Environmental Certification

The Marine Farming Association operate an Environmental Certification programme for our members, this can operate in conjunction with the A Plus programme run by Aquaculture New Zealand or as a stand alone certification. Our members renew their certification annually.

This certification has been relaunched in 2021, information about the new certification is below. 

Our Objective
To promote and educate our members on best practice, this programme is designed to recognise the environmental achievers in our industry and to encourage the others to forge a path of striving for better.

To introduce a hierarchy of controls for environmental issues/risk:

• Can the issue be eliminated?
• Can it be isolated?
• Can we engineer a solution?
• Can we substitute the thing causing the issue with something else?
• Can we write guidelines, codes or practice or standard operating procedures to reduce the impact/risk?

Our Role

The Marine Farming Association will educate, collaborate, and recognise those who have chosen to enter this programme.
The Marine Farming Association will work with consent holders and operators to assist them in educating their contractors and staff on best practice.
The Marine Farming Association want to work with our industry and the community for holistic environmental improvement.
The Marine Farming Association will not be policemen, we will be mentors with education at our forefront.

The Marine Farming Association will also lead and facilitate Research & Development projects to help solve “root cause” issues, the Marine Farming Association will take on this role because it leads to improved knowledge for the entire industry rather than a select few.

Our Goal
The ultimate goal is that consent owners will only engage with the highest environmental performers, resulting in a culture of continuous improvement among the operators.

Our Focus

• Education, there is always more to learn.
• Continuous Improvement, there is no point where we stop.
• Work towards zero waste falling in the water from marine farming activity.
• Zero floats to landfill, 100% of floats recycled.
• Reduction in waste to landfill.
• Consideration to be given to noise reduction when replacing vessels and/or engine systems.
• Minimise light spill.
• Engage employees, those at the cold face have the best ideas & will assist with implementation.
• Invest in research & development, we must find better more innovative ways to farm.
• Social responsibility, consider & care for the communities in which marine farming occurs.

How will we do this?

• Our beach cleaning programme will be ongoing because we know there is historical debris both from marine farming and non-marine farming activity that needs managing.
• We will run mass industry beach clean days when needed to tackle areas of specific concern.
• The MFA Environment committee will continue to encourage membership from all areas of the marine farming industry for two-way feedback, reporting and peer education.
• Our Environmental mentor will continue to audit farms and vessels, and to educate crews on the ground.
• We will run workshops with members staff for feedback and education.
• We will engage with concerned or interested communities and work with them in a collaborative manner.
• The environmental performance of companies in the programme will be reviewed annually.
• We will implement a tiered rating system; we will list the status of those in the programme on our digital platforms for recognition. 
  • Diamond Status
  •  Platinum Status
  •  Gold Status
  •  Silver Status
  •  Bronze Status