Environment & Sustainability

Thailand has pledged to further strengthen multi-stakeholder partnerships to combat illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing and labor abuses in its fisheries sector, according to representatives of its government at the SeaWeb Seafood Summit in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A. earlier this month.

The Thai delegation was led by its ambassador to the United States, Pisan Manawapat, and was comprised of senior officials from Thai agencies working on … Read More

Nearly half of California’s salmon species will be extinct in 50 years if current trends continue, a new study has found.

The fish face myriad threats. Climate change will warm the cold-water streams on which spawning fish rely, while dams block passage to headwaters. Ocean acidification will disrupt marine food webs, while hatchery-raised fish threaten to interbreed with wild fish, weakening future populations.

If nothing is done to rever… Read More

Federal scientists are predicting large “dead zones” to form this summer in the Gulf of Mexico and the Chesapeake Bay, with runoff from agricultural areas resulting in hypoxic zones incapable of supporting marine life.

In the Gulf of Mexico, scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are expecting the third-largest dead zone ever recorded. The hypoxic zone is expected to reach 8,200 cubic miles – about 5… Read More

Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke completed a trip to the U.S. Northeast as part of a review of recently created U.S. national monuments, including the controversial Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. 

Zinke is in the process of reviewing all national monuments designated in the past 21 years as part of an executive order signed by President Donald Trump in April.

“Right now, I’m in the information colle… Read More

FishChoice.com, a sustainable seafood sourcing tool that connects retail, restaurant, and institutional seafood buyers to suppliers of sustainable seafood products, has introduced a new facet to its online platform.

The new feature will allow registered members to personalize their dashboards to track content and enable their businesses to better address sustainable seafood on their own, according to Katherine Miller, the senior directo… Read More

Fiji has pledged to pursue the goal of having at least 75 percent of all longline vessels that are members of the Fiji Fishing Industry Association working in fisheries certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC).

Specifically, the South Pacific island nation will seek MSC certification for its longline yellowfin tuna fishery and will expand the definition of its fishing area to include three high seas next to the country’s Exclu… Read More

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations has signed an agreement with Ghana’s government that will see the West African country take steps to strengthen its fisheries management.

As part of the agreement, Ghana will join the FAO’s EAF Nansen Project, a program offering sub-Saharan African nations resources to sustainably enhance fisheries management to improve food and nutritional security. The project is part… Read More

Hilton has made progress towards its commitment to source all of its sustainable seafood sourcing goals, including 100 percent compliance with its goals by 2022.

The global company, which operates more than 5,000 hotels, detailed progress towards its seafood sustainability goals in a new report.

Hilton became the first global hotel company to achieve Marine Stewardship Council group certification for 60 owned, leased and managed hotels it operate… Read More

A memorandum of understanding (MOU) has been signed to drive the sustainability of small-scale tropical fisheries and the fishing communities that depend on them through the influence of consumer markets.

Partnering Rare on the science-industry project, which forms part of the NGO’s Forever Fish fisheries recovery and restoration program are the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program, the Asian Seafood Improvement Collaborative (ASIC) … Read More

Speaking at the SeaWeb Seafood Summit on Wednesday, 7 June in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A., University of Washington fisheries researcher Ray Hilborn said the perception that the world’s fish stocks are declining is incorrect, and that fishing could sustainably be stepped up in areas with good management.

Hilborn pointed to figures from the RAM Legacy Stock Assessment Database that indicate that fish stocks dipped through the last part of th… Read More