Oxfam Italia, Bolton Food team up for a healthier, more sustainable fishing industry

(ANSA) - ROME, 26 NOV - Bolton Food and Oxfam Italia have teamed up to form a pioneering partnership to make the fishing industry more just and sustainable.
    The Italian company, whose products include well-known brands such as Rio Mare, is the first in the world to reach an agreement with Oxfam Italia for a multi-country approach to raise human-rights standards in the global tuna sector, starting with fishers in countries such as Ecuador, Morocco and Indonesia.
    The alliance, presented at a digital event entitled 'Together for a Human Economy. For More Just and Sustainable Food', seeks to make the fishing supply chain, one of the longest and most complex in the food sector, increasingly fairer.
    The four-year partnership envisages a four-year roadmap until 2024, starting with a process of analysis of the tuna sector at the global level by Oxfam Italia in order to protect and further valorize the people and communities involved.
    This work being done is in "full harmony with the international standards on this subject contained in the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) and the OECD's Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Business" a statement said.
    With this partnership the Italian company is continuing and reinforcing its commitment to sustainability that has already been launched in the environmental sphere with the WWF.
    "The commitment that Bolton has assumed by undertaking this partnership with Oxfam is undoubtedly groundbreaking," said Roberto Barbieri, Director General of Oxfam Italia.
    "We are sure that it will represent a benchmark that all the other companies in the industry will strive to achieve, thereby determining a change in corporate policies and practices that will benefit the larger community of workers in the supply chain, as well as all the company's stakeholders.
    "Thanks to this partnership, Bolton Food has committed to reviewing its business model according to the principles of Human Economy promoted by Oxfam, in order to safeguard the rights of all people and protect the common good".
    Bolton Group CEO Giuseppe Morici expressed satisfaction too.
    "In the same way that we have been working with WWF for the past four years to guarantee sustainable fishing and the health of the oceans, with the aim of achieving 100% of our procurements from sustainable sources by 2024, similarly, the objective of our collaboration with Oxfam was to undertake a process that would further strengthen our social responsibility," said Morici.
    "We will work together, side by side, since only a constant and constructive exchange of ideas will enable us to implement an increasingly ambitious best practice designed to drive the entire industry towards new horizons". (ANSA).