As part of a commitment to continuous improvement and transparency, the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) is today launching a 60-day (1 September-30 October 2023) stakeholder consultation on three key areas: Cleaner Fish Health and Welfare, Shrimp Health and Welfare, and Living Wage indicators.
The three topics are pivotal in the development of the new aligned ASC Farm Standard. The Standard will be launched in Autumn 2024 and come into effect in Autumn 2025, bringing greater consistency to the ASC Programme.
ASC is also seeking feedback on the Terms of Reference (TOR) of the Species Extension Project: Catfish, and the inclusion of Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) in the ASC Farm Standard.
Stakeholder inclusion and participation is a key element of the ASC Programme to ensure that the ASC standards reflect a breadth of knowledge, expertise and expectations.
Cleaner Fish Health and Welfare indicators
In response to the stakeholder feedback received during the previous consultation on Fish Health and Welfare in September and October 2022, ASC decided to include cleaner fish as part of the health and welfare content of the ASC Farm Standard. With this in mind, the scope of existing indicators was broadened, existing indicators were slightly modified, or in some cases new indicators were written to cover cleaner fish. This was done in collaboration with a Technical Working Group (TWG) of cleaner fish experts.
Topics covered include hatchery origin, wild caught origin, routine health and welfare, therapeutants, handling, slaughter and reuse of cleaner fish at the end of the salmon production cycle. The aim of the consultation is to establish whether the proposed content is relevant and if there are any missing topics.
ASC welcomes in particular feedback from producers, primary processors, retailers, NGOs, auditors and academia. More details on this topic here.
Shrimp Health and Welfare indicators
As a key species in terms of volume of ASC certified product, the growth and success of the shrimp sector must be underpinned by sustainable and responsible shrimp farming practices.
In recognition of the species-specific needs of shrimp and the feedback received during the September and October 2022 stakeholder consultation, ASC convened a Shrimp Technical Working Group (TWG) of experts to develop a proposal for a set of indicators to cover shrimp health and welfare. This goes further than the initial proposal.
The proposal is based on revision of the health and welfare indicators currently proposed in the ASC Farm Standard (criteria 2.14 and 2.16) and Shrimp Standard v1.2, re-use of indicators to cover shrimp where possible and the formulation of new indicators for those practices or situations that are specific to shrimp and are not yet covered.
The topics covered in this proposal include shrimp origin- featuring disease susceptibility and eyestalk ablation – fish health and welfare monitoring, handling, slaughter and veterinary therapeutants.
ASC welcomes in particular feedback from producers, primary processors, retailers and brands, auditors, NGOs, academia and research in South-East Asia and Central America. More details on this topic here.
Living Wage indicators
In December 2019, ASC endorsed a policy recommendation to join the Global Living Wage Coalition (GLWC) to engage with broader certification initiatives and begin work on living wage. In response to feedback received during stakeholder consultation in March 2022, ASC endorsed in January 2023 the development of living wage indicators and a living wage methodology.
The criterion intent is that ASC certified farms work towards the continuous improvement of wages, while paying all employees at or above the legal minimum wage.
These new draft indicators include indicators on wage and benefit measurement, understanding any gaps between wages and living wage benchmarks, improvement and reporting.
ASC’s living wage requirements draw from the GLWC and its research partner, the Anker Research Institute (ARI). This includes: using the GLWC definition of a living wage; adopting the ARI methodology for calculation of remuneration (total compensation including cash wages and allowable in-kind benefits and bonuses) and, where they exist, using ARI living wage benchmarks to measure the gap between current remuneration for workers, and what the living wage should be in that geographical location.
ASC would like to understand whether the draft living wage indicators indeed address key social and human rights issues around wages in line with stakeholders’ expectations, whether the proposed indicators are auditable from a Conformity Assessment Body (CAB) perspective, and what impact the requirement to pay workers a minimum of two-thirds of salary while on maternity leave would have. More details on this topic here.
Next steps and timeline
Following the stakeholder consultation, ASC will collate and incorporate feedback received into the presentation of the aligned ASC Farm Standard to the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) in January 2024. Following their endorsement, the full ASC Farm Standard will go out for final stakeholder consultation in Spring 2024. The Standard will then be launched in Autumn 2024 and come into effect in Autumn 2025.
