Royal Hawaiian Responsible Sourcing Guide

Catching shrimp in Oregon

At Royal Hawaiian we make choosing sustainable seafood easy, by ranking all our products according to the sustainability recommendations published by the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch program. Seafood Watch defines sustainable seafood as "originating from sources, whether wild-caught or farmed, which can maintain or increase production in the long-term without jeopardizing the structure or function of affected ecosystems."

To reach these recommendations Seafood Watch analysts synthesize the most current fisheries and ecosystem science available, and evaluate it against the program's criteria and conservation ethic to derive a recommendation of "Best Choice", "Good Alternative", or "Avoid".

The fourth category, "Unranked" simply means that Seafood Watch has yet to complete an assessment.

You can sort our product list by sustainability rankings

In addition, Royal Hawaiian has added a "Royal Blue" category. This highlights responsible producers that have been approved by Royal Hawaiian by meeting one or more of the criteria listed below. The goal of the Royal Blue category is to promote individual producers who are doing things differently and to incentive others to create positive change within their industry.

Criteria for Royal Blue ranking:

• The fishery has been evaluated by one of the following NGOs who are part of the same Conservation Alliance as the Monterey Bay Aquarium:
  • Blue Ocean Institute
  • SeaChoice
  • New England Aquarium
  • FishWise
• Has been certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) or Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC)
• Is participating in a certified Fishery Improvement Project with third party organization such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) or Sustainable Fisheries Partnership (SFP)
• A specific producer within a red ranked fishery who has addressed all the conservation issues to make positive changes within their industry. To qualify for a blue ranking this fishery must not have a red ranking for status of stocks from the Monterery Bay Aquarium and must address all issues of bycatch, habitat damage, and management.