores lately. Why is that? And how do I know if it is sustainable?

Meredith's response:
It's not surprising you are seeing more farmed seafood. By volume, almost half of the seafood we eat is "wild" caught in the open water. But the other half is from aquaculture, most simply defined as the farming of aquatic species - such as shrimp, salmon, trout and tilapia - under controlled conditions.

Seafood can be farmed sustainably, meaning it has little impact on the environment and society. WWF is involved with a project, called the Aquaculture Dialogues, that will help make this happen. Through the project, standards for certifying aquaculture products are being created. The standards will reduce the key environmental and social impacts associated with aquaculture.

In late June experts from our Aquaculture team will be blogging here to talk about Aquaculture, the Dialogues and what we are doing.

Posted 30 May 2008, 10:07 AM

Joe G. wrote:
You mentioned you work with Wal-mart - so how does WWF improve the environmental performance of the fisheries they buy from?

Meredith's response:
As the world's largest retailer, Wal-Mart buys and sells thousands of seafood and aquaculture products every year.

They understood that with their size and scale they could effect change within the entire industry, and so the company committed to purchasing 100 percent of its wild-caught seafood sold in the United States from MSC-certified sources by 2011.

To make this goal a reality, WWF joined together with Wal-Mart, MSC, and the Sustainable Fisheries Partnership. We are assisting Wal-Mart in using their purchasing power to secure seafood from environmentally sustainable sources by actively engaging with fisheries and improving them to MSC certification standards.

Posted 30 May 2008, 1:15 PM

Roger S. wrote:
What is WWF doing to support other, perhaps smaller, stores and retailers of seafood?

Meredith's response:
Earlier this month WWF and more than a dozen U.S. and Canadian organizations released steps that any company can take to develop and implement a comprehensive, corporate policy on sustainable, wild-caught and farmed seafood.

It is titled the "Common Vision for Environmentally Sustainable Seafood" and identifies a clear path for achieving sustainability in the seafood industry, basically providing guidance for a retailer to learn how and where to take action - for example summarizing the type of data to collect and assess to monitor the environmental sustainability of their seafood products.

Posted 30 May 2008, 4:15 PM

Barbara C. wrote:
So much is being done to create 'sustainable seafood' which is great - but I was reading in the news recently that the number of bluefin tuna are critically low - what is causing all these problems for fish?

Meredith's response:
This is a really good question. Many fishermen are very aware of the need to safeguard fish populations and the marine environment. They are often the best marine conservationists as they can make a difference at sea - but poor fisheries management and wasteful and destructive fishing practices have had an enormous effect on fishing worldwide.

Bluefin tuna is a great example of this. Since the Mediterranean tuna fishing season opened at the beginning of May, an estimated 27,000 tonnes of bluefin tuna will potentially have been taken by the end of the month - tomorrow. This is nearly the maximum catch of bluefin tuna allowed by law for the whole year, which is 29,500 tonnes. The tuna stocks cannot support such high levels of catches. Moreover, WWF and our partners suspect that pirate fishing as well - meaning that the total catch is even greater than current statistics indicate. Sustainable management measures aligned with scientific advice must be adopted and enforced. The good news is many consumers, retailers, chefs and restaurateurs across the world have stopped selling and purchasing bluefin tuna in an effort conserve the collapsing population.

Back to answering your question, some of causes to these problems include the technological advances that have made large-scale fishing easier, fishing subsidies are keeping too many boats on the water, unfair fisheries partnership agreements allow foreign fleets to overfish in the waters of developing countries, illegal, unreported and unregulated fishers don't respect fishing laws or agreements, there is massive bycatch of juvenile fish and other marine species, destructive fishing practices such as dynamite fishing, and a lack of sound fisheries conservation and management.

Posted 30 May 2008, 5:00 PM

Thanks for reading my blog on sustainable seafood and for your questions and comments - it's been great to share information on the projects I am working on. For further information you can go to the Sustainable Seafood web page.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Meredith