Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Accepted 24 June 2004

AQUATIC CONSERVATION: MARINE AND FRESHWATER ECOSYSTEMS

Aquatic Conserv: Mar. Freshw. Ecosyst. 14: 437–438 (2004)

Published online in Wiley InterScience(www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/aqc.645

Editorial

Setting environmental standards for eco-labels and trainingdolphins are not so different

STEPHEN J. HALL*World Fish Center, Penang, Malaysia,

Many of us have watched with awe as one of our charismatic mega-vertebrates gracefully leaves the waterand jumps over a bar or through a hoop at the behest of its trainer. Only the most na.ııve would imagine thatthe animal was trained to achieve such a feat straight away. On the contrary, the key to animal training is tocatch the student taking a small step in the right direction and reward it } start by laying a bar on the floorof the pool and provide a fish when your dolphin swims over it. Only by gradually raising the bar andrewarding the right behaviour will one eventually encourage the animal to achieve the spectacular feats wemarvel at. Adopting a similar perspective for achieving environmental standards for the certification offisheries would go a long way towards mitigating the current controversy about the Marine StewardshipCouncil (MSC).

Among fisheries certification programmes perhaps the most significant initiative has been theestablishment of the MSC. Initially formed by the WWF in partnership with the company Unilever, theMSC has operated independently of either since 1999. From the outset, the MSC has had its sceptics anddetractors. Fishers, the conservation movement and developing country agencies for whom the applicationof the MSC standard is problematic have all expressed concerns (Kurien, 2000; Mathew, 2000; Wessellset al., 2001). Of the MSC activities to date, it is the assessment of high-profile fisheries, such as NewZealand hoki, Alaskan salmon, the South Georgian toothfish, and Aleutian Islands pollock in Alaska, thathave attracted most attention. The case of the New Zealand hoki fishery illustrates the controversy.

New Zealand hoki, a species fished at depths of 400–700m with both mid-water and bottom trawls, wascertified by an independent certifier in March 2001 as meeting the MSC criteria for certification; it was thefirst whitefish to meet the MSC standard and remains the largest fishery in New Zealand with exportmarkets to the USA, European Union, Japan and Australia. At that time of certification there wereconcerns among some conservation bodies about the sustainability of the fishery and its impact on by-catchspecies. The fact that the fishery was granted a certificate while having to agree to a set of improvementsprior to the next audit added further fuel to the controversy over whether the certification was justified.Soon after the decision to certify was announced, a formal objection was lodged by a New Zealand-basedenvironmental organization } an action which prompted further deliberation by an independent dispute

*Correspondence to: Stephen Hall, World Fish Center, PO Box 500 GPO, 10670, Penang, Malaysia. E-mail s.hall@cgiar.org

panel made up of scientists and a retired British High Court judge. This panel upheld the certification andalso found that the further progress made by the fishery in the intervening period warranted thecontinuation of the certification.

Although this appeal process upheld the original decision, the nub of the issue for this and the otherfisheries mentioned, and the reason for the continued controversy, is that while the fisheries concerned havemanagement processes in place that are appropriate, the translation of these management processes intoenvironmental benefits, both to the stocks themselves and the wider environment, have yet to bedemonstrated conclusively. In other words, despite certification, the extent to which the stocks concernedare truly sustainable remains questionable. This concern was expressed very forcefully in a recent article inthe UK’s Guardian newspaper, which reported on the results of two critical reviews of the MSC that werecommissioned by a number of large US foundations that fund conservation work. Among other things,these reports concluded that ‘The burden of proof to show that certification will enhance the marineenvironment was with the MSC and it must show that it did not provide an undeserved ‘‘green shield’’ forinadequate fisheries management.’ (Brown, 2004).

Borrowing from what we know about training dolphins, current criticism of the MSC approach bears re-examination. To pursue the analogy, the MSC certification process has rewarded some fisheries formovements in the right direction and has now, through the imposition of improvement directives, set thebar a little higher. Current performance may not be as high as we would like at this stage, but it is moving inthe right direction. Provided that an imperative for continual improvement is sustained, this incrementalapproach is a reasonable and pragmatic way to proceed that recognizes the practical limits to what can beachieved on realistic time scales. From this perspective there is a sound case for supporting the MSC’sefforts, while recognizing its limitations and pitfalls.

Unfortunately, as with all analogies, that with dolphin training is an imperfect one because we are notexactly sure how high the fisheries are jumping or how high they should jump. The practical limits to datacollection make determining stock sustainability an inexact science, and quantifying environmental impactsand their longer term consequences is in its infancy. These realities make both setting standards anddetermining performance against standards a work in progress. Neither of these inadequacies, however,detracts from the validity of the approach. When the exact solution and the path towards it is uncertain thatthe only option is to ‘learn by doing’ } a philosophy that the MSC has taken to heart.

No one would argue that environmental certification or any other single approach is a universal panaceafor the ills that face marine fisheries. A better question, and a more realistic one, is does this initiative takethings in the right direction, even if it is only for a small subset of the fisheries sector and of the markets forfish products. The jury may still be out on this question for the MSC, but it is certainly adopting a modelfor changing behaviour that has proved its worth in other fields. On that basis alone, it should be supportedand encouraged as part of a portfolio of positive steps.

REFERENCES

Brown P. 21 February 2004. Crisis of credibility for ‘green’ fisheries. The Guardian.Kurien J. 2000. Behind the label. New Internationalist 325: 25–27.Mathew S. 2000. Sustainable development and social well-being: which approach for fish trade? Bridges 4: 11–14.Wessells CR, Cochrane K, Deere C, Wallis P, Willmann R. 2001. Product certification and ecolabelling for fisheriessustainability. FAO Fisheries Technical Paper 422.

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Copyright # 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Aquatic Conserv: Mar. Freshw. Ecosyst. 14: 437–438 (2004)