Community-Supported Solutions Come to the Seafood Community
SeaWeb and the Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions announced the opening of submissions for the 2018 Seafood Co-Lab Competition last month.
The Seafood Co-Lab is an annual event that brings to bear the experience and expertise of the seafood industry in addressing new sustainability challenges to the management of fisheries, aquaculture resources and supply chains in the global seafood industry. Teams compete to win a $10,000 prize and attend the Seafood Summit to address their challenge with the support and knowledge of the attendees at the Seafood Summit. Winners will be chosen by the seafood community and will receive logistical and technical support to implement their idea. To learn more about the Seafood Co-Lab, please visit the website.
Proposals are encouraged from teams that comprise both industry and civil society and address a specific challenge in sustainable seafood. Proposals should be submitted online at http://speakingofseafood.org/seafood-co-lab/enter-2018-competition.
“I am thrilled to see this innovative program go so quickly from concept to reality,” said Ann-Marie Copping, OceanWise Manager and member of the Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions Advisory Board. “Today’s seafood supply issues are simply too large and complex to be solved from within a bubble. Collaboration is key, and the Seafood Co-Lab is perfectly designed to stimulate creative collaborative thinking.”
The Seafood Co-Lab’s unique cross-sectoral approach is designed to stimulate original thinking by requiring participants to cross-pollinate ideas with innovators outside of their usual professional silo. While not the first time the competition model has been used, the Co-Lab is unique in that it is rigorously collaborative, brings together expertise from across the seafood community, and funds discrete projects with a clear end goal that helps the seafood industry become more sustainable.
Ned Daly, SeaWeb Program Director, highlighted the value to the seafood community. “Over the last twenty years the seafood industry has amassed a wealth in expertise and experience addressing some of the biggest challenges in seafood sustainability. The Co-Lab is the mechanism through which we can apply this experience and expertise to new, emerging challenges in sustainable seafood. The Co-Lab program will focus this expertise where it can do the most good, promote positive stories, and give new stakeholders an opportunity to join in sustainability by voting for engaging projects.”
Proposals will be accepted from December 15, 2017 to January 25th, 2018. Four finalists will be profiled and promoted to the seafood community and the winning project will be selected through online public voting process. The winner will be announced at Seafood Expo North America, March 11-13, 2017. In addition to the cash prize, the winning project will be teamed with subject matter experts, and up to four members of the winning team will be supported to attend the SeaWeb Seafood Summit in Barcelona, Spain, 19-21 June 2018.
The partnership of SeaWeb and the Conservation Alliance opens up great opportunities for staging and promoting this event to the seafood community. SeaWeb serves the sustainable seafood community by nourishing a coordinated infrastructure of people and knowledge through well-known events such as the SeaWeb Seafood Summit. The Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions connects leading conservation groups from North America, South America, Europe, and Japan that work with businesses throughout the supply chain from fishermen and fish farmers to retailers and restaurants. Together, these two organizations can offer winners not just financial and administrative support, but also a unique conduit to the collective expertise of the seafood community.
For information about becoming a sponsor of the Seafood Co-Lab, please visit http://speakingofseafood.org/seafood-co-lab/support-seafood-co-lab.
About the Seafood Co-Lab producers
SeaWeb serves the sustainable seafood community by nourishing a coordinated infrastructure of people and knowledge to guide, inspire and reward the seafood industry’s uptake of sustainable practices. For more information, visit: http://www.seaweb.org.
The Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions connects leading conservation groups from North America, South America, Europe, and Japan that work with businesses throughout the supply chain from fishermen and fish farmers to retailers and restaurants. For more information, visit: http://www.solutionsforseafood.org.
