What’s behind your canned tuna? The shocking truth supermarkets never tell you

0:00 What's behind your canned tuna? Now think about this. You open a can of tuna for lunch. It seems cheap, safe and simple. I mean, we all know it has high protein, great for fatty acids and low fats, so it's a really good healthy meal. But behind many of the supermarket tuna brands, there are hidden stories of human exploitation, environmental damage, and supply chains that stretch far out to sea. Today we're gonna answer the question, what's behind your tuna? We're gonna go over a Financial Times article that was done, an investigative report that was done on the tuna industry and the human costs, as well as the environmental costs, and of course, the supply change costs. We're gonna talk about that on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast.

0:42 Let's start the show. Hey everybody. Welcome back to another exciting episode of the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin, marine biologist and science communicator, and I'm here to tell you what's happening with the ocean, how you can speak up for the ocean, and what you can do to live for a better ocean by taking action. And on today's episode, we're gonna be talking about what is behind your supermarket tuna. The tuna that you buy, you may buy on a regular basis, you may not. If you're on a health kick and you wanna pump up that protein for, you know, not as many calories and you don't want to have chicken all the time. Seafood is a great option, especially when it's sustainable. But the problem is we just don't think about what goes behind catching that fish and that supply chain and who's catching that fish, what they go through.

1:27 So we're gonna talk all about that. Before we do though, something else we don't talk a lot about is seagrasses. Now I know if you've listened to this podcast before. You've heard me talk about sea grasses, a coastal habitat that is huge for biodiversity. Also to help reduce climate change by absorbing carbon dioxide on a regular basis. It is such a huge absorber, like a carbon sink we call it, of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases. Something that is very important to our coastal systems, not only for reducing climate change, but because of it adds a lot of biodiversity. It nurtures young fish and invertebrates so they can go off to other habitats. It's such an important seagrass or such an important coastal habitat that we don't talk about that much, which is boggles my mind.

2:10 Talk a lot about coral reefs, not a lot about seagrasses. So what I am doing, I am putting a crowdfunding campaign together to talk about seagrass. It's gonna be a podcast called The Seagrass Effect. If you go to speak up for blue.com/seagrass, you'll be able to help and donate to support the launch and the maintenance of that podcast. You can pretty much donate whatever you would like. It's with Balean. We've teamed up with the Balean Foundation to be able to put together these ocean projects, and it's really helpful to get your help and get your backing behind that. Go to speak up for blue.com/seagrass. Now let's talk about the story that opened the door. So the Financial Times ran this investigation into a supermarket tuna and their supply chains.

2:53 So not just looking at like, Hey, these are the different brands and they're sustainable or not. It's actually going back and looking at the brands and almost reverse engineering how the fish gets into the can and into the supermarket. So where are all the middle people? Where are all the businesses involved? Who's catching it? How are they being caught? What's happening to the people who are catching it, the fishermen, the fishers who are catching them? How far out to sea do they have to go? Are they observed a lot? Are they monitored? What's going on? They talk all about that. But this report focused on a single fisherman named Deby Putra Bunanda. Now, he spent seven months at sea catching tuna that was destined for retail shelves. But when he returned home after that seven months, he could barely walk more than a few steps at a time, and he had difficulty speaking.

3:39 What the heck went on? Now, the story highlights the harsh working conditions on some of the tuna fleets. So like the long deployments without any kind of returning to port, because they go so far, minimal oversight of the working conditions and the people's health. They also talked about a lot of dangerous labor practices. Now, if anybody has watched Deadliest Catch, we've learned about one of the most dangerous, if not the dangerous jobs in North America. It's usually the crab fishery in Alaska. Why? Because being out in Alaska on the sea sucks sometimes. It's beautiful, but it sucks sometimes. There are massive ways. You're looking at the Eastern Pacific North Pacific Ocean. It's cold. There are a lot of waves. The weather can turn at any point in time and it can be very dangerous.

4:23 A lot of people lose their lives during that. Even in the show, the Deadliest Catch, people have lost their lives over time. It is not an easy job, folks. It is not an easy job. So tuna fishing out in the Indian Ocean or out in the Pacific, on the other side of the world for us that live in North America, it is a very dangerous job as well. But also what happens is these fish are not just found along the coastlines of your favorite countries or the countries these people live in. What happens is you end up getting on the boat, you go out and you don't come back for a long time. Six, seven months, sometimes a year, sometimes more than a year. And when that happens, you start to get people being like, well, hold on a second. How are people being treated while they're out there for so long? I'll be honest. I go out on ships like in North America when I've been out on ships to do marine mammal observing or trawling or doing, you go out for a couple weeks.

5:10 Maybe a month, maybe a couple months. I think the most I've really been out is like seven weeks, eight weeks. And that was 'cause we got stuck out there 'cause of bad weather and we had to do a ship to ship transfer. When you think about going out for seven months or even like more than a year or more than that, and you're only on a boat, you're not in the port and sometimes you can't go to different ports because of immigration rules and stuff 'cause it's a different country. You start to get complicated and then when people are out at sea all this time, you can get away with a lot. You can get away with a lot 'cause not many people are on there, on the boats to monitor working conditions to monitoring what fish are there. Now we do have fisheries observers that are on them in some regional management areas, but that's not all the time. And that's not everywhere in the world. So what's behind canned tuna the human cost?

5:53 That's what we're gonna discuss in this section. Because of the long distance fishery in this industry. It's far away. Law enforcement can't be there, and public scrutiny is not there to call people out. If somebody's got a camera on their phone and trying to send it back home, you can't always do that. There's probably no signal out there. So NGO investigations and Human Rights groups have documented forced labor. We know there are fishery slaves out there. It continues to happen. There's withheld wages, unsafe conditions and exploitation of migrant fishers in some tuna fleets. And especially what they do is they'll kind of bring you on board, especially in people like in Malaysia, the Philippines, where you're not getting paid as much. They come on board. They go on for a long time. They get their passports taken away.

6:34 Say, Hey, you know what? We got a safe here. We're gonna hold onto it. They don't give it back, especially if they go to different ports, if they come back. If they get sick, they're not treated properly. Some are even thrown overboard if they can't perform. It's a very, very harsh condition. It is the modern day slavery that we see today, unfortunately, and it continues to go on. So these supply chains that include tuna ends up in major supermarkets. So we're eating and supporting the companies that are supporting these fishery slaves, these harsh work conditions, these areas where like occupational health and safety is not at the forefront. If you go on a boat like a Norwegian boat or you go on like anywhere in Europe or you go on places in Canada or the US, occupational health and safety is at the top, like safety is at the top of the list in terms of what you need to know and what you need to be trained on.

7:20 In other places around the world where there are long deployments and they're far away from the coast, there's no monitoring and there's nobody on the board to say, Hey, you know what, you can't do that. Or, that's is unsafe. This is unsafe. It could be very hectic, it could be sad, it could be very stressful for a lot of people and it could end up in death. But what this story does is it connects like the labor force of tuna with ocean sustainability. So the abuse of workers in destructive fishing practices often appear together. So when you see lack of monitoring of like how many fish are taken or where they're taken from, or have they been properly processed and documented. Well, that's the same thing that happens with humans. Usually they're hand in hand fishery slaves and stuff.

8:00 If you're gonna do one thing illegal, you're gonna do the other thing illegal so that you can actually probably identify some of those boats right off the bat just by their problems with environmental sustainability. But this is not just an environmental problem. Tuna fishing is not just an environmental problem. It is also a people problem, and it has to be solved. This is something that the transparency behind who is getting your fish, who's catching your fish is a huge thing. And to be honest, there are a lot of new popup kind of shops, not popup, but they've shops that have popped up online where in Europe and North America. We've documented this here on the podcast before where you can actually get a picture and find out who caught your fish and their families and their generation.

8:41 And you get their whole story behind it. It connects the consumer to the fisher. Which is really cool because you can see that there's not that many middle people or middle companies or middlemen, what they call it in the middle to like take away that transparency. And it's harder to track when you have more people involved. So that's something that's really interesting. Now there is of course the environmental side, like the bycatch, dark fleets, and supply chain opacity, which is something that's a huge part. We're going to discuss it in this section. So tuna caught for cheap retail products often come with like huge environmental, like from industrial fishing of course that uses high impact gear, like FAD, so Fish Aggregating Devices, which, we've had people from the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation on the podcast to talk about fish aggregation devices and how they've improved over that time.

9:31 But there are still some that are being used that are not good for sustainability. They can increase the catch of non-targeted species, including sharks, sea turtles, dolphins, sea birds, and juvenile tuna. Now, of course, like I said, this is from the past. The newer ones that are being tested and that have been discussed on this podcast before are better, but they still come with some caveats, so you have to be careful of that. Now, of course, some vessels stay at sea for long periods. So transshipping tuna at sea, there's less transparency involved there. Because it really comes up to the people who, like I have fisheries observers who are on these trans shipping boats that receive all the goods from the catches and the boats that catch the fish. Sometimes they come in and they don't even know what these fish are because they've already been processed. They've chopped the heads off, chopped the fins off, chopped the tails off.

10:12 Obviously they were dead before that, hopefully. And then they bring 'em on board. But sometimes it's difficult to tell between a tuna and a shark. It really is when you process all the meat and everything. Even when you have observers on these transhippers, it's really difficult to kind of catch and watch and monitor all these fish accurately. So there's a lot of ethical and ecological practices that can be called into question. But even when the companies say, like for marketing, they say, Hey, look, this has been responsibly sourced, that doesn't always mean they have. And there's a lot of greenwashing out there, or blue washing, whatever you want to call it. That happens with these marketing pieces on the actual label of the canned tuna. So it is something that, you know, has to be monitored and has to be caught. We'll talk about that in the next session. So that when we think of tuna, we think of food.

10:53 Like that's always the thing we think about. We don't think about everything behind that. We rarely think of the ecosystems. The protected species and the fishing technology that's used. And so now what I hope to get out of this video for you is to really start thinking about how it's caught. And I know it's not fun because all you wanna do is eat that delicious tuna. It's very good and it's very good for you. And some people really, really like it. But it's also something that you have to think about is like, is this the right company? Is this the right certification, which we're gonna talk about now. We're gonna talk about certifications and solutions, promising ideas with complications, of course. Now certifications have come out. You have the Marine Stewardship Council. You have the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation who works with scientists and major tuna companies to improve gear, reduced bycatch.

11:37 And track stock health. You have a number of different ones. You have Seafood Watch. There are a number of different programs out there, apps that help you track what's the right seafood, where they're caught and so forth. So those are all important. So these organizations have improved transparency 'cause like, say something like the Marine Stewardship Council, what they want to do is they want to take, I think they have over 400 fisheries, probably more than that, where they actually look at where it's caught and the whole supply chain, all the way up to retail. They check everything and they check every part of it. You have to go through a certification process to be able to be certified and put that on your label to say, Hey, I'm MSC certified to be able to do that. So I think, you know, having that, having the ISSF, the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation who've, we've had the president on the podcast before.

12:22 They focus more on ecological sustainability than labor protections, but they're still very interested in reducing those and making sure that those companies and those supply chains that they support do not have any of that in their system, obviously in their whole supply chain. 'cause that's obviously not bad. So the certification doesn't always guarantee like ethical working conditions and/or low environmental harm. That's one of the problems with these certifications. And it's not to say that these certifications are worth nothing. They're worth a lot because they do make the process more transparent. But they may also uncover a lot of things that aren't very good. I'd have to have somebody on from the Marine Stewardship Council to find out how they vet each of their people. It's been a while since I've had them on.

13:03 But they do have some really good sustainable fisheries, and they do monitor those supply chains. However, there needs to be more progress, especially when we look at the labor practices of some of these boats. And some of these companies may not know, or they don't do enough due diligence to know what's happening on these boats, how long these boats are out there, and what they do, all that kind of stuff. So that needs to change. We do know this. This investigation plus a plethora of other investigations, not only from a journalistic standpoint, but also a science standpoint and labor law and just human rights standpoint. We know this goes on and it needs to be improved, definitely improved. So even though there's real progress and real pressure to do better, there's also a lot of greenwashing and gaps in an oversight.

13:44 So, consumers need to understand both of these. However, when you do something like the big consumer question, what are the better choices? There are some more sustainable tune options available. So look for MSC Blue label because you will get the better option. It's not the best option, but it's the better option. Choose products, that say, caught by pole and line or troll caught, like T-R-O-L-L caught because those methods reduce a lot of bycatch. When you're just looking at pole and line, it's just literally a fishing pole in a line. Or a troll caught, it's like you're trolling along and you're catching them. Brands like Safe Catch, Clover Leaf, which is MSC certified products, and then great value MSC certified tuna have better transparency standards.

14:27 But the best takeaway is bigger than the sticker or the logo. That's really something to think about. You have to ask yourself where your seafood came from. Ask how it was caught and ask who caught it and whether they were treated fairly. Now you're gonna ask this at the supermarket and nobody's gonna know. The more we ask, the better the companies get at being more transparent. Because like a lot of times I've done it before. I've gone to my supermarket, I've ordered seafood and I'm like, Hey, do you know how this was caught? Where it was caught and who caught it? And like the 16, 17-year-old behind the counter is like, I don't know man. Like just, do you want it or not? Like they don't care. They're just there to earn their minimum wage. And like especially with a student, there are some, I should say, there are some like managers and stuff that really take it to heart and will do it.

15:13 And there are some fishing markets that will look at everything. And so those are the ones you wanna support. If they're not like that, don't support those supermarkets. Make them say what it is and make them like, look at what it is and make better decisions when they do their purchases. Right. This is a story about literally everyday choices that you make at the grocery store. Tuna is one of the most consumed fish in the world because of its health attributes, I guess you call it. But this means that consumers have power in the type of tuna that we consume. And so it is important that we demand better. It is important that we follow up with Marine Stewardship Council, ask questions. ISSF, ask questions.

15:53 Your supermarket, ask questions. This is where it starts to begin. The movement begins for better transparency and a lot more due diligence where you get your global seafood. That's really what it comes down to. So the next time you pick up a can of tuna, think about the hands that caught it, like the people that caught it, the methods that pulled it from the sea. And then you know what systems you want to support is really what it comes down to. Sustainable seafood is not only about protecting marine life, it's about protecting people too, because people catch 'em. And there's a lot of people who are mistreated in trying to catch food for you so that you can have this can of seafood once a day or once every other day or once a week or however often you consume it.

16:34 Don't consume tuna more than once a week, by the way. It's not very good with the mercury content. So I think that's the big takeaway message is when you start to eat any kind of seafood, any kind of meal, really, any kind of meat or vegetable, just ask yourself. Where does it come from? Who caught it and how it was caught? Those are the big questions you should ask when you're looking at your tuna and any other types of fisheries that you eat or any type of seafood that you eat. It's very important. That's it for today's episode. If you have any questions or comments, please put it down in the comments down below if you're watching this on YouTube. And if you're listening to this on your favorite podcast app, I am so excited. I've got this new service that I'm trying out. I would love to hear from you. You can leave a message or a voicemail, or leave a rating and review.

17:15 But if you go to speak up for blue.com/feedback, you can leave me a message and a question. It just go to me, it doesn't go to the public. If you have a question or something you want me to cover or you have like feedback for me, I would love to hear it. Go Speak up for blue.com/feedback. All one word feedback. 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 from the True North Strong and free. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time and happy conservation.