A sustainable fishing non-government organization has spoken out in support of McDonald’s interest in sustainable seafood.
Sustainable Fisheries Partnership (SFP) announced this week that it “welcomed” an announcement by McDonald’s that it will be displaying the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) eco-label on packaging for all its fish products, meaning the restaurants will only feature certified sustainable seafood.
“McDonald's commitment to source sustainably by improving sources, rather than just switching to ‘good’ sources, has transformed the whitefish sector, reversing decades of overfishing, rebuilding fish stocks and quotas and paying handsome dividends to all whitefish buyers worldwide,” said Jim Cannon, SFP’s CEO.
Cannon said in the past decade, numbers of MSC-certified whitefish stocks have tripled worldwide, and more than half of those came from projects started by SFP. McDonald’s suppliers, Cannon said, “played a critical role” in encouraging the fisheries to become sustainable.
“In some cases, such as Eastern Baltic cod and Barents Sea cod, these fisheries simply would not be certifiable today without the specific actions taken by suppliers — actions that only they could take,” Cannon said.
