2024: A Year of Milestones And Success For ASC – And More To Come In 2025!

As 2024 comes to a close, Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) is celebrating a year filled with unique milestones and achievements across the globe. We recognise ASC farms and feed mills and partners around the world who continue to make significant changes towards sustainability, ultimately ensuring that farmed seafood is produced responsibly.

Increasing impact

Throughout 2024, ASC has expanded its reach and impact, working with farmers, retailers, seafood suppliers and consumers to raise awareness about the importance of responsible farmed seafood. Our growing impact was demonstrated in our 2023 Impact Report which showcased significant advances in our programmes, demonstrating our impact and the continued expansion of our global presence and supply, and ultimately driving transformation within the industry. The new ASC interactive Impacts Dashboard launched earlier this year enhances transparency and highlights the wide range of environmental and social impacts delivered by the ASC programme.

Around the world, our presence is also growing steadily. In our biggest consumer survey carried out to date, ASC was the most recognised and trusted farmed seafood label in all countries surveyed, scoring significantly higher than other responsible farmed seafood programme labels.

Event success

Throughout the year, ASC continued to connect retailers with farms through our unique Discovery Tours, with trips to Norway, Greece and Chile in 2024. Journalists from the US joined us for the first time on the Greece tour, opening their eyes to how ASC certified farms operate. These experiences not only enhance seafood buyers’ understanding of responsible aquaculture but also create valuable opportunities for producers to connect with the global market.

The ASC team was out delivering speeches, taking part in panels, meeting customers and making new connections at events round the globe in 2024. We met with customers at the world’s largest seafood expos held in Boston, Barcelona, and Singapore, engaging with industry leaders and stakeholders through dynamic panel discussions while sharing valuable insights and knowledge.

Other notable events in 2024 saw CEO Chris Ninnes delivering keynote speeches at Tokyo Sustainable Seafood Summit and at IntraFish International Salmon Week. We enjoyed another hugely successful Global Shrimp Forum in Utrecht and are looking forward to another stimulating programme next year from 2 – 4 September 2025.

2024 saw ASC debut at South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, where our US team held a number of engaging events focusing on ASC certified products to increase awareness of our sea green brand with American consumers.

We look forward to a number of exciting events next year including the World Ocean Summit and Expo in Tokyo, the UN Ocean Conference in Nice and the Blue Food Innovation Summit in London.

ASC impact around the globe

Our local teams around the world have been busy in 2024 connecting with producers and market players and delivering innovative and impactful marketing campaigns to promote the ASC label to consumers.

Nordic Region

2024 was a startup year in the Nordic region. The team has built a social media presence in Sweden and Denmark, collaborated with partners, kicked off producer marketing activities and created a marketing and communications strategy with ambitious goals. Over the year, successful influencer campaigns have run in Sweden, laying the groundwork for further success in 2025.

ASC Nordic region builds social media presence highlighting responsibly produced seafood recipes.

With additional capacity for producer outreach, marketing and communication, the team has been able to start a producer marketing programme, focusing on Norwegian salmon producers, to better understand how the ASC can support them.

Northwest Europe

‘Think Fish Week’ 2024 was one of the campaign highlights in Northwest Europe, creating huge awareness about responsible seafood across the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Austria and Switzerland (DACH). In Belgium, ASC and MSC and Iglo co-created a video showcasing the value of partnerships in promoting sustainable seafood, achieving nearly two million impressions and a 1million reach.

The DACH region also continued its consumer campaign which positioned ASC-labelled salmon as the preferred choice for consumers and businesses, emphasising its environmental and social benefits. The campaign effectively targeted both B2B and B2C audiences, with highlights including impactful out-of-home advertising like branded shopping carts that achieved over 5.5 million impressions, and high-relevance influencer collaborations to increase awareness. It also featured well-received advertorials in retailer magazines and premium culinary publications, along with engaging sampling sessions at seafood festivals to provide one-on-one consumer experiences.

Think Fish Week 2024: inspiring consumers to make responsible seafood choices with ASC.

In recognition of responsible seafood farming in the United Kingdom, ASC held the fourth annual UK Awards in partnership with MSC, ultimately crowning Fish Said Fred as the ASC Brand of the Year, Sainsbury’s as the ASC UK Retailer of the Year and Lyons Seafoods as the ASC UK Retail Supplier of the Year award.

Summer 2024 in the UK also saw an in-store ASC and MSC consumer campaign in all Sainsbury’s stores to celebrate their double award win in 2023. The campaign, which included influencer collaborations and interactive social media activities, engaged seafood lovers in making responsible seafood choices.

Southern Europe

In 2024, ASC officially entered the Italian, Spanish and Portuguese markets to support local partners and raise awareness about the ASC label with consumers. A press lunch was held in Milan for journalists to taste ASC certified seabream and mussels and discuss responsible seafood farming. Two ASC certified farms joined the event and shared their experiences about the value ASC certification has added to their business.

Desirée Pesci, Market Development Manager Italy, presents the ASC programme to journalists in Milan.

The first consumer campaign in Spain was launched with El Corte Inglés which became the first retailer selling ASC certified fish at their fresh fish counters. More than 400 fish counter staff were trained on the ASC programme so they could educate consumers.

In France, as part of Monaco Ocean Week, ASC convened a roundtable to examine the transformative role which sustainable investments and blue finance can play in protecting the oceans. In May, ASC France also hosted its First Partner Day, bringing together 43 stakeholders from across the industry.

North America

ASC touched down in the vibrant and seafood-loving city of Atlanta, kicking off with the Summer Seafood Series. ASC partnered with Atlanta-based distributor Inland Foods, local seafood restaurant Fishmonger and local retailer Kathleen’s Catch for an exciting promotion educating shoppers and diners about the ASC label. This was ASC North America’s first concurrent restaurant and retail promotion in a single market.

The “Summer Seafood Series” connected thousands of Atlanta seafood enthusiasts.

In another major achievement, Holland America became the first cruise line to source seafood for their cruise passengers from international global certifications, with both ASC and MSC certifications.

Asia Pacific

Japan celebrated Sustainable Seafood Week 2024 by presenting a Certificate of Appreciation to comedian Hiroyuki Baba, in recognition for his outstanding contributions over the past two years in raising awareness of the ASC label in Japan. The team hosted a culinary showdown with Baba and popular chef Ryūji featuring sustainable seafood designed to inspire home cooking.

ASC recognised Japanese comedian Hiroyuki Baba for his continuous efforts to promote the label and responsible seafood in Japan.

2024 saw the launch of “SeaAsu-kun”, – Japan’s New ASC Mascot which embodies ASC’s mission of protecting the future of our oceans while promoting sustainable and responsible aquaculture. A public competition was held to choose the name, with “SeaAsu-kun,” chosen by Hiroyuki Baba. The name combines three key elements – “Sea” representing the ocean, “Asu” meaning tomorrow in Japanese, and “ASC” to symbolise the organisation.

Another highlight of 2024 was the Japanese team’s visit to Thailand with NGO partner Seafood Legacy for them to learn more about the ASC Improver Programme.

In South Korea, ASC hosted the Korea Sustainable Aquaculture Seminar 2024 which focused on transitioning to ecosystem-based sustainable seafood.

A special cross-regional learning and experience exchange Benchmark Tour was also organised by the ASC South Korean team in Thailand which brought together South Korean producers to visit ASC certified shrimp sites across Thailand.

Looking forward to 2025

ASC CEO Chris Ninnes said, “I would first like to thank all the seafood farmers that have achieved ASC certification, now in 52 countries, all of their partners in the supply chain that deliver our labelled products into the market and the retailers and food service outlets commitments to stock and sell them. The collective action of all of these clients helps drive our shared ambition to reduce the environmental and social impact of seafood farming.

“Of course, this ambition can only be met with the support of the entire team at ASC for their continued hard work and dedication. It is really quite incredible to look back on the huge range of achievements from the last 12 months, helping to drive improvements for seafood, people and planet. The ASC family also extends into the many dedicated individuals who volunteer to run and engage with both our Supervisory and our Technical Boards. Without them the organisation would not function. This family also includes the hundreds of individuals who also give up their time to advise us on the adequacy (or not) of the many documents we seek consultation on. Again all of their inputs are invaluable.

“None of our work can be achieved solely by the ASC, so as we celebrate our collective achievements, I would also like to thank our partners for their ongoing collaboration and support, including Marine Stewardship Council, Sustainable Fisheries Partnership, Global Shrimp Forum, The Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions, and the Certification and Ratings Collaboration. We also continue to strengthen relationships with a growing group of UN agencies, including FAO, and the World Bank, who have helped significantly enhance our initiatives and broaden our impact.

“Looking ahead, 2025 is going to be a big year for ASC and we are all excited about the improvements and opportunities that the next 12 months will bring. We remain committed to our mission of transforming aquaculture for the benefit of people and planet and the launch of our new Farm Standard and the ongoing implementation of the Feed Standard will be pivotal in achieving this. I very much look forward to maintaining existing collaborations but also developing new ones. And I invite everyone to continue to champion the many benefits of sustainable seafood farming throughout 2025. Together, we can make a difference and ensure that future generations can enjoy these benefits.”