London - The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) Board of Trustees has elected Norwegian, Knut Vartdal to a new seat on the MSC board.

Mr Vartdal brings extensive experience and expertise of the Norwegian fishing industry to the MSC board.  He has worked for 9 years as undersecretary of state in the Ministry of Fisheries and Director General of Fisheries and has spent nearly three decades’ as Managing Director of Vartdal Fiskeriselskap – one of the leading fishing vessel companies in Norway.  As of October this year, Mr Vartdal chairs the Board of Directors of Vartdal Seafood AS.

Will Martin, Chairman of the board, says: "Knut Vartdal brings to the MSC extensive backgrounds in both the governmental management of fisheries and the business of commercial fishing and seafood marketing.  Norway is rapidly becoming a significant player in the MSC certification programme, and we appreciate its strong tradition and ethic of sustainable management of ocean resources, as reflected in Knut's background.  We are very pleased to welcome Knut to our board.

Knut Vartdal states: “I very much look forward to working with the MSC. The MSC is becoming increasingly influential in more countries around the world and has gained much importance in Norway recently. Globally, there is little doubt it is the leading certification organization for wild capture fish. The certification of ‘Norwegian’ saithe has been of great importance for the Norwegian industry, and I now look forward to future certifications in Norway – particularly cod and haddock.”

Rupert Howes, Chief Executive of the MSC, says: “This s a very welcome appointment:  Knut is a long-standing member of MSC’s Stakeholder Council with a long and distinguished career in the seafood business. About 70% of Norwegian export fisheries are now involved in the MSC programme. Together they land close to 1.7 million tonnes of fish with a value of approximately € 1.5 billion. I am particularly delighted to welcome Knut in light of this significant increase in participation from Norwegian fisheries.”

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Notes to Editors:

For further information, please contact Nina Haase, Marine Stewardship Council on +44 (0) 207 811 3313or email nina.haase@msc.org

Marine Stewardship Council (MSC): The MSC is an international non-profit organisation that was set up in 1997 to promote solutions to the problem of overfishing. The MSC runs the only widely recognised environmental certification and eco-labelling programme for wild capture fisheries. It is the only seafood eco-label that is consistent with the ISEAL Code of Good Practice for Setting Social and Environmental Standards and UN FAO guidelines for fisheries certification. The FAO ‘Guidelines for the Eco-labelling of Fish and Fishery Products from Marine Capture Fisheries’, require that credible fishery certification and eco-labelling schemes include:

• Objective, third-party fishery assessment utilising scientific evidence;
• Transparent processes with built-in stakeholder consultation and objection procedures;
• Standards based on the sustainability of target species, ecosystems and management practices.

MSC has offices in London, Seattle, Tokyo, Sydney, The Hague and Edinburgh and Berlin. In total, over 120 fisheries are engaged in the MSC programme with 38 certified, 84 under assessment and another 20 to 30 in confidential pre-assessment. Together the fisheries record annual catches of over 5 million tonnes of seafood. They represent over 42 percent of the world’s wild salmon catch, 40 percent of the world’s prime whitefish catch, and 18 percent of the world’s lobster catches for human consumption. Worldwide, nearly 1,900 seafood products resulting from the certified fisheries bear the blue MSC eco-label. For more information, please visit www.msc.org.