April 2015

The Fair Trade fisheries program aims to promote resilient livelihoods in coastal communities through enhanced environmental stewardship, ecosystem protection and improved working and living conditions. Therefore, one of the criteria under the Fair Trade Standard for Wild Capture Fisheries requires Health & Safety Measures to be in place for fishermen and landing site staff.

“Work processes, workplaces (including vessels, docks, landing sites), machinery and equipment, and worker transportation are as safe as possible, and equipped with adequate safety devices”.(SR-OH 1.1, Fair Trade Wild Capture Fisheries Standard, 2013).

In order to idenfity the needed improvements to meet this important requirement, MDPI (Anova Fishing & Living initative’s partner NGO in Indonesia) conducted a comprehensive risk assessment of all Fair Trade landing sites (1 on North Buru Island and 3 in Assilulu (Ambon Island)).

The results show that upgrading the receiving stations where Fair Trade tuna is landed and processed would improve the Health & Safety of fishermen and receiving station employees as well as handling of tuna products.

In response to MDPI’s findings, Anova’s Fishing & Living initative has partnered with local suppliers and provided funding to renovate receiving stations in North Buru and Ambon Islands in order to ensure the safety of workers and improve the handling of tuna products.

This project is expected to:

1)      Significantly improve the working conditions of workers in the receiving station;

2)      Improve the quality of tuna products caught by Fair Trade fishermen by reducing the contamination risks of tuna products, meaning more Fair Trade tuna reaching the market and additional revenue for the Fair Trade certified fishermen

3)      Improve compliance with the Fair Trade standard for wild fisheries

The construction of the 4 receiving stations has already started and is expected to be finalized in July 2015.

Map of Fair Trade Fishers Associations

[googlemaps https://www.google.com/maps/d/embed?mid=z2tX-j8tzUx8.kU4krDP4w9rA&w=640&h=480]