Seafood Mislabeling a Persistent Problem

The findings revealed 32 per cent of the samples overall were mislabelled. The mislabelling rate was 17.6 per cent at the import stage, 27.3 per cent at processing plants and 38.1 per cent at retailers. “The higher mislabelling rate in samples collected from retailers, compared to that for samples collected from importers, indicates the role of distribution and repackaging in seafood mislabelling,” said Hanner. He points to a few reasons for the problem. “It’s either economically motivated, meaning cheaper fish are being purposely mislabelled as more expensive fish. Or it’s inconsistent labelling regulations between countries and the use of broader common names being used to label fish instead of scientific species names that are leading to mislabelling.” In both Canada and the U.S., fish are labelled using a common name rather than a specific scientific name. For example, a variety of species may be sold as tuna, although different species can significantly vary in price. “It creates ambiguity and opens the door for fraud or honest mistakes,” he said. “It also makes it more difficult to track species at risk or indicate if a fish is a species that has higher mercury content. At the end of the day, Canadian consumers don’t really know what type of fish they are eating.”https://www.technologynetworks.com/applied-sciences/news/seafood-mislabeling-a-persistent-problem-315129?utm_campaign=NEWSLETTER_TN_Breaking%20Science%20News&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=69724460&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8E2GER4NOmm1vRRsWLGSkG1SVpKpPfxMcPpbPesAkkA_U0_8ex9av7l8bG0sZ2-muvkrw7Jma9L_TRD6jJoCybXe5jVQ&_hsmi=69724460