nature Vol 467 2 September 2010 OPI \ 10 \ Seafood stewardship in crisis The main consumer-targeted certification scheme for sustainable fisheries is failing to protect the environment and needs radical reform, sayJennifer Jacquet, Daniel Pauly and colleagues. A growing number of consumers want to eat seafood without feeling guilty. Enter the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC), which purports to certify sustainable fisheries and provides a label for sustainable products to "promote the best environmental choice in seafood". The MSC is growing rap- idly; the organization is also rapidly failing on its promise. The MSC has become the world's most estab- lished fisheries certifier: 94 fisheries are cur- rently MSC-certified, accounting for about 7% of global catch, and about 118 more are under assessment. MSC-certified seafood products, identified with a blue check-mark label, pack the shelves of stores such as Wal-Mart, Whole Foods Market and Waitrose. Although other certification schemes exist, such as Friend of the Sea based in Milan, Italy, the MSC is taken most seriously by scientists. The MSC is praised in Jared Diamond's bookCollapst: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed(200S), and is featured as a solution to declining fish stocks in the 2009 film The End of the fine. However, objections to MSC certifications aregrowing. Scores of scientists (including our- selves) and many conservation groups, includ- ing Greenpeacc. the Pew Environment Group and some national branches of the WW F. have protested over various MSC procedures orcer- tifications. We believe that, as the MSC increas- ingly risks its credibility, the planet risks losing more wild fish and healthy marine ecosystems. This can be turned around only if the MSC creates more stringent standards, cracksdown on arguably loose interpretation of its rules, and alters its process to avoid a potential finan- cial incentive to certify large fisheries. From boat to plate Thc