EJF campaigners yesterday presented at an event on ethical issues in the seafood supply chain, highlighting the ongoing prevalence of slavery in the Thai fishing industry.

EJF's investigations last year highlighted the ongoing prevalence of abuse in the Thai fishing industry.

Representatives from organisations including the Home Office Modern Slavery Unit, Seafish, the British Retail Consortium, CP Foods, the Ethical Trading Initiative, Anti-Slavery International and the Freedom Fund were present at the event.

EJF gave updates on our anti-slavery work in Thailand, highlighting the ongoing prevalence of abuse in the Thai fishing industry following our Slavery At Sea report released last year and the subsequent downgrading of Thailand to Tier 3 in the US Department of State’s 2014 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report.

EJF noted that some ‘baby steps’ have been taken to address the widespread and systemic abuse in Thai fisheries, such as demonstration of political will to combat human trafficking, Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing and poor fisheries management. However, major issues remain; in particular, the need for implementation and enforcement of reform in Thai fisheries and the fact that some key stakeholders continue to deny the problems within the industry.