Between 40 and 60 per cent of seafood catch is discarded, lost, or wasted through our supply chains. A key factor leading to this predicament is the lack of sufficient market information, especially small scale fishers.

The lack of information about the number of fishers fishing or farmers harvesting, the nature and quantity of harvests, and the quantity of seafood already in the supply chain can lead to overfishing, overharvesting, or an oversupply of seafood in the market, eventually leading to price collapse and waste. This problem is especially severe in developing nations.

Easy and timely access to precise market information, especially prices, can help fishers and farmers whether or not to go out fishing or schedule another harvest, thus preventing conditions that flood the market with excess supply.

Fishers and farmers in the developing world may not all have bank accounts but almost all have a mobile device: a feature phone or, increasingly, a smartphone.

Thus an opportunity exists to crowdsource the price data from and communicate it to fishers, farmers and buyers, and thus help to reduce over- and undersupply of the market, and reduce overfishing and waste.

•  How might we crowdsource relevant market information - catch profile, species, location, and price - from fishers, farmers, and buyers?
•  How might we ensure that the collected information is valid, accurate, and trustworthy?