Fishy work podcast
First year - 6 podcast episodes
A podcast about marine ecologies and labouring at sea
17 June 2024
Welcome to the first ever episode of Fishy Work, my name is Ian. Join me this season as we cast off into a sea of trash fish, worker precarity, racism, and labour campaigns to name but a few of the topics we'll find stranded and floating, calling out to have a podcast made about them.
In this episode we’re talking with Melissa Marschke and Peter Vandergeest about what structures working conditions at sea, why it can be so bad, yet why fishing is still meaningful for many fisher folk, how researchers go about researching labour at sea, and what organisations, campaigners and unions are doing to help improve working conditions.
15 July 2024
Welcome to the second episode of Fishy Work Podcast! We will continue our discussion of Fishy Work once a month. This episode we welcome the great insights from Prof. Miriam Wilhelm and Prof. Andrew Crane on how local civil society became a key actor in pushing for labour rights in seafood supply chains. It is about time to understand how 'business as usual' is being interrupted by social intermediary (check out the paper)!.
Global scandals exist because there are still bad practices in supply chains, right? But global scandals do not do much positive impact if nothing change on the ground. This episode gives a concrete example of how global scandal is being addressed by emerging actors like labour NGO, who have been front and centre in pushing for a better labour rights for fish workers and work in seafood processing plants. Moreover, it is important to unpack how contextual knowledge, legitimacy and the embeddedness of these front-line NGOs work together with seafood company in favour of the workers.
19 August 2024
Welcome to the third episode of Fishy Work. This episode we are talking about What happens when people move and refuse? In Fishy Work thus far we've spoken more broadly about why conditions at sea can be so bad, including organized attempts to improve the working lives of fish workers. And we've also spoken about the management of the fish supply chain, including how NGOs have worked with companies, especially with the aim of removing forced labour from their business networks. But in this episode, we want to centre on the fish workers, especially migrant workers, including looking into how they migrate and, crucially, what their migration means in social, political, and economic terms.
We are welcoming two amazing researchers to help us understand how migrant fishworkers navigate the challenges and the everyday struggles! Andrew Le is assistant professor at the T. Denny Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics, Arizona State University (see his work here). Siddharth Chakravarty is a PhD researcher at Queen Mary University of London (see his work here).
15 September 2024
Welcome to the forth episode of Fishy Work. This episode we're going to be speaking with Bright Maté Kweku Chai, a former fisher and boatswain on industrial trawls, semi industrial and artisanal vessels. Bright now acts as a local NUSPAW, the National Union for Sea, Port and Allied Workers in Ghana. We are also joined by Vanessa Jaiteh, a senior research scientist at the Center for Development and Environment at the University of Bern in Switzerland.
Vanessa and Bright joined me after an intense workshop. They were both at in Ghana, which brought together various stakeholders, researchers, trade unionists, um, representatives from the local state who are all working together towards improving or trying to improve the working conditions of Ghana.
21 October 2024
Welcome to Episode 5 of fishy work: Un-romancing the Eco Label! In this episode we dig deeper into seafood eco labels, ask if they cause more harm than good for fishworkers, and explore why it is so difficult to create ethical labels for seafood products.
This episode we're going to be speaking with Chris Williams (Fishery Section Coordinator at the International Transport Workers Federation) & Katrina Nakamura (Director of the Sustainability Incubator).
11 December 2024
Episode 6 – Season Finale
Welcome everybody to Fishy Work Episode 6, the season finale. In this episode we're going to do something a little bit different. And we're going to start a little bit different too. So let's start by asking Alin a bunch of yes, no questions, before we recap the previous 5 episodes of Fishy Work. Listen till the end to learn more about what is coming up next for season 2! Subscribe!