Greener than Thou: The Political Economy of Fish Ecolabeling and Its Local Manifestations in South Africa
Introduction
Protecting consumers from unsafe food, the environment from over-exploitation of resources and pollution, and workers and producers from unjust labor and trade relations are generally considered objectives worthy of intervention in development circles—whether through public regulation or, increasingly, through the establishment of voluntary standards, labels, and codes of conduct. Yet, abstract principles are eventually applied in concrete situations and have a variety of effects on differently endowed countries, groups, and individuals. What may seem a good idea to consumer groups, food retailers and processors, or government agencies in a Northern setting, may not turn out to be so advantageous to producers in the South—even though the initial stimulus in the North may have been exactly to safeguard these producers.
Food safety, environmental and social standards have become key features in the trade of agro-food products in the last 15 years. International organizations, government agencies, NGOs, corporations, and industry associations behind the formulation of these standards were initially defensive of efforts aimed at critically examining their effects in different settings. Questioning the inherent “justness” of these initiatives was considered reactionary and necessarily intended to discredit them. This was usually followed by a more open attitude toward reaching a better understanding of the contradictions, limitations, and differential impact of these standards. From a “defensive” phase, these initiatives have now moved into a “constructive dialogue” phase, where they are making efforts to be more inclusive and to reflect upon past experiences to improve the content, monitoring, and management of their standards. In other words, they are trying to “make their system management right.” This means that procedures to develop standards, governance structures, indicators, monitoring, verification, and management systems have all become much more sophisticated than they were even a decade ago. Where there has been little movement so far within these initiatives has been in acknowledging that standards are developed and applied in specific political economies, within complex power relations, and in extremely diverse local conditions and politics. In a sense, an increased focus on systems management brings these labels even further away from a politico-economic understanding of their effects.
In a neo-liberal setting, the legitimacy of market-based instruments to assure food safety and environmental and social protection is based on non-discrimination and equality of opportunity. In this context, if a system has been devised openly, is monitored transparently, and is administered properly, standards are seen as performing a market-lubricant function that provides fuller information to those involved in transactions. Where clear disadvantages are highlighted for certain countries, groups or individuals, technical assistance and capacity building instruments are provided, or simply suggested, as solutions. Is transparency and non-discrimination all that is needed, perhaps coupled with technical assistance, for developing countries to feel at ease with social and environmental labels and certifications? Although justifications for these labels are often couched in a discourse of science, objectivity, independent certification, transparency, and systems management, they need to be understood in relation to market dynamics, the influence of special interests and pressure groups, the role of NGOs, scientific and expert communities, and local politics in shaping actual compliance (among others, see Duffy, 2003, Freidberg, 2004, Guthman, 2004, Robbins, 2004).
Much of the burgeoning literature on the “developmental” impact of standards, labels, and certifications in agro-food value chains still focuses on standard setting (the development of principles, indicators, measurement devices and compliance systems) and standard implementation (compliance and certification) (most recently, see Gibbon and Bolwig, 2007, Giovannucci and Ponte, 2005, Hanataka, Henson and Reardon, 2005, Muradian and Pelupessy, 2005, Raynolds, 2004, World Bank, 2005). Other work examines the ethics and governance of standards, standards as a tool of governance, and the service industry of consultants, auditors, and certifiers that has emerged around these standards (among others, see Busch, 2000, Busch, 2002, Hughes, 2006, Mutersbaugh, 2005b, Ponte and Gibbon, 2005, Taylor, 2005). Two areas that have been relatively neglected are standard adoption (the decision to attempt compliance and certification) and standard verification after certification (routine monitoring, auditing, re-certification). While covering some ground in relation to standards setting, implementation, and governance, this article also places emphasis on local standard adoption and verification after certification. On what basis do producers and other industry operators decide to implement a standard? What are their motivations? What are the expectations and political/economic calculations? What is routine verification achieving? Under what circumstances is it possible to “fail” after certification? What are the commercial and political pressures under which verification takes place?
Specifically, this article examines the political economy of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) label for “sustainable fisheries” and the processes of MSC adoption and verification in the South African hake trawl fishery.1 Global trade in fish and fishery products has grown strongly during the past 25 years. Export values have increased by approximately 600% during this period (in nominal terms), reaching US$58.2 billion in 2002 (Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO), 2004). Fish exports from developing countries currently amount to around 50% of global fish exports. They are developing countries’ most valuable export item among agro-food products—exceeding the combined export revenues derived from key agricultural products such as coffee, tea, rubber, rice, meat, and bananas (Ahmed, 2005). Hake is a white-flesh, mild-flavored, low-fat demersal fish. It is caught in both Southern and Northern Hemisphere Atlantic and Pacific waters and processed into a large variety of products (Pitcher & Alheit, 1995). Europe alone imported 260,000 tons of hake in 2003, or 20% of its groundfish imports (Lien, 2006).2
MSC, South Africa, and the hake industry were selected for this case study for the following reasons: (1) MSC is the main ecolabel in the global fish market; (2) only three developing country fisheries have been certified so far, in South Africa, Mexico, and Argentina; (3) MSC certification in South Africa concerned the hake trawl fishery; hake is also the largest fishery in the country, accounting for approximately 50% of the total value of catches and 40% of the total value of exports;3 and (4) South Africa is the largest exporter of fishery products from Africa by value.4
In the next section, I introduce the main features of the MSC initiative and the critical issues that have emerged since its inception in 1996. In Section 3, I examine how MSC certification in South Africa took on peculiar meanings as the certification process played out within the local political economy of fishery conservation and the post-apartheid “empowerment” of previously disadvantaged groups. In Section 4, I compare the political economy of the MSC initiative with other “sustainability” certifications—relating to timber and coffee in particular. In Section 5, I conclude by arguing that special flexibilities and systems of compliance with standards are necessary to cater to the needs of developing countries and small-scale producers.
Section snippets
General features
Wild fish stocks are self-renewing, but their capacity to do so depends on leaving enough fish in the sea to regenerate the stocks in subsequent years.5 In the last couple of decades, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and conservation groups have repeatedly highlighted the plight of over-exploitation of fish stocks around the world, and the impact of intensive
MSC and the South African hake industry
The challenges highlighted so far refer to the MSC initiative as a whole. In this section, the case study of MSC certification of South African hake will highlight that ecolabeling should be understood in relation to the local political economies of the places where it is applied. In South Africa, MSC certification was sought in an environment of competition against other hake/hoki supplier countries to Northern fish importers and processors (especially Unilever), of internal divisions within
The political economy of labels: inclusion, exclusion, and rewards
The main debates in the literature on “sustainability” standards and labels for food and beverages are currently centered on issues of inclusion and exclusion, the reward structure of inclusion, and the scale and location of actors that are included/excluded.19 In particular, case studies on coffee and timber have shown that sustainability
Conclusion
Many observers of agro-food industries in the South see sustainability certifications and labels as a way of addressing skewed power relations along global value chains. But these certifications and labels only go part of the way, as they themselves play within specific political economies and power relations (Hanataka, Mutersbaugh, 2005a, Mutersbaugh, 2005b). By externalizing functions such as achieving sustainability, “lead firms” in global value chains, such as large retailers and branded
Acknowledgments
I am indebted to Edward Allison, Jennifer Bair, Simon Bolwig, Constance Douglas, Rosaleen Duffy, Steen Folke, Peter Gibbon, Stine Jessen Haakonsson, Dave Japp, Peter Kragelund, James McGregor, Niels Jon Mortensen, Brian O’Riordan, Lance van Sittert, Trevor Ward, and four anonymous reviewers for useful comments on earlier versions of this article. Feedback was also received from an anonymous MSC officer and a number of stakeholders in the South African hake industry. All mistakes and omissions
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2023, Journal of Rural StudiesA global review of MSC certification: Why fisheries withdraw?
2022, Marine PolicyCitation Excerpt :CoC is a system that keeps “sustainable" and “other" fish separate from each other from catch to supermarket shelf or ice display [26]. MSC allows, via its logo, consumers to promote sustainable fishing through a market-based (rather than regulation-based) mechanism by choosing the ecolabelled product over the unlabelled product [60–62,26]. A total of 301 fisheries (211 certified and 90 withdrawn) were analysed, and more than 350 public reports of withdrawn fisheries checked.