UK supermarket Morrisons has become the first food retailer to announce new commitments to the health and safety of the fishermen supplying its seafood.
In partnership with Seafish’s Responsible Fishing Scheme (RFS), Morrisons will require any vessel fishing for the company to sign up to a range of safety measures, to address the issue that sees 12 UK fishermen die at work each year. It is expected that every boat supplying the supermarket will sign up to the commitment by next year.
Morrisons also wants to ensure that it has greater traceability than ever before and has worked with Seafish to assess all of the 525 boats supplying its fish. The supermarket also wants to set standards on handling different species, labelling, traceability, storage and cleaning.
The RFS was developed by Seafish to raise standards in the catching sector. It independently audits and assesses the application of good practice by a vessel skipper and crew in their fishing operations.
Huw Thomas, Morrisons fisheries and aquaculture manager, said, We’ve worked closely with Seafish to develop our seafood policy as part of the Responsible Fishing Scheme.
We think it’s extremely important to ensure that we’ve put in place a minimum set of standards across the board, particularly in relation to health and safety which is an area often neglected in the seafood industry.
Mercator Media Ltd 2013