By The fisheries sector is a vital player in ensuring food security in the coming decades. The industry has seen record levels of production in recent years and is still expected to expand. According to the latest State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture (SOFIA) in 2020, the industry contributed 214 million tons of seafood to the global food supply, its highest-ever record.Â
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations (UN), the expansion of aquaculture has fueled the rapid increase of seafood production in the past few decades.Â
While the growth of aquaculture is a welcome development, the sector’s issues with responsible resource management, further minimizing its environmental impacts, and ensuring benefit equity continue to haunt its expansion.
To help in establishing best practices and clearer goals for sustainable aquaculture, FAO released the Guidelines for Sustainable Agriculture (GSA) this 2022. The GSAs are based on scientifically-backed and enforceable legal and institutional frameworks developed through a series of FAO-led consultations since 2017.Â
FAO’s GSA is still being reviewed by technical experts and is expected to be finalized and publicly released in March 2023.Â
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