February 27, 2018 — The Conservation Alliance is pleased to announce its newest collaborator, Index Initiative, initiator of the Seafood Stewardship Index (SSI). SSI is its first project as a non-profit organization based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The organization seeks to propel the use of benchmarks to engage seafood companies in delivering on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Index Initiative believes in partnerships and working together with a wide variety of stakeholders in and around the seafood industry. “Sustainability is a team effort and in order for the Seafood Stewardship Index to be effective we will need buy-in from all relevant stakeholders. We firmly believe that only by taking into account the different views and blending those into a commonly agreed framework, we will be able to create a meaningful tool to measure how the world’s largest seafood companies contribute to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals,” said Bas Geerts, Lead Seafood Stewardship Index at Index Initiative.
The SSI focuses on the role of leading seafood companies in promoting stewardship of natural resources and production chains. To rank companies on their performance on sustainable seafood, a methodology is developed, after which data will be collected that is used to benchmark companies’ performance against the SDGs. By comparing companies to one another, the Index provides a transparent and impartial means by which companies and their stakeholders can monitor performance and hold seafood companies accountable for their sustainability commitments and progress.
The Conservation Alliance welcomes Index Initiative’s expertise on progress reporting and business accountability. Meaghan Heffernan, Conservation Alliance manager said, “we are thrilled to welcome SSI to our community and look forward to supporting its engagement with our membership body’s efforts to secure, track, and implement business commitments to social and environmental responsibility.”
