By Chris Giordano

Go to your fridge, open it, and take a look at what’s inside. Have you ever wondered how many people worked to bring you those vegetables? What about that carton of eggs? Now open your freezer. Who caught the fish in your fish sticks? What do those fishers actually look like? Where are they from?

Few people consider these questions, but they are important, especially in light of recent headlines. News exposés are cropping up, pointing to the abuse of migrant labor in the fishing industry. The New York Times released an article in July 2015 about slavery on Thai fishing boats. This past November, The Guardian came out with a piece that exposed migrant abuse in Irish industrial fisheries. While the boat owners have filed a defamation case against the Guardian in the High Court in Dublin, the case suggests that such conditions are not limited to developing countries.  Both articles describe conditions migrant workers face that are akin to modern slavery. In many cases workers are lured by the promise of high paying jobs, then tricked into debt that they can only pay off via onboard labor. In the best cases, workers are paid unfair wages, while in the worst cases, they are not paid at all. Boat owners and operators force workers to stay on the boat for years at a time.

What is more troublesome is that we do not know where migrant abuse will show up next. It might be easy to assume that worker abuse is more common in developing countries, but looking at the treatment of migrant farm workers in the United States suggests that similar injustice exists close to home.

Tied to the issue of migrant worker abuse is a larger moral issue: Who is at fault for the slavery? Some might say the blame lies solely on the employer; they actively choose to infringe on the rights and civil liberties of the workers for the sake of a larger profit margin. Blame also may fall on governments if they have the capacity to enforce fair labor laws. However, are we, the consumers, not also to blame? After all, in our efforts to find a familiar and low-cost seafood meal we are driving the demand for inexpensive fish products.

Even if labor abuses are not known to occur in U.S. fisheries, unjust treatment of fishers like these are putting fish in fridges across the U.S. and other developed countries. As consumers, citizens in both developing and developed nations must consider whether they bear a partial responsibility for worker treatment in the fishing industry.

Verité, a nonprofit organization that aids corporations in improving fair labor practices, has developed a list of reasons why abuse occurs in the fishing industry. It can be summarized to a single point: instead of pointing to employer or consumer practices, the issue is one of power. Labor abuse occurs because migrant fishers have little power; they lack contracts, operate under systems that drive them into debt, and cannot turn to a local support network. Though accurate, Verité’s list gives consumers little ability to affect change. How can we pressure for contracts, change systems, and improve the local network all the way from the U.S.?  We can begin by demanding our seafood and pet-food suppliers obtain fair labor certification.

One possible solution is with fisheries certifications. Programs like the Marine Stewardship Council, Seafood Watch, and others already judge fisheries on their environmental sustainability. These efforts could expand on what they do already to include a social aspect to their certification and some are already looking to do this. If we know a fishery has poor labor practices it could automatically be listed as a fishery to avoid. Alternatively, programs like Fairtrade International could be built upon to include marine products alongside land-based products. Tiny shifts in consumer behavior by buying only certified fish would have significant impact elsewhere. Since the United States is the world’s largest importer of fish, what producer wouldn’t shift their product qualities to meet our specifications?

So next time you are in the supermarket, or standing in front of your fridge for a late night snack of fish sticks, think about where your fish came from. Pride yourself on buying sustainably. But, you should think about the person who caught it. When was the last time they saw their family? Do they have the ability to negotiate fair wages? Have they left their ship in the last year? Is the fish you eat labor abuse-free?