At Gold Seal® seafoods we are very much concerned about the safety of the dolphins, and endeavour to ensure that Gold Seal® brand canned tuna is "dolphin-friendly". But what does "dolphin-friendly" mean?

First, it is important to recognize that the killing of dolphins is primarily a problem with the yellowfin tuna purse-seine fishery in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean near Central America and South America. Gold Seal® only imports tuna caught in the Western Pacific Ocean.

Second, Gold Seal® neither employs tuna fishermen nor purchases tuna on a wholesale basis for canning. Gold Seal® purchases the finished product directly from its suppliers, and it has been a Gold Seal® policy to work with its suppliers to ensure that the canned tuna imported for the Gold Seal® label is all dolphin-friendly.

Tremendous progress has been made toward the protection of dolphins, as recently described in an article entitled The dolphin-friendly Tuna Anniversary by Brenda Killian. However, the hard-fought efforts to protect the dolphins recently have seen new threats to dolphins such as Bill HR2179 introduced on August 4th, 1995, into the U.S. Congress to amend the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Additional details about Bill HR2179, the recent defeat of Bill HR2823 in the U.S. Senate, and other information are available from the Earth Island Institute.

Another recent development was the signing of The Declaration Of Panama, a twelve-nation, five-environmental-group accord which has renewed the debate on the "dolphin-friendly" issue. The Earth Island Institute, which does not support The Declaration Of Panama, fears renewed danger to dolphins resulting from the redefinition of the term "dolphin-friendly". Under the terms of the accord, tuna caught by chasing, encircling and capturing dolphins could be labelled as "dolphin-friendly" so long as no "observed" dolphin fatalities are witnessed by on-board monitors. This revised definition is not consistent with the concept of "dolphin-friendly". At Gold Seal® we believe that protection of the dolphins must be the paramount principle in both the debate and the definition of "dolphin-friendly".

Most recently (July 1997) US policy on dolphin protection was weakened to allow dolphin UNSAFE tuna back onto the US market. The new legislation Bill H.R. 408) has been passed despite considerable opposition from Earth Island Institute and many other environmental groups such as Planet Ark and the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society based in Australia.

At Gold Seal® seafoods we are committed to protecting the dolphins and ensuring that Gold Seal® brand canned tuna remains "dolphin-friendly".