Conservation Alliance Guidelines for Supporting Fishery Improvement Projects (2022)
The Conservation Alliance’s updated guidelines for FIPs, including the criteria for basic and comprehensive FIPs, serve as the foundation for FisheryProgress.
Communicating About Your FIP
FIP Communications Guide
FisheryProgress developed the following guide to help you better communicate about your FIPs and reporting on FisheryProgress to your most important audiences, including businesses that source from you and those that will help support your FIP’s improvements. The Communications Guide includes:
- Guidance for communicating about FisheryProgress, including talking points, boilerplate language about the site, and answers to common questions about the site
- Resources for press outreach about your FIP, including best practices, how to refer to FisheryProgress, and template press releases
- Resources for communicating about your FIP on social media, including best practices, how to tag FisheryProgress, and template posts you can use to post about your FIP
Download the Communications Guide here.
Telling Your FIP’s Success Story
Telling Your FIP’s Success Story is designed to help those who work on FIPs to identify the storylines and details about their FIPs that are the most compelling and develop them into easy-to-understand and compelling stories about FIPs’ impact. You can access the toolkit here.
External Resources for Social Responsibility
Resources to Build Understanding of Human Rights and Business Obligations
As multi-stakeholder initiatives that cut across the supply chain, FIPs have a responsibility and an opportunity to address human and labor rights issues in fisheries, and doing so is both a moral imperative and a legal obligation. Many resources exist to help businesses learn more about protections for human and labor rights, common violations of these rights, and the related role and responsibilities of businesses.
- The Responsible Sourcing Tool (RST) is the result of a collaboration between Verité and the U.S. Department of State’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons. Their many resources include a summary of international social conventions specific to the seafood sector.
- The Roadmap for Improving Seafood Ethics (RISE), a project of FishWise, is a free resource tailored to meet the needs of seafood companies. It provides industry-relevant information and tools, coupled with connections to human rights experts and leading practitioners to support implementation.
- Anchoring Human Rights Due Diligence webinar series: The Seafood Ethics Action Alliance has made this free webinar series to provide support and guidance for seafood businesses, addressing topics including: understanding human rights due diligence; responsible recruitment; worker engagement; decent work at sea; and, responsible purchasing practices.
Social Responsibility Assessment Tool for the Seafood Sector
FisheryProgress uses the Social Responsibility Assessment (SRA) Tool for the Seafood Sector as the framework for FIPs to report on social performance. The SRA is the operationalization of “The Monterey Framework,” a shared definition of social responsibility specific to the seafood sector.
The SRA was developed by Conservation International and a broad coalition of experts across the conservation and social responsibility fields. Drawing from leading social responsibility standards, it provides a comprehensive set of indicators for social performance that can be applied in large- and small-scale fisheries. Access the SRA and a variety of supporting resources on the RISE platform here.
Resources for Buyers
Guide for Seafood Buyers to Encourage FIP Impact
FisheryProgress developed the Guide for Seafood Buyers to Encourage FIP Impact to illustrate how to use buying power to reward and encourage FIP progress.
It includes information on creating a clear public commitment to source from FIPs that report on FisheryProgress and demonstrate their progress toward environmental and social responsibility, and tips on how to communicate expectations to suppliers and engage directly with FIPs to encourage their progress. Download the full guide here.
Follow This FIP Monthly Digest
FisheryProgress’ Follow This FIP tool allows you to easily track progress of the FIPs you source from or are considering sourcing from with automated monthly email updates. Each month, review the Follow This FIP summary email and note any improvements or regressions in the FIP’s overarching progress. Read the following primer for more information on how to use Follow This FIP.