Fishery Improvement Projects

Fishery Improvement Projects

For wild fishery products, sustainability programmes such as the BIM backed Fishery Improvement Projects (FIPs) demonstrate Ireland’s commitment to achieving and maintaining sustainable fisheries.  FIPs are a science-based approach to making continual improvements in the sustainability of specific fisheries.  FIPs are a globally recognised means of assessing fisheries and identifying actions to improve the management and sustainability of these fisheries.  The Irish FIPs, within BIM’s sustainability strategy, have continued to act as platform to demonstrate the sustainability credentials of Irish fisheries.

Membership of BIM FIPs, that are appropriate to the applicants seafood business, is a pre-requisite to BIM’s Responsibly Sourced Seafood Standard (RSS). Thus ensuring the sustainability of the FIP sourced seafood through independently certified management practices demonstrating Ireland’s commitment to sustainable fisheries to complement the sustainability elements of the RSS. 

BIM is piloting digital technologies such as blockchain, as means to increase the traceability and visibility of the provenance of Irish seafood caught and processed.  This information potentially can be used to enhance the commercial benefits for sourcing Irish seafood. BIM will be launching a Sustainability Improver programme in 2021. Capitalising on the FIPs and Digitalisation, the objective is to maximise these tools and others that are available to vessels and processors to develop evidence based sourcing policies and prepare them for 3rd party verification and address seafood sourcing requirements in the market.