FisheryProgress is excited to announce a new pilot project with three key FIPs that aims to deepen the impact of the HRSR Policy through robust fisher engagement. The past three years of implementing the Policy have shown us that fishers need to be engaged throughout the process in order for the policy and its desired outcomes to be meaningful and most impactful. This is particularly true in the development of a written commitment to human rights and social responsibility; the development, implementation, and evaluation of grievance mechanisms; and also in the process of ensuring fishers are well informed of their rights.
This project will co-create tools and mechanisms that address challenges related to fisher engagement in the policy’s implementation, with a focus on requirements that apply to all FIPs. Our hope is that outcomes from this project will serve as a model for other FIPs, and that we will have codesigned resources and tools to share broadly across the sustainable seafood sector.
The FIPs involved span three unique geographies and cover a range of fisheries types, from large scale commercial to artisanal. Each FIP and its respective area of work are as follows:
Taiwan Tuna Longline Association (TTLA) Pacific Ocean Tuna FIP: New to FisheryProgress, this distant water commercial tuna fishery, comprised largely of migrant workers, will work to develop a fisher engagement strategy related to implementing HRSR requirement 1.3 Fisher Awareness of Rights.
IPNLF Brazilian Yellowfin FIP: This medium-scale handline tuna fishery will explore a fisher engagement strategy to better understand and address issues with available grievance mechanisms, and barriers around fishers not currently using them.
ABALOBI South Africa Yellowtail Amberjack: Another handline fishery – this one based in the small-scale fishing community of Struisbaai in South Africa – will work to encourage fisher leadership in developing and implementing the social workplan following the risk assessment they conducted using the Social Responsibility Assessment Tool (SRA).
FIPs are social responsibility pioneers in the seafood sector, and we applaud these three fisheries for stepping up on behalf of the fishery improvement world to invest in robust fisher engagement. Knowledge and findings from this unique pilot project will benefit all FIPs, and push the needle forward on working to ensure a seafood and human rights-secure future for all.
We’ll be sure to share more as the project gets underway. Stay tuned for the latest updates.