Stakeholders

Anyone interested in providing her/his input and knowledge on the fishery or farming sites under assessment, is allowed and invited to contribute to the Friend of the Sea audit.

Single persons and/or companies or organization can register as stakeholders, by sending an email to info@friendofthesea.org, including a CV or role's description, and input and comments, within the deadline for submission specified on the News area under Planned and Ongoing Audits.

Please provide official scientific evidence in support of your statements and conclusions. Comments or inputs which are not supported by scientific or proved evidence, cannot be taken into consideration by the Certification Body. Stakeholders should indicate which requirements they believe are not complied with.

The Certification Body will have to provide public answer to any objections to certification. Certification Body answers will be published in the final Audit Report and could lead to failure to certify.

Objections received in the final 15 days after audit end, will be handled as such and will follow the Objections' procedure.

If you simply wish to be updated on new fisheries or farm sites under assessment, please contact us at info@friendofthesea.org.


Stakeholders are an important part of the Friend of the Sea assessment project. In order to ensure adequate involvement, the following procedure applies:

1) At least 15 days before the audit starts, an email notification of a Fishery assessment will be inserted into the News section of the Friend of the Sea website. In this consultation period Friend of the Sea is open to comments from all stakeholders.

2) At least 15 days before the audit commences all main stakeholders (Research Institutes, Government, Local and  International Non Profit Organizations’, retailers, local fishing companies and fishing cooperatives) interested in the audit  are informed of this fishery assessment via email.

3) All comments have to be based on scientific evidence and will be taken into consideration by the Certification Body.

4) Once the audit report has been obtained, this will be uploaded on to the Friend of the Sea’s website and emailed to all stakeholders. There is a 15 working day period to raise objections.

5) After this period, Friend of the Sea will certify the fishery for a period of 3-5 years, subject to annual traceability surveillance audits and on-going monitoring by Friend of the Sea’s International onsite monitoring program.

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