At Whole Foods Market®, we’ve got a wide range of stakeholders. These are the people who have an interest or an investment in what we do or sell. Most directly, we’ve got our customers, team members, suppliers and investors. Indirectly, our stakeholders also include members of the public who are watching and commenting (sometimes publically) on what we do, such as environmental and consumer groups. As Whole Foods Market continually works to be the leader in responsible sourcing of food and other products, our stakeholders challenge us to aim high. And this is a good thing! Simultaneously, we must consider all of our stakeholders’ points of view and balance these perspectives so that at the end of the day we have practical standards that the most motivated and innovative suppliers can meet and we have high-quality products to offer our customers.

So, what is a multi-stakeholder process, anyway? Essentially, it’s a forum for bringing different perspectives to the table. Let’s take a real life example. Right now we’re working on developing a new set of Seafood Quality Standards — our standards for farmed molluscs (a.k.a shellfish like clams, mussels and oysters). The process is well on its way and we aim to finish this spring. To create the standards, we studied the published science, visited farms from coast to coast, met with farmers and talked with many scientists to make sure we understood the issues. We also sought input from environmentalists. These discussions occurred during meetings, on the phone and over email. The process can occur in many ways! We’re also holding meetings with all of our supplier partners to review our draft standards point-by-point and get their feedback.

The first farmed mollusc supplier meeting took place January 10^th at our North Atlantic regional office and attendance was great. We hosted Whole Foods Market seafood buyers, representatives from our Quality Standards Team and Global Food Safety teams, and our consultant, Oceanographer Jon Grant from Dalhousie University in Canada. Almost twenty east coast growers participated in the meeting, hailing from Virginia, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland, Canada.

Together with the growers, we reviewed the standards and had engaging discussions on a range of topics including what makes a production system aquaculture (vs. wild capture), disease prevention, standards for monitoring and preventing impacts to sediments under farms, harvesting, predator control and traceability. We received productive feedback and, fortunately, it looks like we’re on the right track with our standards.

Running a multi-stakeholder process is a lot of work, but it’s worth it in the end because when our stakeholders are involved in the process of developing standards, they’re invested in the outcome and can share in the success.

Look for more details on the farmed mollusc standards this spring!

The last few years have been busy ones for the Seafood Quality Standards team at Whole Foods Market. We implemented new aquaculture standards for farmed finfish and shrimp and we launched our wild species ranking program — making our seafood cases more colorful and rich with information. Now the wild-caught seafood in our fresh cases carry either the MSC-certified label to indicate the seafood is certified sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council, or if it’s not certified, the color-coded sustainability status rankings by partnering organizations, Blue Ocean Institute and Monterey Bay Aquarium. Our farmed finfish and shrimp carry our Responsibly Farmed logo, indicating that the farms have been third-party audited to ensure that our strict aquaculture standards are being met.

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Unlike conventional grocers who may source tilapia from any old place as long as the price is right, Whole Foods Market sources all seafood, including tilapia, according to our Quality Standards. In the case of tilapia, we source from just three supplier partners, all of whom have passed a third-party audit to ensure that they meet our rigorous quality standards.

Our primary supplier partner, Tropical Aquaculture Inc., brings us tilapia from Santa Priscila, located in beautiful Ecuador. Santa Priscila practices polyculture by raising shrimp and tilapia together in the same ponds. This helps reduce waste and water pollution, as tilapia consume feed that the shrimp leave behind and help get rid of organic matter that otherwise could end up in the environment. The farm also re-circulates its water, which further helps to protect water quality surrounding the farm.

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Hey readers, big news! We’ve just launched a new sustainability ratings program for wild-caught seafood. Through this partnership with Blue Ocean Institute and Monterey Bay Aquarium, our customers can now use color-coded ratings to make informed decisions about their seafood purchases. And with our promise to phase out all red-rated sources by Earth Day 2013, we’ve deepened our commitment to having fully sustainable seafood departments.

This new initiative builds upon the partnership that Whole Foods Market has had with the Marine Stewardship Council since 1999 and it complements Whole Foods Market’s existing farmed seafood standards, which remain the highest standards in the industry. It’s all part of our overall effort to move our seafood purchasing, and the seafood industry as a whole, towards healthier oceans and greater sustainability.

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Since launching our enhanced Quality Standards for Aquaculture in July 2008, we’ve maintained a relatively low profile. We got the word out to the media, posted background information and the detailed standards on our website as well as brochures and other signage in our seafood departments. I also presented the standards at various meetings and conferences. However, we found that we still needed a quick way for our busy customers to see-at a glance-that there’s something special about the farmed seafood sold at Whole Foods Market.

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End of the Line, a documentary based on journalist Charles Clover’s book of the same name, is showing at a handful of film festivals and will play in some cities on June 8th-World Oceans Day.  I had a chance to watch the film and have a few thoughts to share.

The film begins with beautiful footage of marine life and quickly (and graphically) moves toward its key message: The oceans are overfished and fish populations are in trouble. Some of the most well-known and well-respected marine scientists are interviewed in the film to confirm these bleak trends.

I appreciate the filmmaker’s intention to tell this important story about the oceans. Our oceans are under incredible pressure and overfishing is a HUGE problem. In their latest global status report, the FAO states that slightly over half (52%) of fish populations are fished at their maximum sustainable limits, and there’s no room for further expansion. An additional 28% of fish populations are overexploited, depleted, or recovering from depletion. Why this happens requires a longer discussion, but the short of it is that overfishing happens when fishing quotas (i.e. limits on how many fish can be caught) are exceeded, or because no regulations or ineffective regulations exist to control fishing. Sometimes regulations are on the books but aren’t enforced. And corruption in the market is a reality that undermines even the well-intentioned.

Even so, I wish that a more complete story was told in the film. Read the rest of this entry »

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the government agency that’s responsible for managing fisheries in U.S. waters, is asking for public comments on proposed policies for addressing what’s known in the industry as illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing (a.k.a. pirate fishing) and bycatch (unintentional or incidental catch) of protected species like whales and sea turtles. Okay, there are a lot of acronyms in that first sentence (I even left some out) but the point is: as citizens we have an opportunity to express our opinion about how these public resources are managed.

Here’s mine: Hats off to NMFS for addressing these critical issues! Together with my colleague, Margaret Wittenberg – Global Vice President of Quality Standards and Public Relations, we’ve submitted comments to NMFS letting them know that Whole Foods Market cares about sourcing seafood sustainably and minimizing the impacts of fishing on the marine ecosystem. To source seafood right, though, we need strong regulations that address illegal fishing because as a grocery store, we can’t police the oceans.

We’re urging our fishery managers to do everything possible to provide the tools necessary to help us avoid sourcing from fisheries that catch fish illegally or take protected species. For example, denying port privileges to nations fishing illegally and prohibiting the import of fish products in violation of these rules would be a huge step forward; it would put the onus of responsibility on nations to fish responsibly, rather than on a grocery store like Whole Foods Market to figure out who is fishing legally and who isn’t. Finally, there may be fisheries that operate legally within a country that is found to be engaging in illegal fishing in other sectors. Consequently, we agree with NMFS’ approach to have alternative certification procedures that allow products to be certified on a shipment-by-shipment or shipper-by-shipper basis.

If you’d like to submit comments yourself, the deadline is May 14, 2009 and details can be found on Federal Register Docket No. 070514119-81404-02 (pdf).

You can read the full letter (pdf) that Whole Foods Market submitted to NMFS.

What do you think? Let us know and, more importantly, let the NMFS know!

In developing the newly enhanced Seafood Quality Standards for farmed seafood at Whole Foods Market, I had the amazing opportunity to visit farms in remote locations around the world to learn about the wide range of aquaculture practices used to raise farmed seafood. I’m often asked, “What’s the most amazing place that you’ve visited?” While every country and the people that I’ve met have been incredibly different and interesting, I often answer, “Iceland.”

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Shrimp farming and healthy mangrove ecosystems…Can the two go hand in hand?

The past few months have been an exciting time for seafood at Whole Foods Market. In July 2008 we released our newly enhanced standards for farmed finfish and shrimp. In launching these standards, we set a high bar not only for how our seafood is raised, but also for environmental performance in aquaculture globally. Our commitment to sustainability reaches beyond our own stores, which is why we’ve posted our standards on our website and contribute to share and discuss our work at conferences and meetings worldwide.

As we have received several questions from customers particularly interested in shrimp and wanting to know what Whole Foods Market is doing specifically to protect mangroves from the impacts of shrimp farming, I’ll focus this posting on the topic of mangroves.

What are mangroves, anyway?

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Sometimes you meet people who are truly remarkable. I met such a person in September 2007 on a trout farm visit to Idaho. Following two days of presentations at the U.S. Trout Farmers Association meeting, my fellow fishmongers and I were greeted by Leo Ray, who loaded us into his truck for an all day tour of the Snake River Canyon of South Central Idaho. A tall, fit man of undeterminable age, Leo is a zoologist, fish farmer, and naturalist. What’s remarkable about Leo is that he not only possesses tremendous knowledge of aquaculture and knows every inch of the vast land around him—the geology, river systems, the wildlife, etc.—but he shares it. With his wisdom and appreciation for nature, Leo transformed for me what first appeared as a dry, rough, rocky landscape into a living ecosystem that interacts each day with large agriculture and aquaculture industries.

Trout at Leo’s farm are raised in concrete raceways situated on a down-sloping hill. This set-up allows him to utilize gravity for water to flow, which is critical for maintaining healthy oxygen levels, among other things. The water in this system flows downhill from one portion of the raceway to the next. Sediments are collected at the end of each level of the raceway and then flushed to settling ponds before the water is released back into the river or into irrigation canals for local farmers. Farms must have Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) permits and monitor water quality according to the Total Maximum Daily Load limits. In Idaho farms are required to monitor water quality each month and report results to the EPA and the Department of Environmental Quality. In addition, these agencies do annual spot checks on the farm. Allowable discharges are based on assessments of what the river can assimilate.

While currently all of the trout we sell at Whole Foods Market comes from flow-through raceway systems like Leo’s, we continue to keep our eye on developments of other types of systems such as closed, re-circulating systems. However, a major benefit of the flow-through raceway system is that there are no energy inputs to create flow in the water. In contrast, closed, re-circulating systems require energy inputs, which have a carbon footprint.

What about feed?

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