SALISBURY — Food Lion has implemented an industry-leading sustainable seafood policy that covers about 1,000 fresh, frozen, canned or packaged products sold across the store.
The policy provides customers with access to responsibly harvested seafood at the same prices. 
“At Food Lion, we believe that we have a responsibility to protect seafood species for generations to come,” Karen Fernald, senior vice president of merchandising said in a news release. “Through our policy, customers can trust that the seafood products they buy in our stores today are responsibly harvested.”
Food Lion’s seafood products have been documented as meeting criteria around sustainability, Fernald said, which adds the Salisbury-based company to an elite list of grocers in the United States to accomplish this goal.
Under Food Lion’s seafood sustainability policy:
• Food Lion’s suppliers will provide full traceability back to the source fishery or seafood farm for seafood products sold.
• Wild-caught seafood will come from source fisheries that are governed by credible, enforceable and science-based management plans that respect the amount of harvest to ensure seafood populations will continue to be healthy in the future.
• Farm-raised seafood is certified and reviewed to ensure that production does not harm communities, workers, the environment or human health.
• The Gulf of Maine Research Institute will confirm fisheries that supply our seafood are responsibly managed.
• Monitoring and compliance measures are in place to ensure harvest levels are maintained within appropriate limits.
“We are extremely proud of the work Food Lion has done to ensure they are contributing to the long-term sustainability of seafood around the world,” said Jen Levin, sustainable seafood program manager at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute. “Food Lion has been resolute in following through with its policy’s commitments, which has required a great deal of investment on their part.” 
To celebrate the launch, Food Lion donated 9,000 sustainable seafood products to local food banks in Charlotte, Raleigh, Winston-Salem, Virginia and South Carolina.
Customers with questions about the policy or the origin of specific products can visit Food Lion’s website at www.foodlion.com/seafood. Also, customers may also view our annual sustainability report at www.foodlion.com/corporate/CorporateResponsibility.