Senior scientists and fishery managers from leading fishing nations concluded three days of talks on the status of fisheries and sustainability of seafood at the fourth annual Science and Sustainability Forum (SSF) which called for the re-evaluation of seafood ecolabelling guidelines that many say are being misapplied particularly in small scale fisheries and coastal communities. A major concern is that ecolabelling is creating market barriers for coastal fisheries and communities.

“What we have seen is that many of these [ecolabelling] schemes are eliminating access of small scale fisheries particularly in developing states to international markets,” said Fabio Hazin, Chair of the UN Food & Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) Committee on Fisheries. “This is a very worrying trend and we have to come up with a solution for that.”

Participants of the October 27-30 Forum noted that even in developed countries there are many well-managed fisheries which simply do not have funds to go through a private third-party ecolabelling scheme, and many question the need and additional costs of ecolabelling, especially when many management systems already have a thorough scientific review process. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on fisheries management, which involves extensive data collection, stock assessments, and teams of scientists and managers. Several forum participants discussed new programs at the national and state level to provide assurances that their fisheries are sustainably managed and conform with the principles within the FAO guidelines for ecolabelling.

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