Fishes under detection scanner to curb adulteration

New Delhi, January 30: With the aim of curbing adulteration in fishes, the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare launched a Rapid Detection Kits for Adulterants in Fresh Fish in New Delhi which has been developed by Central Institute of Fisheries Technology in Kochi.

 

Radha Mohan Singh, Union Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Minister launched this Rapid Detection Kits. This adulteration detection kit is used for enabling detection of fishes which contains ammonia. Ammonia helps in preventing ice from melting and use of formaldehyde increases the shelf life of fish therefore many people in the fisheries sector are using these chemicals. The kit helps in detecting both the chemicals in the fish.

 

While inaugurating the kit Radha Mohan Singh informed that continuous ingestion of ammonia and formaldehyde can lead to many health issues including abdominal pain, vomiting, unconsciousness, and sometimes even cause death. He further added that fish consumption is beneficial for health. Since fresh fish is highly perishable in nature, so fish don’t have a long shelf life. India’s domestic fish market is reported to be selling formaldehyde-adulterated fish, especially in markets located far away from landing centres or production sites. According to Indian and International regulations, the fresh fish and shellfish should be preserved only by means of ice and use of substances other than ice to maintain quality is a fraudulent practice.

 

The continuous monitoring of these contaminants in a laboratory is time-consuming and requires expertise but some people use toxic chemicals in the form of contaminated substances. Today's consumer is conscious about the food quality and safety issues and they need rapid, sensitive, and portable screening methods. Taking these aspects into consideration, ICAR-CIFT has developed two rapid detection kits for checking adulteration of fresh fish with formaldehyde and ammonia. The kits are handy and consist of simple paper strips, reagent solution, and standard chart for comparing results. Formaldehyde is potential cancer-inducing chemical, which is a major health concern, therefore, its use needs to be curbed. For handling, processing, storage, transportation, and display for sale of fish and fish products only cold chain should be used.

This came up when there were reports on marketing of fishes added with hazardous chemicals like formaldehyde, ammonia among others. Formaldehyde is a toxic aldehyde, listed as cancer causing agent by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and ammonia, although it is not carcinogenic, but continuous ingestion of ammonia can lead to hazardous health issues like injuries to mucous membranes of mouth, throat, esophagus, and stomach.