The Organisation of Associated Producers of Large Freezer Tuna Freezers (OPAGAC) has announced that it will develop a global standard to guarantee responsible fishing and the sustainability of the tropical tuna fishery. The organisation has launched this commitment during the Our Ocean conference, held this week in Malta, and pointed out that the standard will integrate both environmental and social sustainability, two inseparable pillars of ensuring the future of this resource on a global scale.
OPAGAC has announced that it will align AENORs UNE 195006 Responsible Tuna Fishing (RTF) standard and the social conditions of its crews with the 2007 International Labour Organization (ILO) Work in Fishing Convention C188 and that those regulations will be applied on board their fleet of 47 vessels, before the end of that year.
‘The future of the tropical tuna fishery, like that of any other, depends not only on environmental sustainability, but also, and in a very special way, on social sustainability, ensuring decent working conditions for crew members capable of ensuring similar levels of competitiveness on a global scale as an essential tool to eradicate illegal fishing,’ said OPAGAC managing director Julio Morón.
OPAGAC the only organisation in the Spanish and European fisheries sector that has presented such a commitment to the Our Ocean Conference, as set out in the Fisheries Improvement Project (FIP), which it has been developing in conjunction with with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), that all of its catches, currently accounting for 7.5% of the world tuna catch by volume, to be MSC certified by 2021.
These initiatives focus primarily on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Objective 14 to conserve and sustainably use oceans, seas and marine resources, but are also linked to other United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Objectives ), including the eradication of hunger, decent work conditions and economic growth, responsible consumption and production, and the establishment of alliances to meet the objectives.
