Projects
Certification as a Conservation Tool in the Marine Aquarium Trade:
Challenges to Effectiveness
Clients: Kingfisher Foundation
Partner: Turnstone Consulting
Project overview
Environmental certification as a conservation tool is meant to create market
incentives for products to be produced in
an environmentally responsible manner. It has been part of the conservation
toolbox for commercial fisheries, forestry,
and other sectors, including the marine aquarium trade, for more than a decade. But the marine aquarium trade presents
substantial challenges to effective certification. This project sought to explore and analyze these challenges and
to consider the extent to which they can be overcome; looking at the marine aquarium trade as a whole and examining
whether the essential conditions are in place for meaningful certifi cation to succeed, especially in
Indonesia and the Philippines.
Challenges
In the marine aquarium industry, live fish, coral, and invertebrates are collected from coral
reefs throughout the world,
and sold to hobbyists in developed countries.
Much of this is collected illegally, with the use of cyanide to stun fish,
making them easier to collect. Cyanide increases the stress and mortality on fish, can kill non-targeted species on
the reef, and encourages destruction of the reef as collectors pry stunned fish out of crevices. Lax management in
major source countries allows for overfishing to occur as well. Most of the world’s marine ornamentals are collected in
the Philippines and Indonesia, and sold in the US and Europe, regions in which ecolabels for other products have had
significant traction.
Approach and Outcome
Starling Resources worked directly with Turnstone Consulting to determine which efforts might need to be taken to achieve success. We examined three key components of effective certification in the context of the marine aquarium industry in Indonesia and the Philippines and found that the conditions necessary for effective certification currently do not exist in either country:
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Satisfying the environmental claim: Requires increased government involvement and a proper legal, management, and enforcement framework.
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Verifying the chain of custody: Requires an integrated industry capable of tracking certified product from reef to retail and to invest in training, equipment, facilities and other resources necessary for more sustainable practices.
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Responding to economic incentives: Requires demand for environmentally preferable products. Better environmental practices need to become a mainstream expectation among consumers and dominant players in the industry, creating pressure and incentives down the supply chain, and in source countries, for reform.
Our findings argue that most, if not all, of these conditions must be addressed in pursuing any effective conservation approach. A key question regarding future investment in certification of the marine aquarium trade is whether it can help achieve them. Effective certification alone will not transform the industry. But in combination with other approaches it may help provide guidance for environmental performance and market incentives for change.
Additional Information
