A private-sector sustainable fishing initiative.

In response to dwindling fish stocks worldwide, a seafood distributor is teaming up with an environmental group to create economic incentives for sustainable fishing. The U.K. branch of the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Anglo-Dutch Unilever - one of the world's largest manufacturers of seafood products - agreed in April to develop a fisheries eco-labeling system and to share the costs of the set-up process.

Over the next two years, WWF and Unilever will consult with scientists, environmentalists, and representatives from government and industry to define sustainable fishing criteria. Participating fishers will probably be required to specify where and how fish are caught. The system may include more selective fishing gear, satellite monitoring of vessels, and genetic sampling of the catch to verify its origin. Labeling and implementation will be provided by an independent Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), similar to the timber industry's Forest Stewardship Council (see "Labeling Wood," page 29). Unilever has agreed to sell only MSC-approved seafood products by the year 2005.

This approach is a major break with existing regulations, which generally come into play only after fish are caught and therefore tend to encourage overfishing. The current European Union quota system, for instance, specifies size and quantity restrictions that apply only at the dock, where fish are unloaded and sold, but not during the actual fishing process. Fishers therefore haul in everything they can, sort the catch, and dump the portion that doesn't make the quotas. The practice is called "hoovering" because fishers practically vacuum an area of water clean of marine life.

The North Sea and some other areas are already seeing an important change in fishing practices, which should make the transition to a sustainable market easier to achieve. Almost half the North Sea catch is made up of sandeel, pout, sprat, and other small species which form the lower links of the marine food chain. Too small and bony for direct consumption, these fish are processed mainly into fish oil - used in margarine and baking products - and into pet food, fertilizers, and fishmeal.

But to companies like Unilever, such fish are far more valuable in the water than on the docks because they're the prey of cod, haddock, salmon, and other commercially important species. With profits worth $400 million in 1995, Unilever accounts for a quarter of the fish products market in Europe and the United States. Its retail seafood brands - Igloo, Birds Eye, and Gorton's - constitute a much larger share of the company's business than its fish oil processing.

In order to protect its long-term profits, Unilever has agreed to stop buying and processing fish oil from European sources by April 1997. Likewise, the British supermarket chain, Sainsbury's, has agreed in principle to stop selling products containing fish oil. About 120 products would be affected, but substitutes are available for all of them.

Many fishers, however, remain skeptical about the effect of the labeling scheme. Concerns range from how it will affect small fishing operations, to the divisive issue of defining sustainable fishing. But environmental awareness and commercial self-interest are a potent combination - more potent, perhaps, than regulations alone.