Advice – Improvements (including landscape and jurisdicational approaches)
Global
Meeting commitments and tackling risks within the aquaculture feed supply chain will take time, especially for those involving long and complex supply chains, but companies must address any supplier non-compliance or risk within their supply chain.
- Prioritize improvement actions: Consider focussing on where the risks or impacts in the supply chain are greatest, where your company has the greatest leverage, or where the potential for positive impacts is the highest.
- Collaboration is key: Though individual efforts within your company or supply chain management can enhance performance, collaborative engagement with other stakeholders generally yields more effective improvements. Many of these are included in the Toolkit under “Improvements”.
- Sectoral Approaches: Sectoral Approaches involve uniting various stakeholders linked to a specific commodity (for example, a feed ingredient such as soy) to establish shared objectives, plans, and collective efforts aimed at addressing challenges within that sector.
- These initiatives may target specific stakeholder types (e.g., producers or companies) or encompass a broader range with involvement from NGOs, civil society, and government representatives.
- Many of these are included in the Toolkit under “Improvements”.
- Landscape and Jurisdictional Approaches: Improvements to feed ingredient production may be beyond the control or action of an individual sector, group of companies, or supply chain members and will require collaboration and the involvement of multiple resource-use stakeholders to improve cross-sectoral issues.
- These need to take place across a wider geographic scale for example to introduce more sustainable land use planning and zoning within a region. These are often referred to as place-based or landscape approaches, of which a jurisdictional approach is a subcategory.
- Many of these are included in the Toolkit under “Improvements – Landscape and Jurisdictional Approaches”.
Based on a review of advice provided by the AFI and other organizations, SFP recommends that improvements consider the following components
What is a landscape approach?
A landscape approach is a conceptual framework where various stakeholders in a given area work together to balance conflicting social, economic, and environmental goals. It aims to shift from the commonly unsustainable practice of managing land in isolated sectors to a more integrated and holistic approach.
What is a jurisdictional approach?
A jurisdictional approach, including for seafood production is a type of landscape approach that operates at scale and is multi-stakeholder in nature. But crucially brings together market and policy (government) stakeholders to improve production within a whole jurisdiction, region, or the boundaries of a management system.
To learn more, view the AFI in this Toolkit or download the AFI’s operational guidance on supply chain management and its guidance for companies.
Other resources on landscape and jurisdictional approaches are provided by:
The latest version of the guidance aims to help businesses develop and implement sustainable seafood policies. It is intended for any business that wants to begin or further its journey towards environmentally and socially responsible seafood, regardless of where it may be in the supply chain or sustainability journey.
It was developed with comprehensive input from industry experts and the nonprofit community.
Although focussed on seafood products and not specifically on aquaculture feed and the ingredients it contains, the guidance provides a valuable resource and framework that 1) could be easily applied and adapted to aquaculture feed and feed ingredients, and 2) applies to certain feed ingredients – namely byproducts or trimmings from fisheries and aquaculture.
Its section “Implement” provides useful advice on activating action plans to tackle the environmental and social impacts of your company and supply chain.
The guidelines also provide anonymous real-world examples of, and resources for, improvement initiatives provided by a range of seafood supply chain stakeholders, NGOs, and international governance organizations that can be applied, adapted, or provide inspiration in addressing the climate change and environmental impacts of aquaculture feed and the ingredients it contains.