Return on Investment

The Hong Kong Sustainable Seafood Coalition—an organization of 12 Hong Kong and Macau seafood importers, international hotel chains, and retailers—agreed in June to focus on the assessment and avoidance of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing in its members’ supply chains. Hong Kong imports 90 percent of its seafood, of which up to 75 percent falls within the IUU category, according to local industry estimates. Pew’s ending illegal fishing project says this commitment will help its efforts to persuade global seafood buyers to adopt policies that avoid and assess IUU risks in their supply chains and provide leadership on this issue in the East Asia region.

A Pew Research Center June report examining technology use in 39 countries found that social media use continues to increase in emerging economies while it has plateaued in wealthier nations. The survey also found that a median of 87 percent of adults in advanced economies use the internet at least occasionally or own a smartphone, compared with 64 percent in emerging and developing economies. A smaller gap exists among adults using online social networking sites, with 60 percent of those in advanced economies and 53 percent of those in emerging and developing economies saying they use such sites.

In June, the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, with support from the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, opened its “Farm for the City” public installation. The exhibit transformed Philadelphia’s Thomas Paine Plaza, located near City Hall, into a temporary 2,000-square-foot garden to encourage public conversations about the role of urban agriculture in strengthening communities. Over four months, the raised-bed gardens were expected to grow about 1,000 pounds of produce, to be donated to Broad Street Ministry, a community service organization dedicated to serving the homeless.