Fisheries and seafood industry leadership in 'Corporate Ocean Responsibility' is essential to navigating this critical juncture and ensuring the long term health of the industry.
Fisheries and seafood leadership on addressing sustainability issues is not only important to the future of the industry, but also to the future of the ocean. Responsible industry performers are well positioned to develop and drive business-oriented solutions to marine environmental challenges and collaborate with other ocean industries and stakeholders in ensuring the health and continued economic use of the seas.
Many policy, practical and public reputation aspects of fisheries and seafood are now affected, if not dominated, by environmental concerns. These issues are affecting all industries that use ocean space and resources, e.g. oil and gas, shipping, aquaculture, ports, marine tourism, ocean renewable energy, seabed mining, etc. This is creating important needs and opportunities for collaboration, synergies, and business benefits among the ocean business community. Unfortunately ocean industries are not engaging in a coordinated systematic approach to many of the developments affecting their ability to do business in the ocean, missing opportunities for collaboration and economies of scale in developing solutions.
As the principle users of the marine environment, fisheries, seafood and other ocean industries have the most to gain by developing and delivering solutions to sustainability - and the most to lose by continuing to be perceived only as the cause of ocean problems as the marine environment is subject to increasing commercial use. Access to fish and other ocean resources, services and space is at risk from the loss of the 'social license' to operate in the seas and from the ocean governance regimes and policies that are emerging from processes in which industry is not well engaged.
To address the ocean sustainability issues and opportunities critical to business, the World Ocean Council (WOC) is creating an unprecedented global, cross-sectoral industry alliance. The WOC is catalysing proactive, collaborative efforts towards 'Corporate Ocean Responsibility' by bringing together fisheries, seafood and other sectors. Cross-sectoral leadership and collaboration will result in significant business value for the fisheries, seafood and others committing to the vision of a healthy and productive ocean that supports sustainable use by the responsible ocean business community.
Growing ocean use, impacts and concerns
Although the ocean covers over 70% of the earth's surface, it is an increasing crowded place. Ocean industries such as shipping, oil, fisheries, aquaculture, and tourism are big and have been expanding rapidly, with increasing impacts to the marine environment. Seaborne shipping already accounts for 90% of global trade, and worldwide cargo will continue to rise in the coming decades, notwithstanding the current economic downturn. The offshore oil industry is expanding and moving into ever deeper waters and new areas, for example Brazil has recently discovered offshore reserves that rival those of the North Sea, and the waters of Angola may soon be the leading oil producer in Africa. In the seafood sector, human consumption of seafood fish grew from 20 to 85 million tons during 1960-2002, at the same time that the FAO estimates that 70% of fish stocks have become fully or overexploited.
Add in the other ocean uses, such as the doubling of cruise ship passenger capacity in the past 20 years, the recent growth in offshore aquaculture, wind farms and wave energy, and the overall mix becomes complex. Inter-industry conflicts in the ocean are on the rise, for example, last year's skirmishes between fishers and oil firms off the coast of Norway. As noted by Michael Grey of Lloyd's List of London: “[I]t is probably sooner rather than later that we will hear of the first accident involving a ship or fishing craft and a wave generator, so systems that promote inter-industry co-operation must surely be welcomed.”
Underlying this growing level and variety of industry activities is an ocean in trouble. Oceans provide 59% of the world's ecosystem benefits; nearshore marine areas alone (5% of the Earth's surface) provide 38% of these global benefits. Unfortunately, the global marine environment, its unique biodiversity and its life-sustaining resources are being degraded, destroyed and overexploited at an ever increasing rate and global scale.
The challenge of addressing sustainability in a global ocean
Sustainable development of the dynamic, interconnected global ocean 'commons' - for which everyone, and no one, is completely responsible - presents unique challenges for industry. As marine environmental health declines, fisheries, seafood and other ocean industries are collectively being held responsible for their impacts by the public, governments, non-government organisations (NGOs), and inter-governmental organisations (IGOs). Advocacy groups are aggressively confronting ocean industries on a sector, incident, or local basis (e.g. oil spills, trawling, port expansion). Moreover, ocean environmental concerns are increasingly being pursed through globally coordinated campaigns (e.g. ocean zoning, marine protected areas (MPAs), ocean noise, marine debris, greenhouse gas emissions). Unfortunately there is often not a corresponding coordination of effort by the sectorally fragmented ocean business community to engage these cross-cutting issues.
Ocean stakeholders are pushing for increased regulation in a variety of international venues where international ocean 'rules' are established. Although the fisheries and seafood industries have a long-standing and productive interaction with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), many ocean sustainability issues are much broader and are being actively taken up in other arenas.
Some of the most important ocean governance developments are being pursued through the non sector-specific international policy processes covering oceans, e.g. the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), etc. Coordinated industry participation in these processes is lacking, as is balanced, comprehensive information regarding industry efforts to address marine environmental issues. Marine industries are often portrayed only as the cause of ocean problems.
As a result, private sector access to ocean resources, services and space - even by companies with the best environmental record - is increasingly at risk due to the loss of the 'social license' to operate. Ocean governance regimes and policies are emerging from processes in which industry is not well engaged and in which other stakeholders have sophisticated, well organised agendas and involvement.
There have been limited efforts by responsible companies to differentiate themselves from poor performers and try to do business in a more environmentally sustainable way. However, the efforts of one company or even a whole sector are not enough to address collective global impacts by a diverse range of industries in a shared global ecosystem.
Industry leadership and collaboration in sustainable ocean use
As the private sector is the primary ocean user, it is well placed to develop and deliver solutions in response to society's demands that marine ecosystem use is sustainable and industry impacts are minimised. As Vaclav Mikulka, director, United Nations Division of Ocean Affairs and Law of the Sea states: “Managing the global oceans requires the involvement of all stakeholders, especially the private sector, and all ocean industries have a responsibility to help maintain the health and productivity of the marine environment.”
The ocean business community can develop this leadership and deliver ocean sustainability solutions that work for business, rather than being forced to react to conditions advanced by other stakeholders. A cross-sectoral ocean business community of leadership and collaboration is needed among those who want to address marine environmental issues, differentiate themselves from poor performers, collaborate with like-minded companies within and across sectors, and engage ocean stakeholders and policy processes. Given the size and scope of the fisheries and seafood industries, visionary companies and executives have a particular opportunity to provide leadership in collaborative, industry-driven ocean sustainability.
With the establishment of the World Ocean Council there is now a structure and process for companies to seize this opportunity and create an international industry leadership alliance on the ocean. As Law of the Sea chief Mr Mikulka says, “The World Ocean Council efforts to bring together the global 'ocean business community' to develop leadership and collaboration for ocean sustainability and stewardship are critical to the future of the oceans.”
The future
Few people know the ocean better than those who depend on it for their livelihood. Companies dedicated to fishing, seafood, shipping, aquaculture offshore oil, and other marine industries can and should be leaders in responsible ocean use and ensuring the ocean is healthy and productive.
The World Ocean Council is helping make this happen through an unprecedented business alliance for individuals, companies and associations who care about the ocean - creating private sector leadership and collaboration in tackling ocean environmental issues, generating business benefits and reducing the threats to continued responsible ocean use. As Lloyd's Register notes, “If we are thinking globally, oceanically and collectively, rather than considering our own narrow industry requirements, the World Ocean Council could be a very good idea. [It] could provide just the sort of co-operative inter-industry vehicle we need.”
A major international industry conference, the “Sustainable Ocean Summit” (Belfast, 16-17 June 2009), will be the first cross-sectoral conference on ocean sustainability developed by and for the ocean business community.
