UK retailer Waitrose has this week helped the Marine Stewardship Council to tip the balance on 9,000 ecolabelled products worldwide. The 9,000^th product – is MSC ecolabelled Waitrose Oat Crumbed Scottish Mackerel Fillets. The mackerel is sourced from the Scottish Pelagic Sustainability Group western mackerel fishery, certified in 2008.

Fishermen committed to sustainable fishing

John Goodlad, Chairman of the SPSG, said: “The MSC certification is independent confirmation that the Scottish mackerel fishery is being managed in a sustainably and responsibly way and that Scotland is helping to set the standard for well managed fisheries around the globe.  MSC mackerel products sold in Waitrose are also a wonderful and tasty source of healthy Omega 3 fatty acids – all caught and processed in Scotland!

“SPSG are fully committed to the MSC process.  As well as certification for western mackerel, we also hold MSC status for our North Sea and Atlanto-Scandian herring fisheries.  West of Scotland herring is also currently under assessment and if successful, will mean we have more than 98% of the Scottish pelagic quota under MSC certification.”

Sustainable fish “Increasingly important”

Waitrose currently stocks over 30 MSC certified products ranging from South Africa hake fillets on the fish counter to luxury MSC certified Coquille Saint Jacques in the freezer department. Jeremy Langley, Waitrose Fish Buyer, said: “We are delighted to have played a role in helping the MSC to achieve this great result, which highlights how increasingly important it is to consumers and retailers alike that the fish they buy and sell is sustainable.  Our Waitrose Sustainable Fishing Policy has been in place for over a decade and as part of this we have worked closely with the MSC to encourage consumers to make the most of fish such as mackerel which are plentiful and delicious too.”

Toby Middleton, UK Country Manager for the MSC added: “Waitrose is a long-standing supporter of the MSC programme and this is very welcome news both for the marine environment and for Waitrose customers. I look forward to working closely with Waitrose and seeing more MSC certified products on their shelves in the future. “

For further information, please contact James Simpson, Marine Stewardship Council on +44 (0)207 246 8913 or email Questo indirizzo e-mail è protetto dallo spam bot. Abilita Javascript per vederlo.

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The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) is an international non-profit organisation set up to promote solutions to the problem of overfishing. The MSC runs the only certification and ecolabelling programme for wild-capture fisheries consistent with the ISEAL Code of Good Practice for Setting Social and Environmental Standards and the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation guidelines for fisheries certification.  The FAO ‘Guidelines for the Eco-labelling of Fish and Fishery Products from Marine Capture Fisheries’ require that credible fishery certification and eco-labelling schemes include:

·         Objective, third-party fishery assessment utilising scientific evidence;

·         Transparent processes with built-in stakeholder consultation and objection procedures;

·         Standards based on the sustainability of target species, ecosystems and management practices.

The MSC has offices in London, Seattle, Tokyo, Sydney, The Hague, Glasgow, Berlin, Cape Town, Paris, Madrid and Stockholm.

In total, over 240 fisheries are engaged in the MSC programme with 105 certified and over 140 under full assessment.  Another 40 to 50 fisheries are in confidential pre-assessment.  Together, fisheries already certified or in full assessment record annual catches of close to seven million metric tonnes of seafood, representing over 12 per cent of global capture production for direct human consumption. The fisheries already certified catch close to five million metric tonnes of seafood annually – over seven per cent of the total wild capture for direct human consumption.  Worldwide, more than 9,000 seafood products, which can be traced back to the certified sustainable fisheries, bear the blue MSC ecolabel.

For more information on the work of the MSC, please visit www.msc.org

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