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WWF and The Marine Stewardship Council New Hope for World Fisheries

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Fact Sheet: WWF and The Marine Stewardship Council New Hope for World Fisheries

January 12th, 1998

Fish have never been more popular as seafood, nor more threatened as marine wildlife:

  •    At least 60 percent of the world's 200 most valuable fish species are either overfished or fished to the limit.  Some, like Atlantic halibut and bluefin tuna, have been fished to the brink of commercial extinction.

  •    Nearly one-quarter of the world's marine catch--including fish, marine mammals, sea turtles and seabirds--is thrown back into the ocean dead or dying.

  •    Governments worldwide pay tens of billions of dollars each year to subsidize an industry that catches only US$70 billion worth of fish.

  •    The history of fishery management is replete with spectacular failures.  Economic and political expediencies have condemned many fisheries to ruin. In some areas, chronic overfishing has resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs.

  •    To reverse this crisis, we must develop long-term solutions that are environmentally necessary and then, through economic incentives, make them politically feasible. To this end,  WWF formed a conservation partnership with Unilever in 1996 to create market incentives for sustainable fishing by establishing an independent Marine Stewardship Council (MSC).

WWF endorses the Marine Stewardship Council

  •    The Marine Stewardship Council is now an independent non-profit, non-governmental organization, headquartered in London. The mission of the MSC is to work for sustainable marine fisheries by promoting responsible, environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable fisheries practices while maintaining the biodiversity, productivity and ecological processes of the marine environment. 

  •    The Marine Stewardship Council is in the process of establishing a set of globally-agreed principles and criteria for sustainable fishing by holding a series of international workshops designed to refine and strengthen these standards, developing a process for international implementation and conducting test cases for certification of fisheries.

  •    Only fisheries meeting these standards will be eligible for certification by independent, certifying firms accredited by the MSC.  Products from fisheries certified to MSC standards ultimately will be marked with an on-pack logo. This will allow consumers to select fish products that they know come from sustainable, well-managed sources, thus creating a market incentive for  industry to shift to sustainable fishing practices.

  •    The MSC is actively seeking the widest possible involvement from individuals and organizations committed to seeking new solutions to the decline of marine fisheries and securing the future of these important resources. As one of its advocates, WWF endorses the Marine Stewardship Council and continues to actively support the MSC's efforts around the world.