With the rapid growth of industrial prawn production there has been a corresponding upsurge in eco-label certification schemes that seek to improve the industry. However, meaningful human rights considerations are rarely incorporated in the formulation of these schemes. The Forest Peoples Programme (FPP) continues to work with coastal community networks to raise awareness of the problems of industrial aquaculture and to push for meaningful human rights considerations in the development of future eco-labelling schemes.
'Selling the Seas', a film produced by The Ecologist Film Unit with the Indonesian NGO, KIARA and FPP exposes the growing public opposition to the Indonesian government's plans to clear a further 700,000 hectares of coast, much of it mangrove, threatening the livelihoods of fisherfolk and other coastal peoples. KIARA demands that northern supermarkets and certifiers pay more attention to the harsh social and environmental costs of inappropriate, industrial shrimp and prawn production. Link to the film on The Ecologist website
NGO News Release Over 70 human rights and environmental groups from around the world express their outrage at the planned launch of the World Wildlife Fund's Aquaculture Stewardship Council. Their concern is that the proposed certification of industrial production of shrimp and salmon favours the vested interests of the aquaculture industry, without reflecting or taking into account the wishes of local communities and indigenous peoples who live alongside shrimp and salmon farms.
We, representatives of local communities, NGOs, social movements and researchers from 17 countries of Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and North America, had a meeting in Lampung, Indonesia, on 4-6 September 2007 to address the continuing expansion and associated impacts of industrial shrimp aquaculture.
NGOs and representatives of tropical shrimp-producing countries and northern consumer countries met in Bangkok to discuss the risks, opportunities and implications of shrimp certification
Farmland rendered useless by salinisation from shrimp farming, Bangladesh, February 2010.
© FPP
Farmland rendered useless by salinisation in Bangladesh, February 2010
© Maurizio Farhan Ferrari, FPP