At the recent Seafood Expo North America, SeaWeb announced the 2018 Seafood Champion Awards finalists — 17 individuals and organizations who exemplify the creativity and commitment to sustainability of seafood leaders around the world.

The annual Seafood Champion Awards program recognizes individuals and organizations for excellence in promoting environmentally responsible seafood. Four winners, one in each of four categories, will be announced at a ceremony on June 19 at the SeaWeb Seafood Summit in Barcelona, Spain.

This year’s competition showcased vigorous innovation in the seafood sector, with nearly half of submitted nominations supporting individuals or organizations who are using new technologies to deliver improvements to complex global supply chain issues like bycatch, traceability and illegal fishing. For the first time, this year’s nominations highlighted significantly more organizations than individuals—a sign that sustainability is becoming more of an institutional mission.

The Seafood Champion Award for Innovation recognizes those who identify and apply new solutions to ecological challenges, market needs or sustainability barriers. The finalists in this category include Skretting, which is being recognized for its fishmeal-free salmon feed.

Social and community issues took a front seat this year. “Many of these finalists put a human face on the social issues that are increasingly part of the seafood sustainability discussion,” said Ned Daly, SeaWeb Program Director. “From preventing slave labor and supporting women workers to feeding the hungry and helping fishing communities leverage sustainable practices into market access, they show us that the seafood community has the courage to engage in even the most entrenched and difficult problems.”

The finalists were selected by a panel of seafood sustainability experts from industry and nonprofit organizations based in Asia, Europe and North America.

Read more about the 17 finalists.