Refocusing Seafood Sustainability as a Journey Using the Law of the Minimum

Sustainability

Michael Tlusty¹  Heather Tausig²  Tania Taranovski²  Meghan Jeans²  Matt Thompson²  Michelle Cho²  Michael Eppling²  Jason J. Clermont²  Jennifer Goldstein² 

[1] John H. Prescott Marine Laboratory, New England Aquarium, Boston, MA 02110, USASustainable Seafood Program, New England Aquarium, Boston, MA 02110, USA;

关键词: aquaculture;    continual improvement;    ecolabel;    fisheries;    law of the minimum;    Liebig;    phenomenology;    seafood;    sustainability;   

DOI  :  10.3390/su4092038

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Globally, seafood is an important protein source because it is a nutritious food source produced with relative efficiency compared to other proteins. Because of problems related to overfishing and deleterious environmental impacts, over the last decade, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have increased their focus on seafood sustainability while businesses have incorporated this issue into their corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting. Sustainability is a concept that can be addressed in terms of scale of issues considered (narrow vs. broad) as well as the scope of how they are measured (undemanding or demanding). Currently, the message of seafood sustainability is becoming complicated in that the journey toward sustainability is being referred to as having achieved a state of sustainability. In addition, companies making a “sustainable” declaration are often at different points in the “scale/scope” arena. As a result, buyers, retailers and consumers have difficulty differentiating between these products. Furthermore, they often assume that a “sustainable” product has no further need for improvement, when in fact this is rarely the case. This change in reference from a continual process (a journey) to a static point (it is sustainable) limits further advances in seafood sustainability and the drive for continual improvement. Herein, the “Law of the Minimum”, growth toward an end goal will occur until one factor becomes limiting, is adopted as an analogy for sustainability. By refocusing the sustainability discussion on a progressive series of challenges to be met, the discussion will return to the journey as the central point. Doing so will help refresh the dialogue around seafood, and to create new opportunities for improvement.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2012 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.