Australian fishing company Austral Fisheries, producers of Glacier 51 toothfish and Skull Island prawns, chose today, Sustainable Seafood Day Australia 2016, to announce that they have become the world’s first carbon-neutral seafood business.
‘We’re excited to be able to launch our new brand – CN Fish – which to us is an inevitable ‘next step’ to ensure sustainable seafood for our customers, and demonstrates our determination to remain at the forefront of sustainability,’ said Austral’s CEO David Carter.
‘Austral operates in many fisheries independently certified as sustainable and well managed, by groups such as the Marine Stewardship Council. We now add to that our Carbon Neutral status. We identified a need to reduce and offset our carbon emissions to help ensure the health of our oceans, which is fundamental to our business.’
He explained that becoming Carbon Neutral is a result of independent audits of the Western Australian based company’s operations to determine its carbon footprint, and then purchasing carbon offsets to support planting trees to cover all of the company’s emissions from 1 January 2016.
Around 190,000 native trees were required to offset Austral’s estimated 27,422 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions for 2016. The project chosen to achieve this is based in Western Australia’s wheat belt and is being undertaken by Carbon Neutral Pty Ltd. This is currently the only Gold Standard carbon offset project in Australia. The calculations, quantity of offsets, and emissions reduction program have been certified under the Australian Government Carbon Neutral Program.
‘Climate change is the biggest single sustainability challenge humanity faces,’ said MSC chief executive Rupert Howes. ‘I congratulate Austral Fisheries for their bold and innovative initiative to become the first fishing company in the world to quantify, publish and then offset their total operational carbon emissions. This is a world first for the sector and I very much hope that other seafood businesses will follow Austral’s lead.’
‘Austral Fisheries was one of the first fishing businesses to support the MSC and they truly embody what it means to be stewards of the sea. They are safeguarding seafood supplies with not just their sustainable fishing practices, with their MSC certified fisheries, but taking it a step further to also tackle climate change,’ Rupert Howes added.
‘Austral is on a journey that includes working within our company, and alongside suppliers and customers, to identify innovative ways to reduce and offset carbon emissions in seafood production,’ David Carter commented.
‘We hope this action will be seen by others in the global seafood business as something to aspire to. Certainly we will be promoting the benefits of a lower carbon-use economy wherever we can.’
