Food Lion registers with seafood transparency platform

Food Lion has joined a global platform where retailers pledge publicly how they source their seafood products, including its branded and private brand seafood.

The organization is called Ocean Disclosure Project and Food Lion has signed on, voluntarily saying that seafood products sold in its stores will be fully traceable to the wild fishery or farm, and come from sustainable sources. The Salisbury, N.C.-based retailer’s profile on the platform will disclose the origin of wild-caught species that are sold at the Ahold Delhaize USA banner’s more than 1,000 locations.

As part of Ahold Delhaize USA, Food Lion also benefits from the sustainable practices announced last fall by Ahold’s service arm Retail Business Services, which develops private brands for the Ahold Delhaize USA brands or banners, that it would restrict certain chemicals from all of its store brands products and packaging. Private label products in Food Lion and other Ahold banners aim to meet high standards for ingredients beyond what’s required by law, the company said.

On Monday, Ahold also set new sustainability targets around its private brands, including a pledge to reduce waste in its packaging.

For Food Lion’s work with the Ocean Disclosure Project, Meg Ham, president of Food Lion, said it is a way for consumers to trust the seafood bought at the store. “Being a good neighbor to us means offering the products and services our customers expect from Food Lion, but also sourcing and packaging those products and operating our stores in a sustainable way. It’s important to us that our customers know where their seafood comes from, so it only makes sense to join the ODP and make public the origin of wild-caught seafood sold in our stores.”

The ODP was created by Sustainable Fisheries Partnership, a non-profit organization that works directly with the seafood industry to improve the sustainability of seafood.