New Report Shows True Cost of Shrimp to Workers

The study, The True Cost of Shrimp, compares the abuses in the shrimp industry to sweatshop conditions in the apparel industry. Click here to read or download the report.

Every year, Americans eat more than 450,000 tons of shrimp, about three pounds for every man, woman and child in the country. Eighty percent of that shrimp is imported, with one-third coming from Thailand.

Says Solidarity Center Executive Director Ellie Larson:

Our hope is that the release of this report will illustrate how the “shrimp boom” is sustained through a staggering, largely hidden, cost to workers, their families and the environment. The true cost of shrimp is not what is seen on a supermarket price tag or a restaurant menu. Shrimp industry workers in Bangladesh and Thailand deserve to have their story told. The abuse of their rights, as workers and as people, must be exposed.