Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Analysis: Global plan to stop ethics slipping through the net

Seafood supply chains criss-cross the globe, making the policing of business ethics notoriously difficult. A new UK-based initiative hopes to help turn the tide

Seafish, a non-departmental public body set up by the UK Fisheries Act 1981 to improve efficiency and standards in UK and global seafood, has created an ethics working group in response to growing concerns about unethical practices within the global seafood market. The working group’s membership-driven work will target unethical supply chains, labour issues and responsible sourcing of seafood including environmental impacts.

Seafish is funded by a levy on the first sale of seafood products in the UK, including imported seafood. It facilitates, chairs and provides the secretariat for the ethics working group (EWG). The EWG’s 40 members comprise companies that process seafood into retail products, federations representing the food and drink industry and NGOs concerned with seafood ethics.

Members include the British Retail Consortium, Young’s Seafood and Direct Seafoods, the biggest supplier of fresh fish to the catering trade in the UK. Major supermarkets Tesco, Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s...