Kaohsiung, Taiwan (October 28, 2021)- FCF Co., Ltd. (FCF) debuts its multi-party engagement workshop for recruitment agencies on October 28, 2021, to explore the potential working opportunities for improving the recruitment process of crew members in the distant water fisheries.
“Forced labor” has recently become one of the topics frequently raised up by NGOs and major media outlets. Not only the fishing vessel operators but also the recruitment agencies were considered as the major roles in ensuring fair hiring conditions and humane treatment for the crew members throughout the entire duration of employment onboard the distant water fishing vessels.
The representatives from the Kaohsiung Branch Office of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT/K), Fisheries Agency of Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan (TFA), Overseas Fisheries Development Council of the Republic of China (OFDC), Labor Affairs Bureau of Kaohsiung City Government, Marine Bureau of Kaohsiung City Government (KCMB), scholars, civil groups as well as the recruitment agencies are in present to discuss the challenges and difficulties, recommended industry-best practices, international standards related to human rights as well as the potential adoption of the risk-averse and systematic approaches.
Max Chou, the President of FCF, addressed in his opening remark, “During the development of our own FCF Social Responsibility Program (SRP), we realized that there is a lack of alignment in standards to address forced labor issues and from the social audits we learned about that some industry-wise challenges couldn’t be lifted just overnight. FCF Social Responsibility Program provides a system that enables our supply chain to minimize the risk of human rights violation by independent social evaluation, consulting services on ethical practices, and tools of the grievance mechanism.”
The speakers of the workshop include:
1. Daryll Delgado, Senior Director of the Research and Stakeholder Engagement of Verite;
2. Chiu Saho-Chi, Senior Project Director of Environmental Justice Foundation;
3. Liu Huang Li-Chuan, associate professor of National Chung Cheng University;
4. Marie Apostol, the Founder and CEO of The Fair Hiring Initiative;
5. Shen Shen, Senior Specialist of TFA
Each speaker has provided an enlightened presentation that draws attention from the participants, and the take- away messages are summarized as the following in response to the questions about “Where–to-start” raised up by many participants:
1. Taiwanese recruitment agencies should start by reviewing diligently the contracts between the crew members and agencies from the sending countries to ensure compliance to Taiwan labor-related regulations.
2. The wage structure of crew members should be aligned with the contract without unfair deposits or deductions.
3. Provide pre-departure training to ensure the crew members understand their rights and responsibility according to the contracts, working environment, and any relevant policies.
4. The recruitment agencies shall ensure the crew members receive their salary at least once a month. If any special requirements are implemented by different countries, the recruitment agencies of both sending and receiving countries are responsible to assure fair treatment to the crew members.
At the end of August 2021, FCF also hosted four (4) workshops with vessel owners from various fisheries including tuna longline fisheries, tuna purse seine fisheries, and squid & Pacific saury fisheries. This series of workshops is part of FCF Social Responsibility Program aiming at enhancing the overall capacity of the whole supply chain to overturn the recent negative allegations experienced in the fishing sector in Taiwan.
