Why Fishermen Want Japan To Maintain Ban On Smoked
Tuna
(By
Russell Dunham, August 18th, 2006)
Mr.
Russell Dunham, Group Business Director of Fiji Tuna Boat Owners Association
writes regarding a recent article on atuna.com which reported about “The push
by the tuna exporters in the Philippines to end the ban on smoked tuna to
Japan”. Mr. Dunham considers this of great concern to Fiji and many other
Pacific Island nations. Here below his opinion on the matter.
”Smoked tuna is the practice of chemically treating tuna flesh and passing the
resultant product off as fresh fish. The result is that producers of high
quality, contaminant free tuna, such as Fiji, are having their hard-earned
markets seriously eroded by unscrupulous and illegal processors. In addition the
consumers of tuna in countries, such as Indonesia, USA and Philippines, where
this fraudulent product is sold are being deceived and exposed to serious health
risk.
I should point out that all CO treated tuna is banned for importation and sale
in Japan, Australia, New Zealand, EU countries and Taiwan and now China.
The science behind this issue is rather straight-forward. The normal red-pink
color in tuna comes from the respiratory pigments, haemoglobin and myoglobin,
that are prominent in these fast swimming, highly energetic fish. Once a fish
dies these pigments are progressively converted to the brown in color
methaemoglobin and metmyoglobin. The natural color of the flesh is therefore a
good indicator of its freshness and the way in which it has been refrigerated
and handled. When these two respiratory pigments in both their fresh (oxy-haemoglobin
and myoglobin) and decomposing (met-haemoglobin and myoglobin) are exposed to
carbon monoxide they are permanently and non-reversibly converted to
carboxy-haemoglobin and myoglobin. This non-reversibility is the reason carbon
monoxide is so lethal to all red-blooded animals (normal haemoglobin in its oxy-
form carries oxygen to tissues where it gives it up resulting in the met-form).
It is also the primary reason why carbon monoxide treated tuna flesh stays pink
regardless of its age or bacterial content.
In fact the pink color of carbon monoxide treated tuna (tail-pipe tuna as the
American scientists call it) is a different pink (commonly called plastic-pink)
to the red-pink of fresh tuna and can be readily distinguished by the
professional tuna buyer or scientist, but not by the unsuspecting public who
rely on good governance to protect them.
Some suppliers hide their use of carbon monoxide by claiming the fish is not
specifically treated with the gas but is instead treated with “colorless smoke”
(in effect this is treated with smoke from which most or all of the ingredients
except carbon monoxide have been removed), others claim a “secret patented
process” has been used. The one positive in the non-reversible, characteristic
pink color of “tail-pipe tuna”, is that it is easy to tell definitively when
carbon monoxide is the active ingredient in any treatment.
Fiji, and other Pacific Islands, rely extremely heavily on their relatively
pristine environments and associated uncontaminated products to market primary
produce throughout the world. Tuna products are extraordinarily important to our
future development both socially and economically. Indeed our futures are
inextricably linked to the sustainable exploitation of our tuna resources. These
futures are currently being seriously threatened by practices that are not only
illegal but whose sole objective is to deceive the public into buying a product
which looks fresh but is not. This is fraud.
The health risks associated with masking the signs the average person uses to
determine if the fish is fresh are also enormous.
We certainly support countries like Japan and the many other countries that ban
the importation of this adulterated tuna.”
This is the opinion of Mr. Russell Dunham, who is Group Business Director of
Fiji Tuna Boat Owners Association
Fiji Fish Marketing Group Ltd.,
PO Box 14720, Suva, FIJI
Ph: (679) 3362696
Fax: (679) 3363621
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