NEW YORK — U.S. officials and human rights activists called on Americans to stop buying fish and shrimp tied to supply chains in Thailand, where The Associated Press has found slaves are forced to work in the seafood industry.
“All of us may find ourselves eating a slave-made product without knowing it, but once we know it, we all have a moral obligation, I believe, to make a personal decision to boycott it,” said New Jersey Republican Congressman Chris Smith, a member of the House Foreign Relations Committee.
Said Mark Lagon, president of the group Freedom House: “This isn’t a matter of low pay or crummy working conditions. This isn’t a matter of saving lots of money to choose the product that is made by cutting corners. This is the flagrant abuse of fellow human beings … Americans won’t stand for that.”
The AP reported Monday that it found enslaved workers who were forced to peel shrimp in Thailand for up to 16 hours a day for little or no pay, and many were locked inside for months or even years on end. Journalists followed trucks from an abusive factory to major Thai distributors. U.S. customs records show the shrimp made its way into the supply chains of major U.S. food stores and retailers such as Wal-Mart, Kroger, Dollar General and Petco, along with restaurants such as Olive Garden.
It also entered the supply chains of some of America’s best-known seafood brands and pet foods, including Chicken of the Sea and Fancy Feast, which are sold in grocery stores from Safeway and Schnucks to Piggly Wiggly and Albertsons. AP reporters went to supermarkets in all 50 states and found shrimp products from supply chains tainted with forced labor.
The businesses that responded condemned the practices that lead to these conditions. Many said they were launching investigations.
Responding to the AP reports, Red Lobster, Whole Foods and some others said they’ve been assured by their supplier, Thai Union, that their particular shrimp were not processed by children and slaves, despite the AP’s findings.
Thai Union, meanwhile, admitted it hadn’t known the source of all its shrimp, and sent a note outlining corrective measures to U.S. businesses. “We were concerned that, despite regular audits, it is difficult to guarantee that all external pre-processors were adhering to our code of conduct,” Thai Union CEO Thiraphong Chansiri said in a statement.
The company promised to exclusively use in-house labor starting Jan. 1.
Earlier this year, after AP reported on a slave island in Indonesia where fishermen were caged when on shore, Greenpeace called for a boycott of Thai Union and its Chicken of the Sea brand in the U.S. On Monday, Greenpeace campaign director John Hocevar said Thai Union isn’t doing enough.
“The company does just enough to weather the PR storm while continuing to profit off the backs of the migrant workers forced to work throughout its supply chains,” he said.
The Thai Embassy in Washington released a statement in response to the AP stories, saying the government will take action against those found to be involved in illegal activities.
