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The Marine Stewardship Council is an international and independent non-profit organization devoted to protecting oceans and safeguarding seafood supplies. They set standards for sustainable fishing practices around the world. Founded in 1996, the organization is governed by a wide range of stakeholders, ensuring the Council’s decisions are balanced and reflect varied sectors and interests.
If you’ve never heard of the Marine Stewardship Council, you’ve likely seen their labeling on fish products. Much of the organization’s recognition comes from their use of a label, which is applied to seafood products that have met their sustainability standards. If you’re shopping for seafood you can feel good about, look for this small blue sticker.
Marine Stewardship Council Mission
This organization’s purpose is to ensure that future generations can enjoy both high-quality seafood and healthy oceans. They help to secure this by evaluating seafood providers based on sustainability, transparency, and quality. The Marine Stewardship Council awards providers who meet their rigorous standards with a blue ecolabel, to be applied to the product.
Through recognizing sustainable fisheries, maintaining MSC certification credibility, expanding seafood markets, and building a public awareness of ocean health and human impact, this organization is working to ensure high-quality seafood is available for generations to come.
The Marine Stewardship Council’s Work
This non-profit organization uses an ecolabel and a fishery certification program to recognize and reward sustainable fishing practices. These titles help influence the choices customers make when buying seafood, ensuring consumer dollars are used to support the seafood providers who emphasize and hold up sustainability.
The ecolabel indicates that a product is wild, sustainable, and traceable. It is only provided to wild fish or seafood from providers who are certified to the Marine Stewardship Council’s Fisheries Standard. This standard includes a science-based set of requirements that must be met for sustainable fishing. In the simplest terms, if you see a blue MSC label on a fish product, you can count on it being a high-quality, well-sourced, and sustainable item.
The MSC also provides useful resources for consumers looking to purchase and eat sustainably caught fish. Certain seafood items present species-specific challenges, and the Marine Stewardship Council has an online guide to understanding what to look for when buying a specific fish – wither it be cod, haddock, mackerel, or prawns.
How the Marine Stewardship Council Can Help You
An MSC ecolabel, when applied to a product, guarantees a sustainably sourced fish. If you’re trying to find a high-quality seafood product, especially if you’re ordering salmon online, this is a great indicator to look out for. Keep in mind that, while there are more than 30,000 MSC certified fish and seafood products available, there are other high-quality items that have been sourced sustainably. This is just one method of indicating a great seafood product.
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