Consumers’ Response to Sustainability Labeling in Wild Caught Fish

Increasing shares of fish products are sold as sustainably caught. This contribution tackles consumers’ specific knowledge on, interest in and expectations about sustainable fisheries and its products, their awareness of existing sustainability labels on fish as well as the purchase relevance of these labels in Germany. We conducted in total 12 focus groups with fish consumers in different German cities. The results show that consumers expect sustainable fisheries to avoid by-catches, overfishing and not to use dynamite. Knowledge about fisheries was mostly low and for many of the discussants this topic was new. When asked in an unprompted manner for their awareness of different labels of sustainably caught wild fish, the label of the Marine Stewardship Council was the only one known by some of the participants. It turned out that participants were skeptical about food labeling and standard setting in general. Accordingly, many participants stated not to look for sustainability labels when purchasing fish products. In order to tackle with consumers’ limited knowledge of fish and low interest in additional information, communication of sustainability in fisheries should be short, simple and reliable. Sustainability standards which clearly differentiate from noncertified fisheries are required.