FAO Members have given FAO a specific mandate to promote social sustainability in the fisheries and aquaculture value chains, including the recognition and protection of human and labour rights.

To fulfil this mandate, the FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Division is developing a practical guidance to promote and facilitate social responsibility compliance by business actors along the fisheries and aquaculture value chains. Thus, the FAO Guidance on Social Responsibility in the Fisheries and Aquaculture Value Chains will be built upon international instruments, standards and conventions.

 At the last Session of the FAO Sub-Committee on Fish Trade (COFI:FT), FAO Members supported the continuation of the development of the FAO Guidance. The proposed FAO Guidance entails the entire value chains, which is divided into six appendixes: (1) Industrial Fishing; (2) Small-Scale Fishing; (3) Aquaculture Production; (4) Processing; (5) Distribution; and (6) Retailing.

 In this regard, FAO is enabling an open public consultation to invite stakeholders of the fisheries and aquaculture sector to submit their comments on the draft document “Industrial Fishing”, which is the first section of the FAO Guidance.

 To submit your comments, please use the following link:

FAO Guidance: (1) Industrial Fishing | FAO Fish Social (konveio.site)

Registration is needed.

Since this is the section of industrial fishing It is therefore of utmost importance when commenting only on industrial fishing activities, and do not include other activities that should be in other sections or in the general part of the FAO Guidance.

The draft of the Industrial Fishing Section will be available for comments on the online platform until Monday 29 May 2023. 

Comments and feedback should be submitted only via this platform.

All comments received will be exclusively used for internal purposes and will not be shared to anyone.

We do believe that your expertise is key to the development of this first section “Industrial Fishing” of the FAO Guidance.

We are all aware that social responsibility is a complex and intricate issue – collaborative and inclusive work can indeed yield positive outcomes for all of us engaged in any sector-related activity.

For any additional information please contact Mariana Toussaint