Sustainably sourced seafood: A criminological approach to reduce demand for illegal seafood supply

The demand for cheap seafood, often compromises quality and legality of the source. Yet, consumers may be oblivious to the social, economic, legal and environmental impacts when purchasing cheap, foreign seafood, implicitly supporting illegal fishing operations. From a situational crime prevention perspective, removing opportunity to offend by controlling demand is more effective than via the criminal justice system. This research explores the role enhanced social values towards sustainable choices can play in promoting local and sustainable seafood, supported by consumers’ purchasing power. It draws on examples that establish a culture of support for locally sourced seafood, rather than accepting cheaper, and potentially inferior and illegally sourced imports. Through that critical analysis, this research discovers by reducing the demand for cheap seafood, the supply of unsustainable and illegally sourced seafood reduces. In turn, this achieves crime prevention and sustainable seafood, supporting humanities at the local to the global level. To ensure the model is globally replicable and simultaneously applied, it further draws on a regulatory pluralism model, driven by the consumer to champion illegal fishing control.