A new partnership between fishermen's organizations, processors and retailers is spearheading the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) assessment of the recovering North Sea cod stock.
Retail supplier Iceland Seachill announced at the World Seafood Congress (WSC) 2015 in Grimsby, U.K., that it would be leading an application to the Seafish Strategic Investment Fund (SIF) to support the assessment, and confirmed that the first stage of the process had been passed successfully.
The other members currently providing financial contributions and support to the project comprise the Scottish Fisheries Sustainable Accreditation Group (SFSAG), Marks and Spencer, W.M. Morrison and Sainsbury’s, while the National Federation of Fishermen's Organizations (NFFO) and Young’s Seafood are supporting the assessment in kind.
The assessment is expected to be commissioned early next year.
The historical decline of the North Sea cod stock has been well documented and frequently used by campaigning groups to underline the dangers of overfishing in general. However, thanks to the efforts of fishermen, particularly in Scotland, the population has grown steadily in recent years.
“This certification, if successful, will underline the incredible recovery of cod following the successful MSC certification of the Icelandic cod and Barents Sea cod that supply our nation’s huge appetite for this delicious fish,” said Nigel Edwards, technical and CSR director at Icelandic Seachill.
Mike Park, chairman of SFSAG, the body responsible for the certification of other North Sea fish stocks, said the “selfless actions” of Scottish fishermen to protect known abundances and spawning aggregations of cod have played “a very significant part” in delivering the fishery to the point where MSC certification is viewed as “the logical next step.”
