Packaged frozen fishery products: species identification, mislabeling occurrence and legislative implications

Pinto, Angela Di; Mottola, Anna; Marchetti, Patrizia; Bottaro, Marilisa; Terio, Valentina; Bozzo, Giancarlo; Bonerba, Elisabetta; Ceci, Edmondo; Tantillo, Giuseppina

doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2015.07.135

Cited by 33 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Sites were sampled only once, with the exception of two vendors who sold both fileted and whole "red snapper, " in which case both products were collected and tested. Our study defined mislabeling in terms of incorrect identification of the species, but the scope of mislabeling can extend to other information like country of origin, farmed or wild caught, and more (Di Pinto et al, 2015b). Samples either needed to be physically labeled "red snapper, " or verbally confirmed as "red snapper" by a vendor employee.…”

Section: Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fishy Business: Red Snapper Mislabeling Along the Coastline of the Southeastern United States

Spencer

Bruno

2019

Front. Mar. Sci.

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Seafood mislabeling is a widely documented problem that has significant implications for human and environmental health. Defined as when seafood is sold under something other than its true species name, seafood fraud allows less-desired or illegally caught species to be marketed as one recognizable to consumers. Red snapper is one of the most frequently mislabeled species, with previous studies showing mislabeling rates as high as 77%. We assessed whether red snapper mislabeling rates varied among states or vendor type. We also determined the IUCN Red List designation of substituted species to assess whether frequently substituted stocks were more or less at-risk than red snapper stocks. We used standard DNA barcoding protocols to determine the identity of products labeled as "red snapper" from sushi restaurants, seafood markets, and grocery stores in the Southeastern United States. Overall, 72.6% of samples (out of 62) were mislabeled, with sushi restaurants mislabeling samples 100% of the time. Out of 13 substituted species (including samples that were indistinguishable between two species), seven (53.8%) were not native to the United States of the 12 substituted species assessed by the IUCN Red List, 11 (91.6%) were listed as less threatened than red snapper. These results contribute to a growing body of mislabeling research that can be used by government agencies trying to develop effective policies to combat seafood fraud and consumers hoping to avoid mislabeled products.

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Section: Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fishy Business: Red Snapper Mislabeling Along the Coastline of the Southeastern United States

Spencer

Bruno

2019

Front. Mar. Sci.

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“…Yet two of the three mislabeled species, red hamour and white snapper, involved replacements by a close relative (yellowfin hind and painted sweetlips, respectively) of lesser value that may involve an intention to increase profitability, a common practice reported in many other studies (Cawthorn et Pappalardo and Ferrito 2015). The substitution of pangasius by rohu (Labeo rohita), a species of equivalent or slightly higher market value, although not directly involving economic gains, nevertheless suggests inconsistencies in the fish processing and packaging plants from the supplying country (Di Pinto et al 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

DNA barcoding of fish species reveals low rate of package mislabeling in Qatar

Chen

Zakaria

Altarawneh

et al. 2019

Genome

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DNA barcoding technique has made it possible to authenticate various species used for food and medicinal purposes. In the identification of seafood species, studies are concentrated in North America, Europe, and Asia. Elsewhere, including countries in the Middle East and North Africa, studies of this sort are scarce. This study focuses on packaged fresh or minimally processed fish fillet available at eight major supermarket chains in Qatar. A cocktail of eight primers attached with M13 tails established for fish species identification was adopted to facilitate PCR and sequencing. Sequences were compared with those available in the Barcode of Life Databases (BOLD Systems) and BLAST in NCBI databases. Among the 62 unique fish packages with resolved sequences, only three are confirmed to be mislabeled, at a rate of about 5%. Two of the substituted species are high value items while the third species was replaced by another, equally low-cost species. The relatively low rate of mislabeling in the samples is perhaps a result of strict local food safety regulations, which may have led to high consistency between the package labels and their contents.

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“…In spite of such difference, authors highlighted that functional attributes as efficient products recall, possibility to identify an individual responsibility and a complete traceability of the meat chain may be regarded as minimum requirements of any authentication system for all consumers [35,56]. Keeping all these aspects in mind, the potential of DNA technologies appears straightforward, as recently well documented for fishery products [57][58][59].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

DNA Barcoding as a Molecular Tool to Track Down Mislabeling and Food Piracy

2015

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DNA barcoding is a molecular technology that allows the identification of any biological species by amplifying, sequencing and querying the information from genic and/or intergenic standardized target regions belonging to the extranuclear genomes. Although these sequences represent a small fraction of the total DNA of a cell, both chloroplast and mitochondrial barcodes chosen for identifying plant and animal species, respectively, have shown sufficient nucleotide diversity to assess the taxonomic identity of the vast majority of organisms used in agriculture. Consequently, cpDNA and mtDNA barcoding protocols are being used more and more in the food industry and food supply chains for food labeling, not only to support food safety but also to uncover food piracy in freshly commercialized and technologically processed products. Since the extranuclear genomes are present in many copies within each cell, this technology is being more easily exploited to recover information even in degraded samples or transformed materials deriving from crop varieties and livestock species. The strong standardization that characterizes protocols used worldwide for DNA barcoding makes this technology particularly suitable for routine analyses required by agencies to safeguard food safety and quality. Here we conduct a critical review of the potentials of DNA barcoding for food labeling along with the main findings in the area of food piracy, with particular reference to agrifood and livestock foodstuffs.

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Packaged frozen fishery products: species identification, mislabeling occurrence and legislative implications

Cited by 33 publications

References 13 publications

Fishy Business: Red Snapper Mislabeling Along the Coastline of the Southeastern United States

Fishy Business: Red Snapper Mislabeling Along the Coastline of the Southeastern United States

DNA barcoding of fish species reveals low rate of package mislabeling in Qatar

DNA Barcoding as a Molecular Tool to Track Down Mislabeling and Food Piracy

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