Campaign group On the Hook intends to identify the Marine Stewardship Council’s main strengths and weaknesses, having accused it of “failing to deliver on its vision of an ocean teeming with life”.
The campaign group is calling on MSC stakeholders to share their views via an online consultation. It will be followed by a series of roundtable discussions to expand on the main themes raised. On the Hook then intends to publish a report with recommendations for improvement at the MSC.
The review came in response to refusal from MSC to reform, according to the group.
“Some MSC-certified fisheries do represent the best in the sector, but others do not,” claimed On the Hook member Charles Clover, executive director of Blue Marine Foundation. “MSC has not kept pace with best practice and has not set the bar for certification high enough.”
The campaign was ”increasingly concerned that MSC is greenwashing high-impact industrial fisheries while remaining largely inaccessible to small-scale, developing-world fisheries” he said.
Clover’s fellow On the Hook advocate Steve Trent, founder and CEO of the Environmental Justice Foundation, added: “MSC can play a critical role in protecting our ocean, but only if its certification process is transparent, robust and credible. In too many recent instances, it has fallen short of that.”
A spokesman for the MSC said it was “disappointed that On the Hook has taken the step of launching its own review of the MSC. We see this as unnecessary and a distraction, given the scale of the challenges facing the ocean.”
The organisation was currently finalising a review of its Fisheries Standard with the participation of more than 1000 stakeholders, which would likely lead to changes to the programme, the spokesman added. “Far from being an organisation not subject to independent scrutiny, the MSC is regularly assessed against international standards for seafood sustainability and independent eco-labels, in line with UN requirements.”
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