In the big picture, Carrie’s work focuses on creating a model for the seafood industry that supports healthier oceans and communities. Working together with stakeholders and partners—fish farmers, fishermen, environmental groups, scientists and skilled seafood buyers—she aims to create a seafood market that supports responsible aquaculture production, reverses trends in overfishing and bycatch, and puts us on the right track toward greater sustainability. Day to day, her work involves developing sourcing policies, and the programs to implement them, for seafood sold at all Whole Foods Market stores. She treks from desk, to farms, fishing docks, and conferences to research, develop, and speak about these industry leading standards.
Most recently, she developed a sourcing policy for canned tuna that requires all fisheries to use pole-and-line, troll or handline catch methods. That means fishermen catch tuna one fish at a time, which prevents bycatch and creates more fishing jobs. The Whole Foods Market canned tuna policy also requires tracking of canned tuna back to the source, utilizing electronic traceability software.
Carrie has a Masters degree in Environmental Management from Duke University, where she studied marine ecology and fisheries management. She has worked on seafood sustainability since the year 2000, but her roots in seafood go farther back: her great-grandfather started a seafood business in 1909.
