What Your Farmed Salmon Ate: Inside a Five-Year Fishmeal Investigation

0:00 Is aquaculture the right way to move forward with sustainable seafood? That's what we're gonna be talking about on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I have a little story for you. We have a, a guest on today, Maya Martin, who is from the, The Outlaw Ocean Project, and she's here to talk about a five-year investigation that she and her colleagues did on fish meal. Now, fish meal is what feeds farmed fish. These fish are predators like salmon and so forth. They're predators, they eat other fish, so they have basically this flour-type material called fish meal that they eat, and it's made up of a lot of forage fish, so these oily fish called, like, salmon and anchovies and sardines, and all these little fish that a lot of animals in the wild feed on, from, tuna, to sharks, to whales, and, so forth.

0:49 It's a big industry, and it's also one of the things that a lot of animals feed on, and it's, has to do with a lot of productivity, upwelling and so forth. There's a lot that we're gonna be covering today. But I wanted to talk a little bit about a story. When I went to university in the late '90s, early 2000s, I, did my undergrad at University of Guelph in the Marine Fresh Water Biology, program. I took a class called Aquaculture. I didn't really know what aquaculture was, actually. In fact, I thought it was, like, plants, like, underwater plants, it kinda is, but also there's seafood that's in there, fish and mussels and clams and all this kinda stuff. And they were really promoting it back then as, like, the thing to do and, the University of Guelph was doing research on it, how to do it right, and all this kinda stuff, looking at sturgeons and everything like that. And, I was still new to it and I hadn't realized how big it was, but I remember them telling me, the professor telling me that at some point, aquaculture's gonna feed, like, half the population, like, the seafood, like, it's gonna be, like, 50% of the seafood, and which it is now.

1:41 But the thing is, like, when you have farmed salmon or farmed fish, they eat other fish like fish meal, and so that fish meal has to come from somewhere, and that comes from wild stocks. And how those wild stocks are fished as well as processed, in lies the biggest problems, and this investigation, this five-year investigation by The Outlaw Ocean Project, has really revealed a lot of nasty things that go on. There's crimes and ethical concerns that people are just like, "Whoa, I did not know that this is actually happening." And so today we're gonna cover a lot of that. Now, during this conversation, we're gonna be talking about forced labor, fisheries slavery.

2:23 We're gonna talk a lot about crimes. We're gonna talk about civil unrest and protests and a lot of violence that goes on. So I just kinda wanna warn you heads up, that this is a very serious episode. We go on for quite a long time 'cause there's a lot of information to go through. There are websites that I'm linking to in the show notes. There's, foodforfeed.theoutlawocean.com, and then there's baittoplate.theoutlawocean.com. and there's a lot of information on there. I highly recommend that you go through that either while you're listening to the episode or after the episode, because there's a ton of things. And you're not gonna get through it all in one 'cause there's so much information. There's videos, there's all the transparencies down there. There's the different websites. There's the findings, the reporting, all that kind of stuff is out there.

3:06 and it's a worldwide thing. and what Maya discusses today is just, it's surprising. it's surprising and not surprising at the same time, but it's surprising that in 2026 we're still dealing with forced labor, all these human rights impacts, a lot of, unsustainable, practices, governments allowing these to happen, enforcement not being done on regulations and things like that. and it's a concern. It has to be cleaned up. I do think that if it can get cleaned up, I think we're in a better place, but there's a lot of work to do, and there's a lot of things that we can do. And we discuss it at the end of the interview where Maya talks about how individuals like you and I can participate and work with other organizations to help. So, this is, an interesting episode to say the least, but just a warning, there's a lot of talk about violence and things that happen on, the high seas and the open seas.

3:52 And so, just to give you a heads-up on that. But here's the interview with Maya Martin. Enjoy, and I'll talk to you after hey, Maya. Welcome to the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Are you ready to talk about The Outlaw Ocean Project? Yes, absolutely. Thank you for the opportunity. All right. I am so excited. This is a huge, massive story that you guys have broken and presented in front of all of us. Before we get into it, just to tell folks, as you're listening to this, if you're near a computer, there are links to the websites in the show notes. I highly recommend that you kinda look at this while you listen to the episode if you're able to do so, because it's so informative, but it's so interesting in the way that it's presented.

4:32 As a communicator, I just love this kinda stuff. And so I highly recommend that you kinda follow along, or after the episode you check out, it's foodforfeed.theocean, theoutlawocean.com. So we'll put that in the show notes so that people can follow along either before or after or during. and Maya, this is great. We're gonna talk about fish meal, and we're gonna talk about the meal that feeds the fish for farmed fish. And this is something that doesn't get discussed a lot. We've discussed it a little bit on the podcast with, somebody that you're familiar with as well, 'cause I believe she kind of informed some of the things in this story. Dr. Marine Cusa, who works for Oceana, she's been on the podcast to talk about fish meal. And she mentioned after the time I recorded, last time she was like, "You have to talk to the people You have to talk to Ian, and you have to talk to Maya. Like, you have to talk to the people because once they break this story, this is gonna be huge." Mm-hmm.

5:21 And so we're gonna get into what The Outlaw Ocean Project is and what this whole thing about food for feed is, on today's episode. But first, Maya, why don't you just let us know who you are and what you do? So, my name is Maya Martin. I am a deputy editor for The Outlaw Ocean Project, and I do a lot of research and writing, and I run, some teams that are reporting. I'm based in Atlanta, Georgia. Right on. Atlanta, Georgia, beautiful city. I've never been, but I heard- Mm-hmm … best food probably in the US, and, like, so entertaining. I can't wait to go there. But I have to ask, how did you get to this point in your career? Were you always interested in, journalism or as an editor?

6:04 Or was it more of the writing and that passion that kinda drove you to this place where you're at now? yeah, I've always been interested in journalism ever since I was a teenager, especially human rights journalism. I was super interested in what people are capable of doing to other people. Mm. and yeah, right out of college, I ended up at The Outlaw Ocean Project, and I've been here ever since. Amazing. So, this is, like, the first opportunity after university. It's kind of interesting 'cause my next question was, like, how did you choose or how did you get involved in a project about the ocean? Mm-hmm. But once you said you've always been interested in the human rights aspect of just life in general, and like you said, that people can do some pretty nasty things to people around the world, that kinda put two and two together ' cause fisheries around the world has had some really horrific human rights, I'm gonna say infractions, but just, they've done some god-awful things to people, and fishery slaves and everything like that that we've gone over on, this episode.

7:03 when you saw the opportunity to work with The Outlaw Ocean Project, did you make that connection right off the bat? Or you were just like, "I wonder what this is about," or how did you find out about this project? I really found out about it through getting employed as an intern of Ian Urbina in 2019, which was actually the year that The Outlaw Ocean Project was founded. so going into that job interview, I had no idea- Right … of what I was getting into. but by the end of the summer, it became very clear. And the human rights element was very clear because I think one of the reasons why he founded the project was because people often only hear about the ocean when some calamity strikes, like an oil spill or, an explosion.

7:47 and there's also, like, not a lot of journalism on the water, and people often care more, or know more about, like, the marine species below the water. But we are, equally as interested in what's happening on the ships to people, because there's millions of people who work out there. A hundred percent. we don't hear stories about that- Mm-hmm … 'cause it's hard to get on the boats. It's hard to find out what's happening. And when you're talking to some of the people, they may not wanna talk. Oftentimes, when we hear about these large ships, especially, like, trawling ships and the ones that are catching, like, the sardines and the anchovies- Mm-hmm they're, like, huge, like, processing plants on the water, we hear that and we're like, "Ugh, corporations," like they're just greedy and all this.

8:29 But the people on the boat are fishers. Mm-hmm. They just wanna fish. Oftentimes, they're coming from places in the Philippines, in Malaysia, maybe from Thailand, and there's some pretty horrific things that happen, to the people on those ships where they don't get to go back to their country when they want to. Their passports get taken. They get sick sometimes. There have been stories of them, throwing people overboard because they can't work as much and they're not getting fed. it's a horrible situation. Pretty much modern-day slavery. Mm-hmm. Did you know about these types of infractions? Did Ian prepare you? did people prepare you for this type of stuff before you started the project?

9:10 I think we jumped right in, with like one of my first assignments was to find footage of the boats, coming back, to shore and washing up on the shores of Japan whenever, North Korean fishermen, they had engine troubles and like died, in those boats and they came back to shore. So like one of my first assignments- Wow … was finding footage of that. So yeah, there wasn't like a lot of on-ramping. but yeah, that quickly became clear that that was gonna be part of, part of my job. Absolutely. Now, before we get into the story- and obviously we're kind of jumping a little bit, but, five years is a long time for a story- Mm these days to spend on, Obviously, it's one story that has many pieces to it, and I'm sure there's many tangents to it.

9:56 But five years on, one story is, it's different to think about it these days 'cause the way the news cycle works, it's just like one story after another and after another. And then when you look at politics these days, it seems like every day is a news story 'cause some politician is saying something, and that becomes like the headlines. As a journalist and someone who's worked on the ocean, on "The Outlaw Ocean Project," like for this five years, how important it is to have that amount of time to spend on a story, to develop it, to research it, to move into places where you could fully understand the entire, the full breadth of the story? Yeah, it's extremely important. and it's something that is quite rare, and we are an organization that is super lucky to have the opportunity to, spend that much time on one story.

10:42 So, in the past, whenever aquaculture and fish meal as issues were covered, it was more in an isolated way. Where you would hear about the salmon pens in the Atlantic Ocean, and the pollution there, or you would hear about fish meal driving food insecurity in West Africa. But these were, told as more isolated stories, and our mission with this five-year project was to take on the entire industry at once and- Right … to see what problems were happening in these various places and how they were connected to each other. so I think it's very important. I think all topics should, get this much attention. but we were very lucky.

11:23 Yeah. I'm glad it was done. and I'm glad you guys are working on this and getting the word out because, not many people knew about it until I started to look into it with Marine and she's told me about her research. I was surprised. surprised and not surprised at a certain point, but you're just surprised when you first hear the information, 'cause as a Canadian, we hear about the open pen Atlantic salmon farms in BC- Mm-hmm … which is a huge contentious issue with the government of Canada, and if anybody's have seen, like, the Salmon People, or listen to the Salmon People podcast, like, you'll know what happened there with indigenous rights and, and everything like that and the government and how that all worked out. But that was the extent of it. We never really heard much about how these animals are fed in the farms.

12:07 Like, we hear about it and we hear, oh, fish feed and stuff. Like, well, yeah, they're fish. they eat other fish. They're predators, and they're gonna need that at some point in their lifetime as they're adults. But we don't really know the full extent. So, can you just kinda give us, like, how this story developed? Like, where Ian was going with this as this is really, like, one of the first stories coming out of the Outlaw Ocean Project. Mm-hmm. and why this story, in particular about fish meal and fish feed? Um, yeah, so as you mentioned, in the 2010s, there was a lot of attention on human rights abuses at sea, particularly Thai boats, and other huge industrial ships and sea slavery and, Part of what Ian's series, "The Yellow Ocean" in The Times, found and other investigations by the AP and others found was that there are a lot of concerns, tied to the fishing industry, and that's wild catch.

13:00 and so one of the ways that the industry, tried to address those problems and the way that, yeah, the industry tried to address those problems is that it turned to aquaculture, which is fish farming. and that was also to address the sustainability problems, caused by fish, like such intense fishing pressure on the oceans, which has led to a situation where over a third of, the world's fish stocks are overfished. and so aquaculture was promoted as this alternative because, if you, can farm fish, you're not taking so many from the sea, and that was the idea behind it. and as of 2022, more than half of all the seafood that's eaten, has come from these fish farms.

13:45 but what we found is that there's like a problem with that easy solution, which is that, most of the farmed fish are reliant on fish oil and fish meal. And so far, a sustainable alternative that's, like cost-effective has not emerged. and so we wanted to take a look at, what was going into these fish farms, and the problems that were tied to that because of course they're relying on fish that was extracted from the water. Right. Right. It's interesting because, now that fish, that fish farming is so big, it supplies, as you mentioned, just over 51, I think it's 51% Mm-hmm … is the, the amount for the world.

14:27 It was sold as that way to take off like that pressure off of wild fish. It says, okay- Mm-hmm … if we keep them, in a farm area, whether we like the open pens or not, like if we have them in here, we could supply people with food. It'll allow our wild stocks to rebuild. Well, what did your reporting find is that, like, for that promise? Is that what it does? I mean, you kinda mentioned it a little bit in terms of like the pressure. It doesn't seem like it's lifting off that pressure for certain types of wild stocks. Mm-hmm. yeah, so two-thirds of seafood that is farmed is of the type that is fed, fish meal and fish oil to grow, faster.

15:07 And, the reason is because that those types of farmed fish, such as salmon, tilapia, sea bass, sea bream, they, need that kind of feed in order to grow and to have the kinds of nutrients that you would expect when you eat seafood. Right. and so we found that this industry is really driving a crisis. yeah, it's really, exacerbating the crisis, of overfishing and, the types of seafood that aquaculture claim to be saving, such as forage fish like anchovetta and herring, sprat. those are the types of fish that are, oh, and sardinella. Those types of fish are targeted, to be fed to the farmed fish.

15:50 and we also did an assessment of all of the fisheries that are targeted by this industry, in the countries that we were studying. and we found that over half of those fisheries were at places where they were overexploited. Mm. And so in a lot of ways, the aquaculture is making the problem worse. Interesting. it's kind of interesting because I think when we hear it'll take the pressures off the wild fisheries, it's really- Mm. It'll take the pressure off maybe some of it off of the salmon, the wild salmon stocks, not necessarily the food that feeds them. And oftentimes that food is not necessarily where they would normally find that food, so the fish that are put into this fish meal are in other places, Can you talk a little bit about where some of the sources of the fish meal come from?

16:41 yeah. So geographically, it comes from Southeast Asia, West Africa, and Peru. Peru is like a huge powerhouse, and then, also China is a huge producer of fish meal and fish oil, partly because it has such a huge aquaculture industry. and in those waters, what's being targeted are, like those forage fish like- Yeah … anchoveta, sardinella, and stuff like that. Interesting. Now, one of the things that we haven't really kind of gone through, fish meal. Can you just kind of describe what that looks like? Like in, like- Mm-hmm … like physically what that looks like or even just what it's made up of and how it's, how it's- Yeah … like put together. Fish meal is a flour that is made by taking lots of, fish and cooking it and pulverizing it into, this flour.

17:28 It can also take the form of pellets, once it's added into the feed. and then the liquid equivalent is fish oil, and that is often fed to salmon. Okay. Interesting. Going back to the sources of the, fish meal, like where we're getting these fish. Mm-hmm. Uh, a lot of places, Africa, Peru, Asia, like a lot of places in Asia. The team that, for the project uses like the phrase, which I hadn't heard of before, but it's food colonialism. Mm-hmm. Now, we've heard colonialism, obviously it's rampant within marine conservation, and it obviously needs to go, and there are people and organizations who are working to take that away, but unfortunately, just historically, we, continue to see it.

18:11 From this perspective, what does it mean, and where did you see this type of action, like food colonialism, like most clearly throughout the project, like throughout your investigation? Yeah. So human rights, advocates, usually point to West Africa, as an example where food colonialism is, really tied to the fish meal and fish oil industry. and historically, those types of forage fish that are just really small and oily, people have said that, have even called them trash fish- Mm-hmm … as if to, say that they are not eaten, like otherwise they would've just been wasted or stayed in the ocean. But that isn't entirely true. And, it's especially not true in West Africa because, over there, as we found in our investigation, people really rely on sardinellas, as one of the major sources of protein, particularly in Senegal and Gambia.

19:05 they rely on it for food. They also rely on it for their livelihoods. so there's hundreds and maybe thousands of fishers and, processors on land who, are now sort of losing their jobs, because of the fish meal and fish oil industry decimating the waters around them. and also, the industry has driven up the price of sardinella, where it's become inaccessible for your average buyer. So people are essentially saying, like the companies that are fishing these sort of oily kind of what they call trash fish are saying that because they need it for the fish meal, but they're trying to kind of show the world that, hey, not many people eat this. But in a matter of fact, they do.

19:46 like people are eating this all the time as part of their culture. It's part of what they feed on 'cause it's… Like I know Peru, I've just done a story about Peru and how important that upwelling is and how important that product, fish productivity is, especially with this new El Niño coming in and that disrupting it, and it's affecting their GDP to that point. So people are eating it. It's not just for the fish meals. People are eating it, but those companies are trying to kinda like work around it and say, "Hey, you know what? People aren't eating it." But that's obviously not true. And it's, kind of interesting how it's easy To spread that message around that people aren't eating these types of fish because- Mm-hmm They may not be appealing to some people in sort of the Global North where that would normally hear of these types of fish. It's easy to kind of like justify it and be like, "Well, nobody's eating it anyway. That's what they're telling us."

20:29 But we have to go and dig through and make sure that, hey, no, like, people are eating this, and it's- Mm-hmm … it's an important aspect. How do we start dispelling that, that type of messaging from these companies? Someone like myself, who's a marine scientist, science communicator, you're a journalist, obviously is coming out with, The Outlaw Ocean Project. As a communicator, like, how do we start spreading that message that, hey, you know what? These fish are actually really good for you if people eat them. They're being taken away. yeah, that's a really good question. I think one way that we're trying to reach consumers in the Global North is through this tool we created called Bait to Plate. so when you hear about, food insecurity and other issues that are happening, like, out there in the Global South, it can seem really far away and not tied to you in any way.

21:16 But, through Bait to Plate, we have mapped several relationships between, the fishmeal, plant that is taking the sardinella and other species all the way down to the farmed fish that ends up on your plate. and I think that is a way to empower the average consumer to know that, there were hidden costs that were tied to their farmed fish. so that's one way, one effort toward transparency that, we've been working on, but it is a good question. Yeah. And I'm glad you answered it that way because it really makes us focus on the supply chain- Mm-hmm of not just catching the fish, but how it gets from the ships to the plants, to the processors, to the mills, to the farms, to the importers, to the retailers, and to the agencies.

22:02 and it's really well-documented on the Bait to Plate, website, which we'll link in the show notes. Can you talk a little bit, like walk us through like one supply chain- Mm-hmm end to end to just kind of show people what it goes through. I wanna talk a little bit about what happens in those plants that, the website really highlights. Just like the general kind of- Yeah … process. Yeah. Yeah. So usually it starts on the ships, and most of the ships that are catching, fish for fish meal are either trawlers or, purse seiners, which some scientists have said are, have like a high likelihood of bycatch, of catching other species that, they didn't mean to catch- Mm-hmm which just leads to, removing more marine life from the ocean unnecessarily.

22:48 But those are the two main types of boats, catching fish meal and fish oil. And then there's also, sometimes it's created from like the offcuts of the heads and the, tails and, waste parts of the fish, which is actually more sustainable. But for those that target it, what happens is that either it'll be processed on the ship, in a huge factory trawler that's basically like the same as a factory on land, and then it's taken to shore, or sometimes it'll be transshipped to, another ship which takes it to shore. once it's gone shore, it is, taken to this fish meal processing plant which pulverizes it and cooks it, turns it into the fish meal or the fish oil.

23:32 and then from there, it usually goes to a feed mill. It's added to other ingredients such as soy, or, yeah, other ingredients, and then it's turned into a pellet. And then that pellet is sold to the fish farm, where it's fed to the farmed fish. and then that farmed fish usually goes through some kind of processing itself at another processing plant, where it's turned into filets or, Mm-hmm different forms for the consumer. Then it goes to a wholesaler or a distributor, and then it ends up, at a restaurant or a grocery store or, it reaches the consumer in some other way. But it's a very, very long and complex supply chain. and sometimes hidden, sometimes you don't realize, where everything goes.

24:17 Yeah. As a consumer, a lot of times we're not thinking of-- All we think of is, like, the ship that caught it, and then, like, a ship, And then all of a sudden it's in your store. Mm-hmm. That's kind of how a lot of people think. They don't really see how it, it all connects. And I'm sure some people will be surprised by how many stops it makes along the way. Like, from the baitfish that are getting caught for the fish meal to the, actual farmed salmon, let's just say, that gets to your area. Mm-hmm. On the website, you have all the different types of stops it could make within the supply chain. What really caught my eye was the amount of crimes or concerns that happen in each one of these stops, I guess, or parts of the supply chain.

24:59 We're looking at, just as an example, they looked at, I guess, in the investigation, more than 30,000 ships with at least 3,800 crimes or concerns either aboard the ship or within the supply chains. And then it kinda goes with 370 plants with at least 900 crimes or concerns was this stuff that was witnessed or discussed by people who had gone through it or who had witnessed it themselves? Like, how did you get all this information and why are there so many crimes or concerns? And I guess what is a concern? What is categorized as a concern? Obviously, a crime is something illegal in that country, but what is a concern before we get into that? Yeah, yeah. A concern is something that is, not necessarily illegal, but it is a problem.

25:41 So one example is that food insecurity. so we might categorize something as a concern when a plant is taking, a type, like a species of fish that is overexploited in the nearby waters, even if the government, is permissive and that is not, like illegal. Right. Um, another example is transshipment, which is, I think it's less common in fishmeal, but transshipment in general is whenever a fishing ship doesn't wanna return all the way to shore. So a more, logistical, like easier way to, transfer the catch back to shore is just to meet up with a, like refrigerated ship and- Yeah … transfer the catch to it, and it goes back to shore.

26:27 that's another thing that isn't always illegal. it's definitely not illegal on the high seas, and in some countries it is legal, if you have permission to do it. But it is, a problem because it means that the crew is not getting to stop at port and, see like port inspectors who would otherwise catch, "Oh, you guys don't have enough like fresh vegetables," or, problems like that. So those are examples of what we would classify as a concern, even if it's not, like necessarily illegal. Okay. Okay who do you hope uses this website here, the Bait to Plate website? Mm-hmm. Like is it consumers? Is it retailers or regulators or other journalists? Like who is it designed for?

27:09 I would say all of the above. we hope consumers will use it just to have greater awareness of what goes into farmed seafood. and we hope retailers will use it, to see like blind spots where they, somehow didn't see that their supplier was connected to these problems- and to encourage retailers to, do much firmer, stricter due diligence checks. Yeah. and we would also want regulators to look at, all these things that, are concerns, and why they're concerns and like how frequently they're happening. because that can influence the policy decisions that are made. Yeah … so it has a wide audience. Yep. Yeah, no, that's great. And I c- like I think it's kind of interesting 'cause you kinda alluded to it where- Mm-hmm … if there's a fishery that's already exploited- it's already being fished beyond the maximum that it could take, and the government in that area allows for the, the fishers who are doing this for the fish meal industry to continue to fish even though it's not sustainable at this point because they've overexploited it.

28:12 Did you find that happens quite a bit in these countries? Like is it more of like they just come in like, "Yeah, we need this," and government, I guess, gets money from it or they get, their fishers are employed because of it? Is that the pressure that they want to alleviate is to keep the fishing industry going- even though it's, exploited? yeah, I would say that is one of the reasons is, that governments, especially the governments of countries where fish meal and fish oil production is happening are eager for foreign investment, and so they're willing to look the other way when it comes to certain things. but it's also for practical reasons. so policing the ocean is very difficult for reasons I'm sure you can imagine.

28:53 The ocean is huge and- Yeah … it's expensive to get out there. It's hard. Um, and so if you're a smaller country, a smaller coastal country, you're gonna struggle to have the resources to, have people tracking ships by satellite or- Mm-hmm Going out on the water to check on the ships that have turned their satellite transponders off. and so yeah, those are things that we've definitely documented, in a few places in the reporting. Interesting. Out of all these sort of links- Mm-hmm … what was the hardest link to prove that they were doing something? that wasn't they were either concerned or actually illegal. like was it hard to get into some of these places or how did you access some of these places?

29:35 do you mean like crimes and concerns? Yeah. Yeah. There was some field research. We went into fish meal plants, in Senegal, Mauritania, Thailand, and talked to workers and, got information. but a lot of it was also just open source, research. So we would, like in Peru, we found this website that posts every time, the government has found that a ship was catching juvenile fish. Mm. Um, and we scraped those regulations and took a look. and we also searched, Facebook, Twitter, for any, protests and stuff like that. and yeah, we used the internet, to locate sources and there were at least 70 journalists who were involved in the project.

30:24 many of them were interpreters who were able to go into foreign language websites and locate documents for us. Okay. Interesting. I'd like to talk about like the plants, some of these fish meal plants. I've never even thought about this, but I mean it makes sense, but can you describe Like the stench that someone would smell that lives beside an actual- Mm-hmm … processing plant in some of these countries? Yeah. if I remember correctly, we have a few people quoted in there who were neighbors of the plants and, some of the quotes were, "Smells like a dead dog," Or like, "My wife told me I had to shower before I could um- Oh … come back home after just walking through the neighborhood." That's not even working at the plant, this is just- Yeah … walking by it.

31:07 Yeah. Um- Wow … and Ian, went to The Gambia in 2019, and was in the area of the fish meal plant, and he had to wash, like, all of his clothes, every night because the smell was just so overbearing. and smell is not something you would think of as- No … um, like a tangible harm, but it really is tangible because especially in The Gambia, it has driven tourism out of the city, of Gunjur. Because of the smell, it's just so gross. Yeah. Wow. Um, beach visitors, and it really affects, like, your quality of life if you're living around it. and not just that, but we also found that the stench of rotting fish, emits this chemical called trimethylamine or TMA, which some scientists have found is carcinogenic.

31:54 And so- Oh … that is, like, a real, real harm, and that's why we, took a look at every plant in the investigation and, calculated how many people were living within a mile or within five miles of it. and that's something we published for each plant. Wow. that's insane to think about. I know, like, in the US there's Chemical Alley where people who are living beside chemical plants and, refineries, and, the chemicals, the carcinogens that come out of that and it's an awful, awful area. They can't move. Nobody wants to buy the places and things like that. You never really think about that from a fish meal plant. You would think they'd have better standards- Mm-hmm … to ensure that the smell doesn't get out, and I guess that's just the regulators, I assume.

32:37 Is that what it is? It's like they're not making the effort to contain the smell if that's even possible? Yeah. a lot of countries we found had weak regulations or did not enforce the regulations, that were existing. so in wealthier countries, there are technologies that have been built, that can contain the smell, such as scrubbers or biofilters. but in poorer countries, they tend to not be used, because they are expensive. And- Yeah … if the government is not, enforcing the law, then, it just won't happen. Yeah.

33:17 Unfortunately it makes sense from that- Yeah … perspective, but it can be terrible and, it could get people a little angry. and during this investigation, your team documented, was it something like at least 80 incidences of civil unrest tied to fish meal? Yes. Um, a lot of times, like in Peru, India, Senegal. what drove people to the streets around fish meal? Yeah, often it was the smell. Other complaints were, the effect on the local economy, or they found plants dumping wastewater into nearby fields which contaminated the water they were drinking. or there were some protests in Peru over fishers who were upset about the, price that had been set for anchovies.

34:04 there were, yeah, a variety of reasons, but I think- Yeah … smell was one of the main themes- Yeah … that we saw emerging every time. And were these protests like civil protests, or did they get violent in terms of interactions with local police and other authorities? sometimes they did get violent. Oh … and one example is in India, there was a protest over a local fish meal plant and, there was some kind of clash with the police and someone threw a rock through one of the police car's- Oh … um, windows. but it just shows, like, how, upset- Yeah … people were, and rightly so. Well, I think especially the frustrating part is if they know there's, technology to be able to stop the smell- Yeah … and stop a lot of these mishaps.

34:50 and it's not being used. I would be very frustrated as well to be like, "Well, why can't we use that?" Like, "Why can't you just pay for that?" Mm-hmm. They know the companies can pay for it. The companies just don't want to. Mm-hmm. Which goes to show they don't care about the local community, which is really, it's gross in a lot of different ways. One thing that was interesting when I did the research is that the fish meal production in West Africa was connected to immigration. Can you talk about how that connection works? Yeah. Um, so- Or migration, I should say. Yeah. what we were looking at especially was the migration route from West Africa to Spain's Canary Islands, which are, like a Spanish, owned islands that are in Northwest Africa.

35:31 and there are several reasons why people are, attempting that migration route, which is extremely dangerous, and is I think 3,000 miles from Senegal to the Canary Islands. and one of the reasons, is climate change. that's a huge driver. It's causing, lands to, farmlands to no longer be farmable, and other, like, economic impacts. but another reason is overfishing. and that's overfishing partly by, Spanish and other European, huge, like, industrial ships that- Mm-hmm have been licensed to fish in those waters, for various things. but it's also connected to the fishmeal industry, which is largely supplied by, these artisanal fishers, in wooden canoes who, are supplying to the fishmeal industry because the fishmeal industry, pays more, than- Right … the processors onshore.

36:26 but it's become so that there's a buyer for every fish, so there aren't a whole lot of, like, stops on it. And so that has driven, like an overfishing crisis where, fishers are now struggling to find work. and a lot of them are, as a result of that and other factors, getting into their wooden pirogues and attempting, this extremely dangerous journey to the Canary Islands- which claimed thousands, I think 3,000 lives in 2025. Dear God. That's insane. That is absolutely insane. Mm-hmm. Now, let's shift over to the fleet and the workers on the fleet. Mm. You guys, your reporters got to be on some ships.

37:06 I think it was six voyages at sea. how did you arrange that? 'Cause I can't imagine that these boats really wanted this information to get out for certain boats. Mm-hmm. so It's not that we, not necessarily that we, got on, like, the industrial vessels. Like, it's not like they were allowing us to get on. Yeah. But, usually what we did was embedded with, an NGO such as Sea Shepherd- Yeah which partners with local governments to police the waters around- that country. So in Gambia, that's one example where, Ian and, a couple of the other reporters were able to board, a Sea Shepherd vessel and go with, the Sea Shepherd staff as well as, people from the Gambian government, as they inspected ships.

37:51 but it's tough and expensive. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah. and what did they see on those voyages? Like when they first step, you know- Mm-hmm … when they first boarded some of these vessels? Yeah. in Gambia, the situation of the deckhands was really insane. and so Ian, found that they were all four of them sleeping in this room that was right above the engine room, and so it was extremely hot and- Mm you could not stand up in there. It was like four people in this one small, very hot, cramped room. and they also found that, captains were not routinely keeping track of the amount of fish that were caught as was required by law, Right … in many cases.

38:41 and, in the South China Sea, the reporters found that, overfishing is driving, scarcity, and scarcity breeds conflict. And so there were clashes that were witnessed between the Indonesian Coast Guard and the Vietnamese Coast Guard over, these fishermen who were fishing illegally. And, like, Indonesia was trying to arrest them, but Vietnam was not allowing it to happen. those are just a couple of- Yeah … examples. Yeah. Causing, like, some major national conflicts, yeah. Yeah. Or international conflicts. why does a, fleet with, uh, no, I guess what we'd, like, quote unquote, "license plate" matter to the average seafood eater? Like, why would I care if a fleet doesn't have, like, a documentation, I guess, or a license plate?

39:24 that's a good question. So it is very important, As a transparency tool. and because the fishing industry is extremely opaque, and similar to how you need a car to have a license plate, so that you know who is committing a crime, I guess the same could be said of ships, which is like if you don't have a license plate- Yeah it makes it very difficult for, monitors and for, regulators to track, who is committing what crime or how much fish is being taken out of the water. So, anyone who cares about the oceans, should care about, what vessels are doing to obscure their identities.

40:06 Mm-hmm. Yeah. now in 2018, more than 30 people, I think, were recorded as dying, and over 440, had been injured at fish meal plants. Mm-hmm. Like what are the main ways that people get hurt or even killed in this industry? Like why is it so dangerous? so fishing in general is extremely dangerous. You're doing it very far from shore. You might not have a doctor on board. and it is physical work. so in the fishing industry, we found cases, especially in Russia, we found a lot of cases of people, getting injured. We found one person who lost his arm because of an accident that happened- Mm … on the ship, involving a loose cable.

40:47 and really this happens a lot, like people falling overboard and going missing. and at the plants themselves, what we found was often the cause of, accidents or deaths was that, as fish rots, it lets out ammonia and other chemicals that are dangerous. And so if you're in a room with rotting fish and it, doesn't have a lot of ventilation, we found that people have gotten injured or sometimes died, just from asphyxiation, Yeah because they were exposed to those chemicals. Wow. and then the plant- Stuff you wouldn't even think about too, right? Yeah. Jeez. is it true that fish meal can spontaneously combust? I saw that on the site. I was like, "Really?"

41:28 Yeah. It's hard to believe, but, um- How does that happen? … it is true. I don't know that I can explain that very well, but, um- Yeah uh, something to do with, as it heats up, it, it can spontaneously combust and, we found that, like several fish meal ships over history have caught on fire because- Really? … um, of that issue. Wow. That's incredible. I never, thought about that. there's certain chemicals that the EU has banned. as they, they tend to be a little more stringent than, say, like the US. Mm-hmm. So I think there's one that's, I don't know if I'm pronouncing this, ethoxyquin- Mm-hmm … that was banned in 2017, but the US still allows it in some of the animal feeds, including aquaculture feeds.

42:10 what did your review of FDA records find with respect to that chemical? so our review of FDA records found that, they're, ethoxyquin is making it into, animal feeds and therefore, the farmed fish that you eat at, alarming numbers. We looked at, I think 16,000 shipments and found that, several, I can't remember the exact number, but several, like ethoxyquin was very frequently making it- Mm-hmm into, US seafood imports. And that's, like do you know what it does to people? Like is that a toxin to people? Is that what it ends up being? so there has- A carcinogen? it has been, classified as a carcinogen.

42:50 Okay. Um, so there hasn't been any, like documented evidence of harm to you if you eat the seafood that has eaten feed that has ethoxyquin in it. But, the EU and other governments have, obviously decided that the risk was high enough to ban it. So like it's just the difference I guess in terms of thresholds of the amount that- Yeah … that the EU would have and that the US and maybe other countries would have. I feel like that's often the case with the EU. The EU's a, like I said, a little bit more stricter with a lot of these things that are in their products and the US, even Canada are just like, "No, no, we'll allow that." And we're always surprised that, whoa, I can't believe you allowed that. But- Yeah. … um, yeah, that's interesting.

43:31 your team compared, like, the marketing and certification claims against documented supplier problems. What does that gap look like when we look at these types of things? Yeah. so we looked at, about 500 seafood companies. so these are companies that are at the end of the chain that are actually, like, selling the seafood, with their brand, that you see in the supermarket- Okay or the restaurant. so we looked at about 500 of them, and we found, and these were 500 of the companies that make the strongest claims, saying their seafood was ethical and sustainable. and we found that over half of them somewhere in their supply chain were tied to some kind of crime or concern, so that was 250 companies.

44:14 Dear God. So what does that say for these, like, certifications? Like, I think there's one stat in here that, out of the plants and the ships investigated, at least 80 held, Marine Trust certification. Mm-hmm. But virtually all of them had crimes or concerns in their supply chains. So when we talk about these certifications, as a consumer, like, what does that tell the consumer that they should be looking out for? Like, do they believe these certifications? 'Cause we've seen other, like, seafood certifications, aquaculture as well as wild fisheries with the supply chains, like- Mm … the Marine Stewardship Council and things like that. Like, does this harm the certification process if the certification body is not investigating these more carefully?

44:56 Yeah. So there are several certification programs for seafood, and for farmed seafood, and they are industry-led. And the idea was that they could reassure the consumer because, auditors and inspectors have been to, the fish farms usually and talked to workers, looked at, paperwork, and verified that the seafood was not connected to any of these types of problems. But what we found, and what many other, academics and advocates who've looked at this have found is that, there is a huge gap between what they are, the certifications claim to be reassuring consumers on and what, the reality is in supply chains.

45:43 and so the reality is that for many of these certification programs, they look at, conditions on the farm and sometimes in the processing plant, but they rarely go beyond that. and it's partly logistical reasons like you can't, really go out on the ships and talk to workers- in their native language while the captain is gone, or at least that's what companies have struggled to do. but at the same time, even though they can't do that and often like the spot checks at factories are, announced and so there's no surprise there, it ends up just being like a paperwork checking exercise.

46:24 and so it fails to, discover real problems. and so these certification programs at the end of the chain are making claims about the, quality of the seafood on the farms, but they're not looking further up. And so, consumers should be skeptical, and not go to these certification programs as, just like the end-all be-all of, knowing that the seafood is okay to eat. I know I mentioned one of the certification programs, Marine Trust. Did you guys look at, like, some of the popular consumer ones, Seafood Watch, Marine Stewardship Council, I think in Canada, Ocean Wise. Did you have a chance to look at those or talk to people within those?

47:05 'Cause I know some scientists who work on that. they do a lot of data investigations. I don't know if they do as much investigation as The Ocean Outlaw Project or as some other people have done. But did you guys look at those types of certifications and was it the same kind of result where it's just like if you look deep enough, you could find these concerns or crimes? Yeah. With the Marine Stewardship Council, that, is not something we looked at specifically in this report, but- Right … we have checked, on that in other reports we've done, where we found that there were, factories producing seafood in China that were using state-sponsored forced labor, Mm where a certification program said that, they were not connected to abuses, but they were, like, further up in the chain.

47:50 those others you mentioned, Seafood Watch, Seafood Watch, I think has acknowledged this themselves, but, they do a lot of great work in, saying, or, like, determining the sustainability of certain, types of fish, whether they're sustainable or not sustainable. But on the labor side, they haven't been able to- Right … really, monitor conditions in certain industries, and what labor abuses might be there. It's extremely difficult 'cause obviously they're hidden- They are … in a lot of places. I mean, look at the level of investigation that you guys went through to be able to uncover that. Mm-hmm. It's not surprising, I guess. They can only do so much in certain ways, and I think it's good for people to know that if they use it. It's not the fact that Seafood Watch knows of these crimes and are going, mind you, now they know, so I wonder now if that's gonna change.

48:36 but do you have dialogue with like, people at the program to say, "Hey, look, here are the plants that, we have the names"? Do you supply that to them to help with their assessment? Oh, yeah. So every, certification program, every company, every group that's mentioned in our reporting- Yeah we reached out to them by email and said, This is what we found in your supply chain," or, "This is what we found with certified, companies." Mm-hmm. And we outlined all of that. and they were often, well, sometimes some groups were really open to engaging with that, and opened internal investigations. Others, didn't respond. Right. But we publish all of our interactions with those types of groups on our website- under the discussion page.

49:19 So it's, like, full transparency for you guys. Like, this is what we found. This is who contacted us, who we had dialogue with, and the conversations that went through that, as long as it doesn't endanger somebody. is that the idea? Yeah. That's definitely the goal. Okay. that's great. I mean, it's obviously not great to see all the stuff that comes out of it, like all the really, really horrible stuff. Mm-hmm. But it's great to see how transparent this whole process is for you guys. Obviously, it's part of your journalism aspect, but you don't always see that, and it gives us a way to kind of look at this in a very easy fashion and make assessments on whether we wanna continue to eat certain seafoods based on whether this happens. And I find it'll be interesting to see- Programs like MSC and Seafood Watch and Ocean Wise take this information and whether they're gonna continue to support certain fisheries based off of these types of concerns to inform their users whether, this is, a good fishery or not.

50:13 I know there's a lot of people who wanna eat the seafood, but if they know it's contributing to some really horrible things that are happening, like I know I wouldn't want to eat that fishery. Like, if it's sustainable, it's sustainable, but if there's other things going on, that needs to be cleaned up before, that happens. So it's really great that that's happening. Now there's, fish farms. I was very surprised at this one. There were fish farms in, I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing this properly, Xingyang. Is that how you pronounce? Xingjiang. Xingjiang. So I'm, I'm sorry. Xingjiang. in the desert. That sounds kinda weird, like impossible. Why are there fish farms in the desert? I assume they're internal, like they're not open pen, they're just internal. Like, they're like in a factory. what's happening there? Why are they doing that in a desert?

50:53 so this is what we found in, China. And, we looked back at the history and we discovered that, China is such a huge, like, seafood, power around the world. and so since I think the '80s, China has been, farming fish in its eastern shores, and, really intensively, and that has led to, some pollution, of course. And so the Chinese leaders, we found, said that, these eastern shores are very polluted and there's not much, like, growth we can do here. and so there was a coordinated effort to move fish farms to the desert- and particularly Xinjiang, which is, this province in northwestern China that is largely desert.

51:39 but it is a place where, human rights abuses have been extremely prominent, Yeah … Turk, Uyghur, and other, Muslim ethnic minorities. And, so they moved aquaculture to that region, which is very interesting because it is the desert. Yeah. But they were able to, find a way to tap into the groundwaters under that desert and, bring the water up, and they- Mm … seeded it with certain microorganisms that, turned it into something akin to saltwater. and they- very successfully established, fish farms there. That we found, about 1,000 fish farms. Um- A thousand?

52:19 Yeah. Holy cow. In that northwest region. And, in the desert, the Taklamakan Desert itself, we found 250. is this good for the communities around it? Like there's Tibetan communities, there's other communities around that. Like, is it affecting them in a positive way in terms of jobs or in a negative way in terms of, like, environmental disasters 'cause of pollution? it depends on who you ask. But it is certainly true that those are places where, human rights abuses are very prominent and, the population is surveilled. over a million people have been detained, and forced labor is so common that the US government has passed this law called the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which forbids any imports from that region.

53:09 and so whether the people are, benefiting from it or not- Yeah … is hard to say. Yeah. It's, it's not-- I mean, obviously- Yeah … forced labor is forced labor. It's not- Yeah … it's a horrible thing. But, I have here in the, in, from the sites in my notes that, like from that region, like some of the seafood ends up in like US school cafeterias or military bases. So if the US have these laws, are they not able to detect that this is where some of the seafood's coming from? yeah. So the enforcement of these laws, especially when it comes to seafood, is very anemic. and we have this old number, from a study, I think in 2017, that, less than 1% of seafood imports to the United States were inspected.

53:56 it's hard to say whether that number has changed or how- Mm-hmm but, yeah, seafood imports are an opaque place. Yeah … and there aren't many inspections going on. Hmm. That's interesting. Did you get pushback from like anybody? I mean, this investigation's obviously is gonna not make a lot of people happy- Mm-hmm that are working within this industry and that are getting called out for this type of stuff. did you get a lot of, critics or people who kind of came out against you? Did the people working, like your team, did they have like threats against you or anything like that? Like, what was the pushback? So the investigation came out last week. so I would say we're, waiting for more, more pushback.

54:37 Yeah. but, we made an effort to reach out to every company and body that, Right … was in the investigation, and some of them did come back, strong. And we took their feedback whenever it was, plausible and used- Right it before we published. and I would also say that, people in some contexts, have really faced, like, pushback from their own governments. not necessarily us. But there was this one advocate in Mauritania who was posting about, Turkish ships that were fishing in this marine protected area. they were connected to fish meal. And then, like, the same day, the police showed up at his house and arrested him. Um- Oh, wow. So it is, like, a touchy subject- especially in some contexts.

55:20 but the response so far, has been very positive and, yeah. Interesting. So I guess, like, when we look at all of this- Mm-hmm you in terms of, there's a lot of information on the site. I mean, you guys have done a wonderful investigation, transparency everywhere. how does someone who's listening to this who, wants to do better, wants to, like seafood, wants to make sure it's sustainable- Mm-hmm They have their certifications out there that say, "Yes, this is sustainable, this is not." When they're just trying to, like, digest all this information that we talked about today- Mm-hmm … it seems like there's a lot of negatives that have come out, and there needs to be a lot of, like, work to clean this up.

56:01 Where do you suggest, like, an audience member who's listening to this, like, just begin? Like, where do they begin with all of this information to just kind of, like, digest it and then, like, put that into action? for digesting it, I would say, like, the landing page of the website offers a really big picture view of, everything that we did and, what we found, and also the findings page on the website. For how to be a sustainable seafood consumer, we published a follow-up piece in "The New York Times," that attempts to answer that question. And, the answer was, I mentioned before that two-thirds of aquaculture is the type that depends on fish meal and fish oil, but the other one-third is things like bivalves, which are mussels, and oysters and other types of species that, get food by filtering the water of, like, nutrients around them.

56:50 and we view that as a much more sustainable form of aquaculture because it doesn't rely on feed. so people can eat that. and I would also recommend, like, locally caught seafood. if you can see it come in from the ocean, then it's a lot harder to hide, abuses- Right … in the supply chain. and another thing is just to ask yourself more broadly, how much is the world going to, give for us to consume, and how can we cut down on, the amount of resources we're taking with, our food, especially- Mm-hmm in the Global North? yeah. That's incredible. That's incredible. there's a lot of, good things.

57:30 And I like that idea of what people could do and how people can, if they wanna eat seafood, there's certain ways. Looking at that one-third, I think that's really great. people wanna get more information, they can go to foodforfeed.theoce- theoutlawocean.com, and then you can go to thebaittoplate, uh, .the, theoutlawocean.com, which I'll put both the links in there in case people, just wanna click on something. Maya, this has been wonderful. I have one last question for you. personally, as someone who kinda like walked into this type of thing, obviously human rights is, a big passion of yours to make sure people are treated properly. Not having a lot of knowledge, pre-knowl- like knowledge of what was happening in the ocean on this.

58:16 After five years, when you look at everything that you've witnessed and heard about from other people, from people on your team and things, like are you okay? You know what I mean? Like, there's some pretty, I'm sure some pretty horrible things that you had to see, looking at, ships where people have all died and they're kinda washing up. Like, how do you kinda like sift through this and mentally digest it and be okay as a human being? Hmm. that's a good question. I would say that I'm lucky because I can just close my computer and walk away. Right. Um, for the people who are, experiencing these things, it's a lot harder.

58:56 And so I think I have the privilege of, seeing things through a computer screen and not, being- Mm-hmm … subject to them in real life. but I'm okay. Yeah. Well, I hope so, because, like, it's a tough thing to witness, obviously- Mm … and to see people, I'm sure you and your team have built up relationships with a lot of people who are even more affected by this, and we hope that they are okay. We hope that there's something that is done about this. I guess from that perspective, sorry, one more question, is like, does Ian and the team want to be done? Like, the final kinda overall thing, where does this project go from here? Mm-hmm. we think that retailers can take a harder look at their supply chains.

59:41 retailers, wholesalers, distributors, anyone at any stage of the supply chain, we want them to think more. And as well, we want consumers to think more about how it is that- Mm-hmm … seafood has gotten to us so cheaply, and how there are hidden costs along the way. and we think that, as journalists who are outside of the company, us being able to find these crimes and concerns and, these, relationships in the supply chain, it was possible. And we think that as retailers, with all the information, all the trade data, and all the, paperwork, they should be able to do better and know when certain things have entered the supply chain.

1:00:28 and governments, we think, need to do a better job as well with enforcing, the laws, especially import laws that the government has passed specifically to stop the import of goods tied to forced labor or unsustainable fishing. but those are, the main things that we- Mm-hmm … would want as outcomes of this reporting. Yeah. It is difficult, too, for people who are listening to this. I have a lot of listeners sort of in North America, in Australia- Mm … in the UK, and not in the countries necessarily that with a lot of these crimes happen, although sometimes we'd probably be surprised. and I guess to do that, are there any, nonprofit organizations that've been working with those governments to try and eliminate this type of forced labor that people can go and follow and support, in either in petitions or comment periods or anything like that?

1:01:21 do you mean the organizations that are working with Western governments? Yeah, Western governments or even the governments in like Peru or anywhere in Africa, like where a lot of these things are happening. unless, are they happening also in like Western countries too, some of these illegal acts? not as we covered in our reporting, but- Right … Western consumers are often the beneficiaries of- Right what's going on in other countries. Yeah. there are several groups in each of those countries that are working on these issues. I would say Amnesty International, Greenpeace, there are several local groups. there are organizations, that are working on Uyghur human rights and human rights in China.

1:02:02 there is Oceana. yeah, I don't know if I can, like recite them all, but- Yeah, yeah. No, of course. I mean, that's a lot right off the bat- Mm-hmm … that people could do. And I'll link to them, and see if I can link to any of those programs, for those organizations. I appreciate that. And to be honest, I appreciate all the work that you and your team have done to give us this information. It's not easy to get. it's a lot to go through, and you guys have done it in such a great way to be able to present it to us. And I'm sure a lot of people are just gonna be like, "Oh my gosh, I did not expect this to happen." there to be so many, like crimes and/or concerns around all of this, entire industry. And then there's a lot. There's a lot in there. I highly recommend that people go in there. But Maya, thank you so much for you and Ian and the team for doing this.

1:02:42 you're gonna be promoting it all, all over the place. Is there a next step to The Outlaw Ocean Project? Are you gonna continue with this type of topic or are you gonna move on to a different type of topic, that you're able to let us know about? yeah, We have a lot of plans. Um, and I also just remembered that in the methodology section of our website, we mention a lot of the, like groups that helped us or- Perfect … groups that were working on fishmeal and fish oil in those countries. There's like a country-by-country methodology memo. and we mention those groups there. But, what we're working on next, Several things. And one of them, we do mention like on our website, which is krill. Yeah … so krill is one thing that has been suggested as, a supplement that can be added to fish feed to make it like carry more, of certain, ingredients, that add nutrients.

1:03:31 But, that is also a place where there's not a lot of like oversight happening. and these huge boats are going down to, the ocean around Antarctica and extracting krill from the waters. and we're very interested in like how that is impacting, the ecosystem and the whales, um- Mm-hmm that are reliant on the krill and are already, disappearing. so that is one next step of this reporting that we're hoping to get into. Very interesting, Maya. Thank you so much for joining us today and providing all this information. We went longer than normal, but that was done on purpose 'cause there's so much to go through and we really appreciate the work you've done. and we'd love to have you or any of your team members come back to discuss more on the next step and, how like the launch of this story has gone and what we can do more about it.

1:04:16 But we appreciate you coming on today. Thank you so much. Thank you. You bet. Thank you, Maya, for joining us on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Also just, like, for the work that you and your colleagues have done over the last five years to be able to tell us what is happening on the ocean. When we hear about seafood and sustainable seafood, we look at the data, we look at how the fish were fished. We don't talk about the people that are involved in that, the people on the boats. We don't talk about the people in the processing plants. And, there are fisheries, like this is for fish meal only. There are fisheries that have improved significantly in their supply chain. The Marine Stewardship Council follows that through the supply chain. Seafood Watch follows that through the supply chain.

1:04:57 And I think this investigation will be good at accompanying those to ensure that everything is followed properly. To get this information, the people, the journalists on this project had to go at lengths to get this information, had to go through witnesses and key sources and so forth, sometimes putting themselves in danger to get this information for us to understand what's happening. So a lot of these certification processes don't have the ability to do that, and so they are going to probably, I assume, are gonna be looking at these, and it'll be interesting to see how things change in the future in terms of what is supported and what is not supported. But this is, a big investigation that doesn't happen a lot, for obvious reasons, and I'm glad that, it's fully transparent. it's very much very science-like, in terms of that transparency, and the people here are dedicated to just finding out the truth and working with companies to do better.

1:05:44 And I think that's really important. So I'd love to hear what you think about this. hit me up if you're watching this or listening to this on Spotify, hit me up in the comments. If you're listening to this on your favorite podcast app, let me know what you think, because I would love to know what you think. DM me on Instagram, TikTok, wherever. All my social links are in the show notes as usual. And I wanna thank you, so much for joining me on today's episode, and obviously thank Maya, thank the team at The Outlaw Ocean Project. would love to have you back and talk more about this and other projects that you're following. And, I wanna thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time, and happy conservation.