The Marine Stewardship Council and Developing Countries - SEAFOOD Ecolabelling: Principles and Practice - page 292

The fishery 1) has been or is very likely to have been experiencing overfishing for
some time, 2) is depleted or very near depleted, and 3) is not likely to experience
significant recovery based on the model projections and lack of a rebuilding plan.
Therefore, I would suggest that a passing score on Principle 1 is largely unjustified
(MSC 2006).
To this, the assessment team responded that:
Principle 1 relates to avoiding over-fishing and depletion of the exploited population,
but also to modifying fishing practices so that there is demonstrable recovery. In its
evaluation of the fishery, the team provides standards in relation to the level to
which recovery should occur (both target and limit). Furthermore, the team notes
that the catch limit has been reduced and fishing practices modified to promote
recovery, although it is much too soon to determine whether recovery is occurring
at a reasonable rate and there is no formal recovery plan (MSC 2006).
The revised final report of July 2006 contains the same wording in the conclusion.
At the same time, MSC has admitted an appeal to the proposed hoki certification
based on the stock issues and environmental matters. While the objection procedure
runs its course, the hoki industry continues to hold MSC certification, via extensions
granted to extend the original certification until the present objections procedure is
completed.
However, New Zealand hoki is just one of the 22 certified fisheries, so not too
much should be made of one case. A further picture of the environmental benefits
arising from MSC certification was made available in May 2006 (Agnew et al .
2006). In this study commissioned by MSC, 10 certified fisheries were examined,
all of which had been subject to at least one post-certification audit. In relation
to these fisheries, 62 certification conditions were examined to determine whether
they could be assessed quantitatively and whether they could ultimately lead to
environmental benefits. The study identified eight instances of 'no gain' (there was
no category for 'deterioration') and 89 environmental gains. However, these gains
are of very different nature - 29 were 'institutional gains' that could lead to environ-
mental benefits (thus, these are hypothetical, or conditional, gains), and the same
can be said of the 27 instances of 'research gains'. The 17 'operational action' gains
are activities in the fishery (such as new regulations) that are expected to lead to
environmental gains, but for which there is no automatic link. The most desirable
gains, 'operational result' gains, amounted to 16 instances - within these 16 in-
stances, only 8 (the same number of 'no gain' cases) were judged to be most likely
stimulated (or partially stimulated) by the certification process (Agnew et al . 2006).
In short, the Agnew et al . (2006) study paints a mixed picture of the environmental
impact of the MSC programme. The authors also highlight some lessons learnt,
two of which are particularly interesting: (1) the biggest gains seem to arise in
areas where conditions for certification were attached - thus one could argue for