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Advancing Human Rights in Seafood Supply Chains: The Next Chapter for SEA Alliance

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As we shared first in April,  the integration of SEA Alliance into FNET has brought deep, sector-specific seafood expertise into the organisation, through our new Seafood Ethics Action Special Interest Group.

SEA Alliance and human rights in seafood supply chains

Established in 2018, Seafood Ethics Action (SEA) Alliance is a pre-competitive initiative that brings together seafood businesses and retailers to strengthen human rights due diligence and drive practical actions across seafood supply chains. Its integration into FNET brings deep, sector-specific expertise into the wider FNET network, creating new opportunities to build on this work through collaborative action, shared learning and practical solutions that improve outcomes for workers. FNET was delighted to appoint Julia Black as the new Head of Seafood to lead this workstream.

SEA Alliance has strong foundations and a track record of delivering real-world impact. FNET has ten years’ experience in collaborative action and deep expertise in human rights, making it a natural fit for the next stage of SEA Alliance’s work. Being housed within FNET gives SEA Alliance a strong platform to convene, collaborate, and drive practical change. Seafood presents a distinctive human rights challenge: long and complex supply chains, work taking place far from scrutiny at sea, and significant reliance on migrant workers across the value chain. Combined with the sector’s importance to global diets and livelihoods, these challenges demand solutions that reach beyond individual businesses. Ongoing collaborative work is necessary.

Given SEA Alliance’s great successes and visibility on seafood and human rights, FNET has decided to retain this recognisable name. Please refer to us as “SEA Alliance, an FNET special interest group”, or “SEA Alliance” for short. For the time being, our brand will continue to look the same. But watch this space, as there will be updates on this coming soon!

Funding action on human rights in seafood supply chains

With thanks to FNET’s team and board, and the SEA Alliance’s former steering group, FNET has secured continued philanthropic funding for the Change on the Water Fund.

This fund provides catalytic funding for projects designed to improve human rights outcomes for workers in seafood supply chains and address systemic risks.  Launching again in spring 2027, the Change on the Water Fund gives SEA Alliance and FNET with a practical mechanism to turn shared priorities into action

We also welcome collaboration beyond our membership. If you have an initiative that could benefit from industry participation, are seeking partners, or have identified an issue where collective action could make a difference, please contact Julia Black. We can help connect organisations with SEA Alliance members and identify opportunities to work together.

We want to express our gratitude for the continued support of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation, whose funding is enabling us to accelerate the next phase of SEA Alliance’s work. Their funding will enable us to build on SEA Alliance’s existing work, increase its scale and reach, and draw on FNET’s wider membership network to deliver greater impact for workers across global seafood supply chains.

Working with FNET and SEA Alliance

We want SEA Alliance to be a point of connection between businesses and the wider seafood community. If you have worked with SEA Alliance in the past, we would love to reconnect. And if we haven’t worked together before, we’d like to hear from you too.

Whether you’re an NGO, industry body, researcher, supplier, seafood business or other organisation working to improve outcomes for workers, contact Julia Black, FNET’s Head of Seafood. We’re particularly keen to hear about emerging issues, opportunities for collective action, projects seeking industry partners, and ideas where SEA Alliance members could help turn ambition into practical action.

SEA Alliance priorities for human rights in seafood

SEA Alliance is building on its established work with a clear set of priorities for addressing human rights risks across seafood supply chains.  Current areas of focus include UK fisheries, responsible recruitment, human rights due diligence, feed/aquaculture supply chains and worker connectivity and WI-FI as an enabler of human rights. As part of FNET, SEA Alliance members also benefit from access to wider expertise, working groups and collaborative initiatives across the FNET network, creating opportunities to share learning and tackle common challenges across sectors.

Our work is underpinned by FNET’s human rights due diligence framework, with practical tools and resources to help members identify, prioritise and respond to human rights risks, including FNET’s risk-assessment tool, which is currently being updated.

Interested in joining SEA Alliance and FNET?

We’re always keen to welcome new seafood businesses to SEA Alliance and the wider FNET network. Visit our Join page to learn more, or get in touch to arrange an informal introductory call. We’d be happy to tell you more about our work, the opportunities to collaborate with other members and how your business can get involved.

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