"Major Change for Thai Seafood Industry", 28 Jul 2017

Thailand is on the brink of making real progress toward the elimination of destructive fishing and human rights abuses in its seafood supply chains. As a potential yellow card de-listing from the European Commission looms, it remains to be seen whether the country will take the steps needed to fully meet the standards to eliminate human rights abuse in the seafood industry... At the UN Ocean Conference in New York this year, Thai delegates announced a voluntary commitment to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing by rigorously controlling, monitoring, and inspecting all Thai-flagged fishing vessels operating inside and outside Thai waters... The key question is whether these reforms will help Thailand to remove the worst offenders from the water and result in a net positive impact for oceans and people, relieving some of the environmental pressure from overfishing and destructive fishing that helps to drive forced labour and illegal fishing. Product traceability and transparency in procurement are also vital to combating seafood fraud and the laundering of fish caught through IUU fishing and forced labour. Government regulations can only be effective if the industry actually gets on board... Following a global Greenpeace campaign and extensive dialogue, the world’s largest tuna company – Thai Union – recently agreed to a comprehensive set of reforms to help transform its supply chains. In doing so, the company also sent a strong signal to the broader tuna sector and seafood industry that the destructive and socially irresponsible status quo must come to an end...