Anecdotes and Lessons of a Decade - SEAFOOD Ecolabelling: Principles and Practice - page 433

We also expect that both types of certification and ecolabels will increasingly
include more information on traceability, also known as provenance and chain-
of-custody, so that consumers can be informed about the country and locality of
origin of the products they choose. They may also move to a more tiered ranking
approach to certification (such as a set of bronze, silver, gold ranks; Kaiser &
Edwards-Jones 2006) rather than a pass/fail system (such as the current MSC
system).
In some regions, as certification of type (i) begins to become more widespread,
the ecological sustainability aspects will probably be absorbed into larger promo-
tional programmes for seafood that are currently being developed around the world.
For example, in Australia there are major new programmes to promote seafood for
its health benefits and to enhance profitability and employment - the Australian
Seafood Cooperative Research Centre (www. seafoodcrc.com) and Seafood Expe-
rience Australia (www.seafoodpromotions.com). It does not take much imagination
to see ecological sustainability, which is not currently mentioned in the Australian
initiatives, being folded into such programmes to provide an integrated seafood
certification system across all seafood issues in the marketplace.
The tension between national government and private certification systems will
be limited, because we expect that although governments will more forcefully ex-
press a role in certification, consistent with FAO guidance, as the voluntary systems
increase in market relevance the primary role for governments will be to place the
'floor' into minimum standards of performance. The leadership in sustainability
standards will probably always be maintained by the voluntary systems of certi-
fication, provided they can be agile and responsive to new issues and consumer
concerns.
In the present development phase of seafood certification and ecolabelling sys-
tems, with rapid growth of the concept and uptake by resellers, the links to creation
of environmental improvements are being lost amongst the rush to achieve mar-
ket penetration and advantage. However, demonstrating environmental improve-
ments linked to certification will nonetheless continue to build as an issue for
interest groups and consumers, and at some time in the not-too-distant future, this
will become a driver for increased competition amongst certification and ecolabel
programmes.
Ultimately, this may lead to increasing standards that will become the norm
for fishery and aquaculture ventures, and continue to keep pace with community
expectations. However, in the shorter term (next decade), there will probably be a
rise in the number of issue-based ecolabels targeting specific issues of relevance to
a modest base of fisheries, aquaculture ventures and consumers. Such certification
systems will serve to tackle specific issues that have attracted consumer attention
within a local region and where local market traction can be achieved through
product and region-specific certification, ecolabelling or product recommendations.
The present-day embryonic phase of seafood certification and ecolabelling
may therefore be best seen as creating the institutional structures and gradually