Seaspiracy: A Personal Review

This is a personal review of #Seaspiracy from someone who works in the seafood sustainability sector and also works as a professional journalist.

#Seaspiracy has raised many important points about the bad and illegal practices in the seafood industry, including overfishing, ghost fishing gear, water pollution, slavery among other things. These are currently happening and these are the same issues being addressed by sustainability. It's true that we have a huge challenge ahead of us in addressing these problems and that is why I think that it is severely problematic that the concept of sustainability was not discussed in context and in detail here. It was even reduced to an extent where experts who have done great work in pushing towards change seemed to be unsure of what to say, and even in the case of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), absent from the discussion. Marine and aquaculture sustainability means so much more than what has been discussed in the film. Sustainability means leaving enough fish in the ocean to restock, protecting of habitats and making sure that the environment around it is also preserved, and also ensuring people whose lives depended on fishing or aquaculture can make a decent and fair living while respecting the environment. Sustainability means that the industry is making an effort to improve the current practices, and making sure that these changes are adapted by future generations.

As a professional journalist for almost 10 years who has worked on stories on climate change, marine conservation, economics, and indigenous peoples, this story is a poor attempt at investigative journalism, and only presents a perspective that is one-sided and severely biased. How the information was gathered was very unethical and disrespectful. The questions were leading and framed in a biased manner. The interviewer was more on a accusatory tone rather than really asking questions. The sources interviewed in this film are clearly already biased towards a certain agenda. This is a documentary with an obvious agenda, nothing more.

I understand that for some people, going vegan is key and I respect this as a truly legitimate option. In fact, we even made an entire magazine issue on this trend in shrimp aquaculture. (See our issue on Alternative Shrimp on ShrimpTails) But for the million of people whose lives depended on fishing and aquaculture, this may not be the ideal solution. Food security is a real problem and protecting the oceans to secure food for everyone also presents a real solution. Give sustainability a chance.

This film is a wake up call in many ways in exposing the ill practices of the industry in the mainstream media (which are also known to people who work in the sustainability sector). But more importantly, this film is a wake-up call to the fishery and aquaculture sector to improve their communication and storytelling. This is why media management is crucial. We are extremely proud of the work we do, and we have had huge strides in working towards a more transparent and sustainable sector. But it is important that the public also understands it immensely. We are not part of a vacuum, and stories need to be able to successfully come across. We need to be able to self-check and be critical, but also work together on a viable solution together.

Read more about the industry response here:

Global Aquaculture Alliance

Marine Stewardship Council

Aquaculture Stewardship Council