Seafood Task Force Plays Leading Role at SENA Boston - Mar '26
Boston, USA, 31 March 2026
The Seafood Task Force (STF), a leading trade association that represents members of global tuna and shrimp supply chains, held a series of high-impact meetings in Boston in March. Held during the Seafood Expo North America (SENA), the meetings showcased the STF’s tangible progress and impact on-the-ground across India, Thailand, and Vietnam’s shrimp supply chains in 2025.
On March 14th, the STF presented to leading retailers who are members of the Food Marketing Institute (FMI), providing an overview of the organization’s shrimp supply chain program. This was followed on March 16th by an open session attended by over 50 stakeholders, including major retailers and importers from North America, as well as processors and government authorities from India, Thailand, Vietnam and Ecuador. These meetings socialized STF’s on-the-ground work with the purpose of encouraging even broader industry participation.
STF members and the Executive team presented how buyer and supplier members work together to drive industry improvements from vessel to plate, providing risk assurance to STF members. Central to the presentations were the STF’s 2025 achievements across India, Thailand and Vietnam, as well as laying out its 2026 workplans.
In India, the STF completed a landmark cycle of baseline assessments across the full shrimp supply chain: from processors and farms to fishing vessels supplying marine ingredients for shrimp feed, enabling working conditions at sea to be visible to STF Member global supply chains for the first time. Since a Train-the-Trainer program in July 2025, over 14,500 factory workers and 2,000 farm workers have received training on child labor prevention and freedom of movement at dormitories. Members have also implemented policies and procedures to prevent child labor and restrictions on freedom of movement from the point of recruitment. This series of capacity building programs will continue throughout 2026 to improve the recording of working hours, payment for wages and legal benefits, employment contracts, and traceability issues at factories and farms, as well as initiating improvement efforts for social accountability on vessels.
The STF’s deepening collaboration with India’s Marine Products Exports Development Authority (MPEDA) was also highlighted. The Joint Director of MPEDA addressed the meeting, speaking to the value of the partnership and the progress achieved to date. As the STF and MPEDA are currently working together on a range of initiatives including building social accountability capacity among MPEDA officers and its affiliated bodies NaCSA and NETFISH, as well as embedding social accountability requirements into MPEDA’s farm enrolment and renewal processes; strengthening MPEDA’s Shapahari certification standards; and exploring collaboration on grievance mechanisms and facilitating inter-governmental experience-sharing on electronic traceability and vessel behavior monitoring systems.
In Thailand, the STF reported on safety training delivered to over 500 fishers in 2025, equipping them with life-saving skills at sea, alongside capacity-building programs for government officials focused on identifying human trafficking at port calls. Looking ahead to 2026, the STF will expand its collaboration within the industry and the government to promote safe working environments at farms and on vessels, and will begin addressing responsible recruitment practices to mitigate risks of debt bondage.
Vietnam represents a relatively new market for the STF, with buyer- and supplier-members prioritizing the issue of absent labor contracts and missing legal benefits for workers at medium and small-scale farms. A time-bound improvement plan developed during the STF October 2025 is now being implemented, with assessments across supplier-members’ Vietnamese supply chains planned for completion in Q2 2026.
STF members spoke at the session about the value that the Seafood Task Force has delivered for them. Themes included the STF’s role as a pre-competitive collaboration platform, the cost efficiencies of collective action compared to individual company efforts, the demonstrable reduction in supply chain risk levels, and the importance of credible, active due diligence in building more stable and resilient supply chains.
STF Executive Director, Martin Thurley said:
“Our Boston meetings this year provided a great platform for socializing the value STF is bringing to its members. From India’s shrimp farms and fishing vessels to Thailand’s coastal communities and Vietnam’s growing aquaculture sector, STF is bringing the full supply chain together and working with respective governments in a way that individual companies are unable to achieve by working alone.
The response from industry stakeholders at SENA reaffirmed the importance of what we are doing and we look forward to welcoming new international retailers and brands as we continue to scale our impact.”
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For media inquiries, please contact: stf@thephagroup.com
About the Seafood Task Force:
The Seafood Task Force (STF) was established in 2014 to restore global confidence to trade, following concerns about social and environmental abuse in global tuna and shrimp supply chains. It is made up of over 50 major retailers, brands, food service companies and their supply chain partners.
The STF drives supply chain oversight at scale, pioneering a pro-competitive approach that makes it easier for its members to meet international standards and growing due diligence requirements.
The STF is a US-based, not-for-profit trade association established for the seafood industry by the seafood industry. Its vision is a future where its members’ seafood supply chains are fully traceable, free from the risk of human rights violations and free from environmental degradation.
For more information: https://seafoodtaskforce.global/