Bumble Bee Seafood “adamantly disagrees” with claims made in a new lawsuit that the supplier and its owner, Kaohsiung, Taiwan-based FCF Co., use forced labor and have inadequate worker-safety standards.

....[the] California[-based]...tuna firm said in a statement...“We continue to work within our supply chain, with others in the tuna industry and through the Seafood Task Force to make the responsible recruitment and treatment of all workers an ongoing top priority."

In the lawsuit, filed in U.S. Superior Court for the District of Columbia, the nonprofit group International Labor Rights Forum, which also goes by the titles Global Labor Justice-International, alleges that Bumble Bee and FCF “have a long history of engaging in and/or allowing unfair and dangerous labor practices in the commercial fishing of the seafood that ends up in Bumble Bee products.”...

Bumble Bee’s tuna is sourced through “distant-water fishing,” a practice...“that is recognized by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection as a practice at high risk for forced labor,”...

Yet Bumble Bee makes marketing and advertising representations that convey to consumers that it is “best-in-class” in terms of its worker safety standards and that it is the company’s mission to “champion sustainable fishing” throughout its supply chain...Bumble Bee’s “deceptive” marketing representations impede “meaningful efforts for change,” the organization said.

In May 2020, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Trade placed a Withhold Release Order (WRO) [against] Yu Long 2, and in February 2020, the...Tunago 61 was given a WRO, though it was revoked on 31 March by the CBP after it obtained evidence tuna produced by the vessel was not caught using forced labor conditions. At the time, the vessels were suppliers to FCF Co, which purchased Bumble Bee Foods in January 2020.