Introducing the MSC Labour Eligibility Requirements

The MSC Labour Eligibility Requirements consolidates existing MSC labour requirements into a single document and will be effective from 01 May 2023.

Fishery and Chain of Custody applicants and certificate holders must comply with MSC's labour eligibility requirements before being audited or certified to the MSC’s Fisheries or Chain of Custody standards.

Chain of Custody requirements for third-party labour audits or self-assessments will be extended to all applicants and certificate holders with processing, packing and/or manual off-loading in their scope.

The document is organised into three main parts:

• Requirements for all applicants and certificate holders
• Requirements for applicants and certificate holders at sea
• Requirements for applicants and certificate holders on land

Requirements for all MSC applicants and certificate holders

Exclusion for entities convicted of forced or child labour violations

The MSC requires that fishery or Chain of Custody applicants or certificate holders shall not include any entity convicted for a forced or child labour violation in the last two years.

This applies to any of the following if they are implicated in a conviction for forced or child labour violations:

• Individual vessels or sites
• Groups of vessels or sites
• Individual members of an MSC certificate holder and/or client group.

The offence resulting in the conviction does not need to have occurred within the Unit of Assessment.

Requirements for at-sea applicants and certificate holders

Public reporting of policies and measures

All MSC certified fisheries and at-sea supply chain businesses are required to complete and submit the MSC At Sea Labour Eligibility Requirements Reporting Template.

The Reporting Template allows certified fisheries and at-sea supply chain businesses to detail the policies, practices and measures in place to ensure the absence of forced and child labour.

Reports for every fishery certified to the MSC Fisheries Standard can be found on Track a Fishery.

Requirements for land-based Chain of Custody applicants and certificate holders

The Labour Eligibility Requirements document extends existing requirements to all certified supply chain businesses that undertake processing and packing of certified seafood in all countries.

From 01 May 23 all applicants or certificate holders in all countries who process, pack/repack and/or manually offload must either

• Complete a labour audit with a third-party labour scheme*
• OR submit a self-assessment of the risk of forced and child labour in their supply chain to their Conformity Assessment Body and allow the MSC to commission a third-party audit if called upon to do so.

* Recognised audit programs include amfori BSCI, SEDEX SMETA, SA 8000, BRCGS ETRS and any other program recognised by SSCI.