Fifty of the world’s largest businesses, retailers and fishing companies from across the tuna supply chain have announced a commitment to stamp out illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing in their industry, to eliminate forced labour from fishing vessels and to protect the health of the oceans and livelihoods of fishing communities.
Launched on World Environment Day 5 June at the UN’s first global Ocean Conference, the Tuna 2020 Traceability Declaration aims to stop illegal tuna from coming to market. It is supported by 18 civil society organisations including the Benioff Ocean Initiative, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, The Nature Conservancy, and OceanElders.
The combined revenue of the businesses is $150 billion. To help deliver on the outcomes in the declaration, the World Economic Forum will mobilise an “Ocean Data Alliance”, an open-source collaboration between leading tech companies, governments and research institutes. This will bring together the data needed for comprehensive monitoring of ocean resources. Such traceability of stocks and the elimination of illegal activities is possible through new Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies such as blockchain, big data, machine learning and satellite tracking.
Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing represents a global theft of about 26 million metric tonnes of fish, or $24 billion dollars, each year. Around 1 billion people rely on fish as their primary source of animal protein, particularly in developing countries.
Tuna is one of the most overfished and at-risk groups of fish. Many are “keystone species”, meaning that overfishing can have a significant impact on ocean health. Bluefin tuna have seen their populations collapse by over 90% and will take decades to fully recover.
IUU tuna fishing is a source of forced labour in many countries, violating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Labour Organisation’s Conventions and Recommendations.
“The Tuna 2020 Traceability Declaration is an unprecedented commitment to stop illegal tuna from coming to market. Multi-stakeholder collaboration combined with Fourth Industrial Revolution innovations such as advanced remote sensing, the latest generation of satellites and new computing technologies provide real opportunity to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals to make this happen,” said Dominic Waughray, Head of Public-Private Partnership, Member of the Executive Committee, World Economic Forum.
