Go directly to content
Comment on dolphin slaughter in the Faroe Islands
ASC does not certify – or condone – any kind of mass slaughter of dolphins or whales, in the Faroe Islands or anywhere else, and does not certify the farming or captivity of these animals.
Only individual fish farms can be certified against ASC’s strict standards, and neither the Faroe Islands nor any aspect of these practices is ASC certified.
We share the widespread concerns about this practice but ASC has no influence or ability to prevent or take action against it, because it is completely unrelated to fish farming and falls under the remit of national law.
ASC is a certification programme for responsibly farmed seafood – that includes species like salmon, shrimp and seaweed, but not dolphins or any other marine mammals. Our standards are used by independent certification bodies to audit individual farms to determine if they are being managed responsibly.
The certification of a company’s farms in the Faroe Islands (or anywhere else) does not imply any endorsement of the wider company or country. These audits take into account hundreds of factors, including environmental and social impacts and wider impacts such as feed production and energy use. But of course, every programme must have a defined scope and a limit to what it can consider, and it is simply not possible for ASC audits to take into account issues that are completely unrelated to seafood farming.
Our programme has public consultation at its heart and we strongly believe in the importance of listening to public opinion, which is something we would encourage all involved in this practice to do.
ASC is unique among farmed seafood certification programmes in that all of our standards and audit reports are transparent and available to view online. Not everyone has time to read through our detailed standards of course, which is why we also try to summarise our programme and its impacts on our website, particularly on our Aquaculture Explained pages.
Protecting the environment is a passion for us, as it is for many people, so we understand that discussions about such emotive issues can easily lead to misunderstandings about what we do, and what is covered by our programme. Hopefully our website can help to clarify these things, but we are able to answer any additional questions anyone may have for us.