Seafood is a highly traded commodity that is exposed to a wide range of environmental and social sustainability challenges. Digitalization of the seafood value chain helps to address these challenges. Using Global Value Chain (GVC) analysis, this paper presents a qualitative case study on the conditions for adoption of digitalization by Dutch fisheries. Field results show the different digital technologies available in the Dutch fisheries ranging from sensors, Internet-of-Things, blockchain, and Artificial Intelligence. Despite several identified incentives such as improved fuel efficiency, reduced fishing time, and increased catch productivity, there is in general a low commitment from fishers to adopt digital technologies. First, the benefits are perceived to be uncertain due to costs, investments, and inherent risks associated with technology adoption as well as external risks related to prices, catches and government regulations. Second, there is profound resistance from fishers to collect and share data due to lack of trust between fishers and the government, and among fishers due to competitive nature of fishing. This research proposes design arrangement for implementing digitalization that considers: 1) horizontal coordination (producer organization or association) to move from individualistic to collective fishing practices, 2) viable business model to incentivize data collection, 3) connecting fishers to ecosystem of stakeholders for sharing incentives and risks, and 4) technological solutions to protect strategic interests in sharing data. This study contributes to literature by linking GVC governance, sustainability, and digitalization, and by providing a systems approach that considers coordination, incentives, and risks in fishers’ decision making in GVC.
