The impacts of aquaculture extend beyond the final grow out site, as the production of many species relies on upstream supply chain stages, such as hatchery and nursery production, which often occur across multiple sites. A key challenge in addressing these impacts is the diversity of production practices, both between and within species, together with the need for effective information sharing between the various sites. Managing these impacts throughout the upstream supply chain and enabling the transfer of batch-specific information is essential to ensuring that the industry operates responsibly as a whole.

This Criterion requires ASC-certified sites to source aquatic animals from supplier sites that address key impacts at the relevant production stages.  

Intent – The aquaculture industry sources from responsibly operated suppliers.

Traceability plays a crucial role in seafood sustainability certification as it ensures that claims are properly transferred through the supply chain to the end consumer.

As one of the most internationally traded commodities – often through complex supply chains – seafood is highly vulnerable to food fraud, especially product mislabelling, species substitution and provenance misrepresentation77Lawrence, S. J., Elliott, C., Huisman, W., Dean, M., & van Ruth, S. (2022). The 11 sins of seafood: Assessing a decade of food fraud reports in the global supply chain. Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety, 21, 3746–3769. https://doi.org/10.1111/1541-4337.12998.

This Criterion focuses on ASC-certified products being correctly differentiated from non-ASC-certified products, and traceability systems being in place on ASC-certified farms to maintain the integrity of products traded and sold under the ASC label.

Intent – The aquaculture industry supplies food that is traceable through the supply chain.

Business ethics are defined as the application of ethical values to business behaviour by the Institute of Business Ethics (IBE) and range from the behaviour of an individual, to sales and accounting practices and how companies treat their employees. The benefits of running a business ethically include stronger teams, increased employee loyalty, a strengthened reputation and competitive advantage66Ferrell, O. C., Fraedrich, J., Ferrell, L. (2011). Business Ethics – Ethical Decisions Making and Cases (8th Edition). Mason, OH, USA: South-Western Cengage Learning.. However, businesses often operate in environments that can make operating ethically a challenge, and many businesses can face problems with fraud.

This Criterion focuses on ASC farms operating in a legally-compliant and ethical manner to reduce the risk of corruption and fraud.

Intent – The aquaculture industry upholds ethical business practices.

A management system supports an organisation to manage the interrelated parts of the business to achieve its objectives. Management systems include policies, processes and procedures, and vary in complexity depending on the organisation’s context. They can support compliance with laws and regulations, detection and resolution of issues, and monitoring of essential operational activities.

This Criterion focuses on the development of a management system for the implementation and maintenance of ASC Requirements on ASC-certified farms.

Intent – The aquaculture industry continuously manages and improves processes to deliver consistent performance against the ASC requirements.