San Diego, CA — FISH Standard for Crew Inc. is pleased to announce that NovaNam (Pty) Ltd, a Namibian-based subsidiary of the Nueva Pescanova Group, is the first fleet to achieve FISH certification. NovaNam’s ten vessel Namibian-flagged fleet that harvests hake operates out of Lüderitz and Walvis Bay and includes approximately 300 fishers working on the vessels. Employing auditors trained in the FISH Standard, Bureau Veritas awarded the certification after extensive policy and procedure review along with on-site vessel inspections and in-person crew interviews.
“It is exciting to be able to formally announce the first FISH certification, a well-deserved certification that reflects the hard work of both NovaNam and the certification body Bureau Veritas” said Mike Kraft, FISH Standard for Crew Executive Director. “This audit was originally scheduled for December 2021, but the resurgent pandemic prevented auditor travel and limited access to crews. All parties involved agreed to delay as having auditors on the vessel and face to face to perform crew interviews is critical to the credibility of the process and FISH Standard.”
“Congratulations to Nueva Pescanova and NovaNam. Their commitment to FISH Standard reflects their leadership and the high value they place on the safety and well-being of their workers and the transparency of their operations,” said Fridrik Fridriksson, chair of the FISH Standard’s Board of Directors and Chief Human Resources Officer at Brim. “We believe FISH can serve as one of the tools to help ensure fishers are treated fairly and responsibly and give harvesters like Nueva Pescanova Group a way to demonstrate that commitment to their stakeholders.”
As previously reported, FISH is actively working with organizations and fleets in Alaska, Papua New Guinea and Iceland and in discussions with additional organizations around the world. With the increasing focus on the responsible treatment of workers and rising expectations from stakeholders that seafood come not only from environmentally, sustainable sources, but socially responsible ones as well, FISH can serve as a tool that organizations use to demonstrate this and be a component of their due diligence process.
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FISH Standard for Crew provides a voluntary, independent and accredited third-party certification program for labour practices on vessels in wild-capture fisheries around the globe. The FISH Standard is based on ILO-C188 and related guidance.
The Nueva Pescanova Group is a leading Spanish seafood company, engaged in the fishing, farming, processing and marketing of seafood, both fresh, chilled and frozen.It employs more than 11,000 people and operates in 19 countries on 4 continents, selling its products in more than 80 countries around the world.
