Sourcing Spotlight: Taking a Closer Look at Prawns

Prawns and shrimp have long been a part of human diets, providing protein and healthy fats since prehistoric times and, as global travel and trade increased, gradually growing in popularity across every continent. Today, prawns are a regular feature on menus across the world, from creamy and comforting shrimp and grits in Louisiana to the delicately golden Japanese ebi tempura — yet, wherever you’re ordering, it’s unlikely that that the menu includes information on their origins. Without transparency in our supply chains, our customers remain blinkered to the impacts of their food choices, and our procurement decisions can be supporting some truly shocking practices.  

Both chefs and consumers tend to be less educated about the origins of their seafood than they are for other ingredients. While a diner is likely to understand what ‘organic’ means, or may deliberately choose local or free-range meat, they have never been offered the same degree of information into how their seafood was caught or farmed — so they don’t expect it, and they don’t ask. Similarly, many chefs are accustomed to a lack of oversight into their seafood supply chains. This absence of transparency makes it all too easy for abuses to occur. 

Human rights abuses in the global fishing industry 

In recent years, the global fishing industry has become notorious for human rights violations: trafficking and modern day slavery, miserable and dangerous working conditions, punishing hours and withholding of pay are all too common on what has been called ‘the outlaw ocean’. Far from the jurisdiction of the land, these problems prove extremely difficult to solve.  

Periods spent at sea have grown longer in recent years due to the emergence of large 'factory ships', where smaller fishing boats now offload their catches. This allows small boats to operate for weeks or even months without docking; isolated from friends and family, workers often have no means of contacting authorities when needed.  

It’s important to remember that this can happen anywhere. Following a three-year investigation, the BBC’s 2024 Slavery at Sea documentary revealed the story of Filipino migrants in Scotland who were recruited onto scallop fishing vessels; they were expected to work 18-hour days with no more than 2-3 hours of rest at a time, seven days a week, for payment far below the UK’s minimum wage, while management withheld their passports and other documents. That said, countries in the Global South are markedly more vulnerable to exploitation, working to meet the demands of wealthier nations. 

The problems with prawns 

The relentless global appetite for prawns has made them a particularly risky ingredient: the world wants prawns to be cheap, plentiful and — ideally — already peeled, cleaned and processed.  

Farmed prawns account for 55% of the prawns produced globally, and most of this aquaculture occurs in Asia, primarily China, Thailand, Indonesia, India, Vietnam, Brazil, Ecuador, and Bangladesh. In Indonesia alone, the annual production of farmed prawns increased from under 150,000 tonnes in the year 2000 to almost one million tonnes in 2021. Combine this accelerated demand with the vulnerability of people living in poverty in many of the global centres of prawn production (like Indonesia, Thailand and India), and you have a recipe for exploitation.  

You might imagine that this situation is improving over time, but you’d be wrong. A 2024 report from the Sustainability Incubator set out to explain the 45% decline in global prawn prices since 2018. Human Rights for Dinner: Supermarket Shrimp and the Business of Exploitation reviewed recent investigations of prawn supply chains in India, Vietnam and Indonesia. In each of these countries, prices have declined while conditions of employment have deteriorated, and incidents of human rights abuses and forced labour have increased. The situation is similar for prawns farmed for export in Ecuador, Bangladesh and Thailand. This is the true cost of cheap prawns. 

The true cost of cheap prawns 

Here are just two examples of the many hotspots for human rights issues across the global prawn industry. 

INDIA'S HIDDEN HARVEST

In 2009, policy changes opened up imports of broodstock into India for l. vannamei (whiteleg shrimp) — one of the most-consumed species in the United States, where prawns account for more than 30% of the seafood consumed every year. By 2013, India had surpassed Thailand as the largest exporter of prawns to the USA, a growth is attributed to India’s “significant capacity to supply labour-intensive, hand-peeled shrimp at a low cost.”  

In 2024, a report from Corporate Accountability Lab called ‘Hidden Harvest: Human Rights and Environmental Abuses in India’s Shrimp Industry’ revealed the results of an extensive, multi-year investigation, exposing pervasive systemic abuses throughout the Indian shrimp supply chain, from hatcheries to shrimp farms to processing facilities. Violations documented in this report included hazardous working conditions, verbal abuse, sexual harassment, child labour, forced labour and controlled movements. 

WORKER PROTECTIONS AT RISK IN THAILAND

Thailand’s prawn industry was the focus of an Associated Press investigation in 2006, which concluded it was rife with abusive labour practices, including fishers being trapped on ships for years at a time and the use of child labour in prawn peeling. During later investigations carried out in 2012-2013, the Environmental Justice Foundation also gathered evidence of human trafficking into prawn facilities in Thailand, as well as serious labour and human rights violations.  

In response to international criticism, legislation was introduced to protect workers; however, new legislative changes being drafted today are currently under scrutiny, with international NGOs like the Environmental Justice Foundation insisting that they would dramatically weaken these protections. 

Environmental impacts 

The prawn industry also poses real risks to biodiversity, ocean health and the climate crisis, all of which have their own impacts on local communities. For one thing, prawn farming has been a major driver of coastal habitat conversion. The loss of mangrove forests is a particular problem; mangroves sequester carbon at up to four times the rate of terrestrial forests and are critical for biodiversity, as well as helping to protect coastal communities from the effects of storms. Between 2000 and 2016, Indonesia lost 3% of its mangrove forests in the creation of fish-farming ponds  

Saltwater from prawn hatcheries and farms can also seep into groundwater, contaminating domestic and agricultural water supplies. Meanwhile, the farms pollute surrounding bodies of water, such as coastal estuaries, with catastrophic effects on local fish populations and a knock-on economic impact on coastal fishing communities.  

What would a better prawn industry look like? 

Switzerland-based sustainable seafood company Blueyou has been dedicated to ‘serving the ocean’ for more than two decades, launching Blueyou Asia in Singapore in 2024. The company’s mission is to establish environmentally-friendly seafood supply chains for hospitality and retail. To accomplish this, they partner with local communities to develop socially inclusive food systems that also support healthy oceans and ecosystems.  

We asked René Benguerel, Co-Founder and Managing Director of Blueyou, for his insights into sourcing prawns more responsibly. “Whether farmed or wild caught, there is a need for more transparency and traceability in local, regional and global supply chains,” says René. “Any sort of credible third-party verification that includes auditing of certified supply chains (chain of custody) is helping in achieving more responsible prawn supply chains – the standard of the ISEAL Alliance is a good benchmark for credible and robust auditing schemes.” 

“Generally, the farmed prawn sector has been initiating important steps towards improvement, and there are more and more certified prawns entering markets in Asia,” he continues. “For operators in the hospitality industry, it is very difficult to verify the origin or the social and environmental impacts of a given product. This is why certification is such an important asset for the transition towards more responsible practices. Ask for certified products and fully transparent sourcing. The Aquaculture Stewardship Council offers a solid approach to more responsible prawn farming. In the wild capture sector, the only credible benchmark for certification remains the MSC, which offers a credible and effective solution for verification and auditing against robust environmental standards.” 

Nature-based prawn farming: the way of the future 

New options are beginning to emerge, re-envisioning the aquaculture industry to meet demand while also ensuring that local communities and ecosystems are respected and given what they need to thrive. One example is Blueyou’s Selva Shrimp programme, which is restoring mangrove forests at scale by creating economic incentives for farmers to conserve mangroves as a means of producing seafood. These natural ecosystems can support prawns, crab and fish raised without feed, fertilisers or chemicals, improving biodiversity and capturing carbon. To date, the programme has restored 280 hectares of mangrove forest in Eastern Kalimantan, Indonesia and 13,500 hectares in Southern Vietnam. 

Since traceability is key, the system operates a digital solution that allows prawns to be tracked from the ponds to their final destination. The prawns are also third-party certified to a set of standards specific to each region, including ISEAL approved schemes like organic and ASC.  

The productivity of the ponds is high and participating farmers earn a good income, building more resilient and viable coastal communities for the future. Blueyou has even added a tipping function that allows hospitality and retail customers to tip the farmers who harvested the prawns, with 100% of this money going directly into farmers’ bank accounts. 

With prawns ubiquitous on menus, it’s also worth exploring whether you need to serve them at all. Explore sustainable, lesser-used fish caught in responsible ways, or — as MCS suggests — choose rope-grown mussels instead, one of the most ocean-friendly choices you can make. Getting creative can help your offering to stand out. 

However you choose to proceed, make sure you bring your customers along with you. Tell the stories behind your seafood, share why you go the extra mile to ensure everyone in your supply chain is treated with dignity, and help to bring these issues into the spotlight. 

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