Leading seafood boss says shrimp probe 'wake-up call'

BANGKOK -- The president of one of the world's biggest seafood exporters expressed frustration and promised change Tuesday after saying an Associated Press investigation that linked slave-peeled shrimp to his company should be a "wake-up call" to the industry.

Thiraphong Chansiri said Thai Union will spend millions of dollars to end reliance on poorly regulated contractors that have been responsible for much of the abuse.

He said under the current system, it's almost impossible to ensure supply chains are clean.

Like other exporters in Thailand, his company has for years relied heavily on poor migrants working in factories in the port town of Samut Sakhon to peel, gut and devein shrimp.

The report revealed Monday many of these laborers are undocumented and can end up being tricked or sold into factories where they are forced to work 16-hour days with no time off and little or no pay for sometimes years at a time.

Some end up locked inside. Others are allowed to go out, but only if they leave their children or spouse behind as a guarantee against running away.

Thiraphong said despite great efforts, Thai Union has been unable to keep labor abuses out of its supply chains. It has tried everything from spot checks by third-party auditors to regular meetings with external suppliers. But problems keep popping up.

"We realized that we could not ensure 100 percent," he said. "Even with the whole system that we established."

He said Thai Union exclusively will use in-house labor for shrimp processing starting Jan. 1, a change he said would cost the company about $5 million.

"This move will provide us with full oversight of all processing stages and will ensure that all workers, whether migrant or Thai, are in safe, legal employment and are treated fairly and with dignity," Thiraphong said.

A day earlier, he called the latest revelations "another wake-up call not only to us, but to the entire industry."

On Tuesday, the Global Aquaculture Alliance, which audits companies and offers a Best Aquaculture Practices seal of approval, said it will pull its certification from anyone outsourcing shrimp processing.

Journalists followed trucks from an abusive factory raided last month to major Thai distributors, including a Thai Union subsidiary, and traced similar connections from another factory, raided in May, that was directly supplying the parent company.

Thai Union and four other exporters that bought shrimp from the sheds sell to companies around the world.

Those retailers and restaurant chains widely condemned the practices that led to these conditions, and many said they were launching investigations.

Big Australian supermarket chain companies, including Coles and Woolworths, were among those that expressed concern.

Coles, Red Lobster, Whole Foods and some other companies said they had been assured by Thai Union their shipments were clean. Thai Union said shrimp it purchased from the sheds AP tracked did not go to major U.S. companies but declined to say where it went.