Significant increases in support from consumers, restaurants, cafes and workplace canteens have made Australia’s annual Sustainable Seafood Day (SSD), held on 18 March, the most successful in its history.
Thousands of Australian consumers and more than 150 restaurants, cafes and canteens – a quantum leap from the 29 participating establishments last year - helped celebrate sustainable fishing practices, by eating or serving Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified seafood on the day.
More than 120 of Compass’ workplace canteens and cafes took part this year, through their Eurest, Scolarest, Medirest, ESS, Restaurant Associates and All Leisure Hospitality brands.
These included sites at Google, Bluescope, Mercedes Benz, The Reserve Bank of Australia, Taronga Zoo, IBM, Pfizer, David Jones and a number of government agencies, hospitals, universities and TAFES.
In addition, Sodexo Australia had a further 15 sites from across the country involved.
A number of independent restaurants and cafés also took part this year. To see the complete list of independent establishments that took part this year visit www.msc.org/cook-eat-enjoy/ssd/whos-involved.
This year’s SDD event was also the backdrop to major supply chain announcements from Australia’s two largest retailers – Woolworths and Coles – who announced sustainable seafood sourcing policies on the day.
Woolworths announced it had introduced MSC certified canned salmon to its Select range, and will introduce MSC certified canned albacore tuna this April.
Coles has joined forces with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) to develop a three-year action plan to move its seafood offer to a more sustainable footing and will be working closely with their seafood suppliers and the MSC to provide its customers with more Coles Brands seafood from certified sustainable fisheries.
Woolworths also announced it will offer funding incentives under its Fresh Food Farming sustainable food program to a select number of fisheries in its supply chain to conduct MSC pre-assessments and develop improvement plans for more sustainable practices leading to MSC certification.
