Friends of the Sea - Sustainable Seafood

According to the FAO, a fishery is typically defined in terms of the "people involved, species or type of harvested aquatic species, area of water or seabed, method of fishing, class of boats, purpose of the activities or a combination of the foregoing features".  

Directly or indirectly, the livelihood of over 500 million people in developing countries depends on fisheries and aquaculture.

Close to 90% of the world’s wild fishery catches come from oceans and seas, as opposed to inland waters. These marine catches have remained relatively stable since the mid-nineties ranging from 80,000,000–86,000,000 tonnes.

A small number of species support the majority of the world’s fisheries. These species include herring, cod, anchovy, tuna, flounder, mullet, squid, shrimp, salmon, crab, lobster, oyster and scallops. All except the last four provided a worldwide catch of well over 1,000,000 tonnes in 1999, with herring and sardines together providing a harvest of over 22,000,000 metric tons in 1999.

Friend of the Sea Criteria for Sustainable Fisheries require:

- target stock to be not overexploited

- fishery to generate maximum 8% discards

- no bycatch of endangered species

- no impact on the seabed

- compliance with regulations (TAC, IUU, FOC, minimum size, etc)

- social accountability

- gradual reduction of carbon footprint

Over 30 fisheries in all oceans have been found to be compliant with Friend of the Sea criteria and are considered approved. 8 fisheries origins have NOT been approved as they were not compliant with one or more Friend of the Sea crteria.