The announcement followed a meeting in Japan where a dialogue between the companies concluded with a shared commitment to advance sustainable practices within their global operations and supply chains.
The dialogue marks the third in a series of keystone dialogues between companies from Asia, Europe and the Americas and facilitated by Stockholm Resilience Centre. These companies collaborate in the Seafood Business for Ocean Stewardship (SeaBOS) initiative, with the objective to take leadership on ocean stewardship.
In line with the SeaBOS charter, the meeting resulted in an agreement to address key topics affecting ocean health and seafood sustainability, including illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing and modern slavery. SeaBOS companies are now piloting and testing new technologies for traceability in their global supply chains and will actively engage in the ongoing Global Dialogue on Seafood Traceability to improve existing global standards. All companies are committed to transparent reporting and aspires to play a leading role in improving global ocean policy and regulations in support of ocean stewardship.
In the dialogue, the SeaBOS organization was also formally established with the appointment of Shigeru Ito, CEO and President of Maruha Nichiro Corporation – the largest seafood company in the world, as the first chair of the SeaBOS initiative. Knut Nesse, currently CEO of Nutreco, was appointed managing director of SeaBOS from January 1, 2019.
“SeaBOS is a global coalition between companies with a strategic vision to actively contribute to addressing the ocean stewardship challenge. I am committed to making this initiative a great success and ensure that we take on a global responsibility,“ said Mr Ito.
“The ocean cannot wait and we have the responsibility to make a difference. We now have a solid financial and institutional basis for this young initiative, which started only in 2016, and I am very happy to accept this new position as SeaBOS director”, said Knut Nesse.
Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden participated throughout the meeting in her role as global advocate for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the initiative is obtaining scientific support from the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University. With this important support and its new organization in place, SeaBOS is now ready to step up its actions for ocean stewardship.
The aim of the SeaBOS initiative is to stimulate industry leadership for ocean stewardship in accordance with best available science. SeaBOS is the result of a science-based identification of “keystone actors” in global seafood carried out by the Stockholm Resilience Centre (SRC) of Stockholm University in collaboration with the Royal Swedish Academy of Science, published in 2015.
The SRC has facilitated and coordinated the work of SeaBOS since 2016, but is now transferring this role to the companies. SRC will remain the main scientific partner to the initiative through funding from the Walton Family Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
The SeaBOS charter including its ten commitments for ocean stewardship can be found on www.keystonedialogues.earth
