BLUEYOU LAUNCHES MOST COMPREHENSIVE ANIMAL WELFARE POLICY FOR SUSTAINABLE SEAFOOD WORLDWIDE

Blueyou launches most comprehensive animal welfare policy for sustainable seafood worldwide. The progressive seafood supplier partnered with Aquatic Life Institute to create the ground-breaking global policy.
Progressive seafood company Blueyou has recently launched the first animal welfare policy for a sustainable seafood portfolio brand worldwide. The policy, created with strong guidance from Aquatic Life Institute, indicates an important shift toward aquatic animal welfare considerations for the seafood sector and sets a new standard for all brands to strive for in their own corporate policies.
Every year, 2 – 3 trillion aquatic animals are harvested, caught, and killed in fisheries and aquaculture for human consumption. This number is 35 times higher than globally farmed and slaughtered land animals combined. Yet historically, unlike in other animal-farming sectors, animal welfare in capture fisheries and aquaculture has been excluded from meaningful welfare consideration and, today, is still not addressed by most seafood producers, distributors, food service companies, and retailers. Blueyou is changing that.
Blueyou has been a pioneer in sustainable seafood solutions, addressing both environmental and social impacts of seafood harvesting systems for more than 20 years. Despite this long-time expertise and experience in working with producers on site, the fact that Blueyou is only now rolling out a specific animal welfare policy reflects how the seafood industry is just starting to address one of the last key remaining topics for conscious consumers – animal welfare. Aquatic Life Institute is confident that Blueyou’s trailblazing commitment to welfare will pave the way for other seafood companies to follow in their steps to meet the growing demand for comprehensive policies from consumers.
Aquatic Life Institute was intricately involved in providing edits and suggestions to the new welfare policy prior to publication, and remains impressed with Blueyou’s vision and commitment. As Aquatic Life Institute is dedicated to supporting and accelerating activities that positively impact aquatic life, the organization focuses on the highest-impact welfare interventions for all aquatic animals on a global scale. In working with companies like Blueyou, Aquatic Life Institute aims to encourage comprehensive sustainability policies that include animal welfare as they can help businesses overall – by attracting and retaining customers, building brand loyalty, reducing risks, and setting companies apart from other competitors – on top of the ethical considerations.
“Blueyou’s visionary and clear animal welfare policy is the strongest example that we have seen to date from a major seafood company. Their specific language around minimising animals’ stress and suffering, educating the supply chain around them to create a domino effect, and a commitment to publicly reporting on progress is an excellent model for other seafood companies to adopt. We applaud Blueyou for taking this significant step forward in their business priorities.” stated Sophika Kostyniuk, Managing Director, Aquatic Life Institute.
Blueyou’s new animal welfare policy is a statement for the company’s holistic view on the responsible seafood movement. As part of their complete new set of 10 impact policies, Blueyou recognises the integral role of animal welfare and health in sustainable food production and are committed to improving the conditions of species raised and caught in their supply chains and origins.
“We believe that future seafood origins must be aligned with the planetary boundaries in terms of the environmental impact dimension, including climate change,” said René Benguerel, Founder and Managing Director of Blueyou. “However, of equal importance for Blueyou is the social and community-dimension of the seafood industry, a well as the animal welfare of the species being caught and harvested for human consumption – including the species which are affected by indirect side-effects of the industry, such as aquatic animals being used for feed in the farmed sector as well as those being affected by the wild capture fisheries, such as the bait species and by-catch.”
A truly groundbreaking policy, some of its strongest elements include its ambitious plan to address some of the most pressing issues in aquaculture – namely stunning before slaughter, and mutilation – by the end of next year (Dec. 2025). As well, the policy’s plans for promotion of nature-based farming systems and lower trophic species, in addition to stocking densities and water quality, are exceptionally robust.
Another interesting aspect of the policy involves its approach to improving welfare in wild capture fisheries, where considerations for welfare are really just at the beginning stages for most companies and producers. For this reason, Blueyou’s plans for a gradual approach, starting with awareness raising among actors in their supply chain followed by welfare improvements on a pre-competitive basis using guidance from Aquatic Life Institute, promises to be impactful. Additionally, their plan of moving towards low trophic species highlights the important linkages between fisheries and aquaculture by reducing the need for wild-caught fish as feed.
Aquatic Life Institute and Blueyou are highly committed and excited to continue collaborating together on not only developing this policy further, but also beginning implementation to ensure its success in the coming years.
About Aquatic Life Institute
Aquatic Life Institute is an international non-profit organisation that works on advancing aquatic animal welfare in both aquaculture and wild capture fisheries globally. The organization works with certifiers, non-profits, academic institutions, industry stakeholders, governments, and the public to improve welfare of aquatic animals.
About Blueyou
Blueyou is a seafood importer and wholesale distributor headquartered in Switzerland with branch companies and distribution networks in Asia, Europe and North America. Blueyou directly works with community-based fisheries and aquaculture producers and supports improvements in environmental, social and animal welfare matters. Blueyou’s key focus areas are restorative aquaculture in combination with mangrove restoration, empowerment of coastal fishing and farming communities and the development of climate-smart seafood production and harvesting systems.