Addressing environmental considerations for Marine Stewardship Council certification: A case study using lobsters

Bellchambers, Lynda M.; Phillips, Bruce F.; Pérez‐Ramírez, Mónica; Lozano‐Álvarez, Enrique; Ley-Cooper, Kim; Vega-Velázquez, Armando

doi:10.1016/j.marpol.2014.07.006

Cited by 22 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…The institutional impacts of MSC certification were mainly perceived as positive (73% of the comments- Table 2). There were positive impacts on transparency (of management and fisheries process) [17], gains in political influence [13], and increased funding (resource) availability [11,12,64]. QUOTE: "Information was there if the fishers wanted it-and they could have contributed if they wanted it (they are satisfied)."…”

Section: Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Shifting focus: The impacts of sustainable seafood certification

et al. 2020

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Alongside government driven management initiatives to achieve sustainable fisheries management, there remains a role for market-based mechanisms to improve fisheries outcomes. Market-based mechanisms are intended to create positive economic incentives that improve the status and management of fisheries. Research to understand consumer demand for certified fish is central but needs to be mirrored by supply side understanding including why fisheries decide to gain or retain certification and the impact of certification on them and other stakeholders involved. We apply semi-structured interviews in seven different Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified fisheries that operate in (or from) Western Australia with the aim of better understanding fisheries sector participation in certification schemes (the supply side) and the impacts and unintended benefits and costs of certification. We find that any positive economic impacts of certification were only realised in a limited number of MSC fisheries in Western Australia, which may be explained by the fact that only a small proportion of Western Australian state-managed fisheries are sold with the MSC label and ex-vessel or consumer market price premiums are therefore mostly not obtained. Positive impacts of certification in these Western Australian fisheries are more of a social and institutional nature, for example, greater social acceptability and increased efficiency in the governance process respectively. However, opinion is divided on whether the combined non-monetary and monetary benefits outweigh the costs.

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Section: Environmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Shifting focus: The impacts of sustainable seafood certification

et al. 2020

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“…In the Gulf of Mexico reef fish FIP, Deighan and Jenkins () found that fishery stakeholders used pre‐assessment results to identify those species that required the least amount of work to get certified and limited the FIP's scope to those species. Including additional species or gears can also significantly increase the costs of certification in terms of assessment costs and the amount of activities needed to improve performance (Bellchambers et al., ; Pérez‐Ramírez, Phillips, Lluch‐Belda, & Lluch‐Cota, ). For multispecies and multi‐gear fisheries, these factors are likely considered prior to launching a FIP and would therefore not be captured within our data; however, given that the fisheries operating farthest from the MSC standard offer the greatest conservation gains, evaluating the decision‐making process undertaken when determining a project's scope is an important area for future research.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Key attributes related to fishery improvement project (FIP) effectiveness in promoting improvements towards sustainability

et al. 2019

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Fishery improvement projects (FIPs) are emerging as a popular market‐based means to improve fisheries sustainability and have been employed in scores of fisheries around the world; however, project ability to realize improvements has been highly variable, and little is known about how fishery and project conditions affect improvement efforts. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the FIP model as a tool for improving diverse fisheries around the world, we compile a unique dataset of social, ecological and economic characteristics for over 60 FIPs globally, which we use to identify key attributes correlated with improvements in fishing practices, management and/or on‐the‐water outcomes. Using a random forest classifier, we identify three important attributes related to FIP effectiveness in demonstrating improvements. Specifically, FIPs are more likely to have achieved improvements with increased cumulative project time, when regional‐level management arrangements are present and when the target species has a moderate inherent vulnerability to fishing. Interestingly, improvements were not correlated with a number of expected features, including a fishery's socio‐economic setting or baseline performance against the desired sustainability standard (e.g. the Marine Stewardship Council fisheries standard). This study improves our understanding of factors related to FIP effectiveness in improving fisheries practices and management and provides key insights for practitioners into important attributes to consider when implementing the FIP model to promote fisheries sustainability.

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“…Annual audits are relatively costly, typically amounting to 15% to 20% of the price of the initial full assessment (Jaffry, Glenn, Ghulam, Willis, & Delanbanque, 2016). Moreover, the reassessment or compliance costs for fisheries are, in some cases, even higher than the initial costs of MSC certification (Bellchambers et al, 2014). Adopters pay all assessment costs to conformity assessment bodies.…”

Section: Adoptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Controversy Over Voluntary Environmental Standards: A Socioeconomic Analysis of the Marine Stewardship Council

Wijen

Chiroleu‐Assouline

2019

Organization & Environment

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Voluntary standards certifying environmental qualities of labeled products have proliferated across sectors and countries. Effectuating these standards requires the collaboration among and between creators (typically firms and nongovernmental organizations) and adopters (firms across a particular supply chain). However, the need to collaborate does not rule out the presence of controversy. Drawing on the case of the Marine Stewardship Council, a leading seafood standard to conserve the world's threatened marine fauna, we analyze how this controversy, from economic and sociologic vantage points, impacts a sustainability transition. In essence, interest divergence drives controversy over standard design, which spurs controversy over standard effectiveness and prompts the proliferation of competing standards. Controversy is magnified by the opacity or nontransparency of the fields which such standards seek to govern. We conclude that, while interest divergence and field opacity entail inherent controversy over voluntary environmental standards, the impact of this controversy on sustainability transitions is typically predominantly positive.

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Addressing environmental considerations for Marine Stewardship Council certification: A case study using lobsters

Cited by 22 publications

References 21 publications

Shifting focus: The impacts of sustainable seafood certification

Shifting focus: The impacts of sustainable seafood certification

Key attributes related to fishery improvement project (FIP) effectiveness in promoting improvements towards sustainability

Controversy Over Voluntary Environmental Standards: A Socioeconomic Analysis of the Marine Stewardship Council

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