Mislabelled fish slip into Europe's menus

[gfkelly1969]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-21993684

[lastcast]

I think this has been rife in Ireland for years, particularly from small "wet fish" businesses. I am very suspicious of skinned fillets which are not always easy to identify (until cooked and tasted!) and make a point of buying my fish "skin-on". I think pollack and whiting are often passed-off as something else.

[The Austrian]

nothing new there GF, if you order 'fish and chips' you get basa fish, Pangasius bocourti, which is a type of catfish in the family Pangasiidae. Basa are native to the Mekong River Delta in Vietnam and Chao Phraya basin in Thailand. These fish are important food fish with an international market value. Full of antibiotics and chemicals, cheap and nasty! If you order 'cod and chips' - well, you should be safe, but can you? Really? Catch your own is the only way to go, I trust no one anymore. Follow up the money train and you get your truth, as simple as that. Profit before conscience and honor. Sad? Yes!

[willie bendit]

Point well made Martin.

[donal murphy]

yea ive heard of it in fish and chips alot.... im sure its happening all over the place..

is this the next horsemeat scandal

[John D]

The fishing industry is full of deceipt & deception unfortunately. Overfishing is just the tip of the iceberg! Raising awareness is the key though. I'm constantly letting my friends, family and work colleagues know about the Irish bass laws and stuff like that.

It's up to us to try and tell people about these things!

Yours hopefully,
John D.

[johnwest]

nothing new there GF, if you order 'fish and chips' you get basa fish, Pangasius bocourti, which is a type of catfish in the family Pangasiidae. Basa are native to the Mekong River Delta in Vietnam and Chao Phraya basin in Thailand. These fish are important food fish with an international market value. Full of antibiotics and chemicals, cheap and nasty! If you order 'cod and chips' - well, you should be safe, but can you? Really? Catch your own is the only way to go, I trust no one anymore. Follow up the money train and you get your truth, as simple as that. Profit before conscience and honor. Sad? Yes!

I presume it's marketed as Vietnamese river Cobbler in some supermarkets? I saw a consumer programme on TV a while back investigating "cod" and chips in England and the quite a few outlets were using basa (not always knowingly) instead of cod. The funny thing was that when they did a "can you tell the difference?" survey, most people who noticed any difference preferred the Basa!

@ Donal Murphy, should we be worried that scad are also known as Horse Mackerel?

[Caz-Galway]

Nothing new here.

From 2010 http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/ ... 042210.php

DNA barcoding reveals mislabeled cod and haddock in Dublin
Scientists identify 25 percent of cod and haddock in Dublin seafood industry as different species
Ecological scientists in Ireland recently used DNA barcoding to identify species of fish labeled as either "cod" or "haddock" in fish and chip shops, fresh fish counters and supermarkets in 10 postal districts in Dublin. They found that 39 out of 156 (25%) randomly sampled "cod" and "haddock" were genetically entirely different species and, therefore, mislabeled under European Union (EU) regulations.

In addition, as Dana Miller and Stefano Mariani from University College Dublin report in today's Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment (e-View), 28 out of 34 (82.4%) smoked fish samples were incorrectly labeled, and 26 out of 28 (92.9%) samples labeled as "smoked cod" were completely different species.

"In light of recent findings from North American scientists using the same approach, it seems mislabeling seafood is pervasive on a global scale," said Miller. "This, coupled with the enormous rise in seafood demand, raises alarm. There is an increasing need for effective and sustainable seafood industry management and especially for transparency within the seafood industry itself on an international level."

Last April, researchers Ron Burton and Phil Hastings from the University of California, San Diego used DNA barcoding to identify fish served in New York restaurants; they found that 25% of the fish were mislabeled.

"Consumers should be able to go to a shop and know they are eating what they paid for, especially when the product is purchased within the EU, where numerous policies relating to labeling and tracing are already in place," said Mariani. The authors argue that these findings suggest mislabeling could contribute to overfishing—that is, mislabeling cod in Ireland could be creating a false perception of market availability.

"There are many problems associated with mislabeling fish, like in the case of mislabeling the depleted red snapper to enhance perceptions of availability in the U.S.," continued Miller. "Consumers may think that if 'cod' keeps showing up in markets and restaurants across Ireland, the stocks must be healthy."

The fish samples the researchers tested included smoked, fried, battered, fresh and frozen cod and haddock. Approximately 25% of these samples turned out to be cod labeled as haddock or vice versa, or a completely different species of fish altogether, such as pollack, whiting or saithe, mislabeled as cod or haddock or even Pacific cod being labeled as Atlantic cod.

To identify the correct species, the scientists extracted tissue from each sample and entered the gene sequences into the Barcode of Life Data Systems online at www.barcodinglife.org; the researchers also cross-referenced the sequence with other databases. The study includes a complete list of all analyzed fish, as they were labeled and identified.

"With the rapid advances in bioinformatics, the traceability of fish stocks will be more affordable and available," said Mariani. "This will hopefully make enforcing the proper labeling of fish easier and will subsequently encourage transparency in the fishing industry. With a restored trust in retailers and policymakers, the seafood industry can be turned into a sustainable operation on a global scale."[/color]

[the weasel]

Sure its being going on for years and im sure that the average cod and chips that you ask for is probably pollack or whitting that your getting.

John Ainsworth.

[The Austrian]

...I saw a consumer programme on TV a while back investigating "cod" and chips in England and the quite a few outlets were using basa (not always knowingly) instead of cod. The funny thing was that when they did a "can you tell the difference?" survey, most people who noticed any difference preferred the Basa...

surely I'd say many unfortunate consumers realised by now by now that it wasn't the infamous 'bad pint' that made them sick after a night out, provided they have something like a brain between their ears...
http://www.dietmindspirit.org/2008/01/3 ... gray-sole/

And, to make matters worse, these fish fillets are doused in a chemical bath before freezing, just to soak up and retain more cell water in order to double the weight of the frozen fillets. Easy maths: twice the weight=double the profit.
Worst junk food ever, even compared with our so called 'organic salmon'...

Anyone for fish & chips tonight? Make sure what you get is what you pay for!