Seafood Technology

This presentation will fill the total picture of this conference between fisheries and aquaculture, blue biotech and bioconservation, by considering the optimal processing technology of marine resources from the raw material until the seafood reaches the plate of the consumer. The situation today is that even with the maximum sustainable exploitation and proper management of wild fish resources, the supply is not sufficient to meet the market needs for seafood. The demand is expected to grow in the future as more consumers are requesting seafood for the health benefits and for enjoying the large diversity of seafood products counting not only a vast variety of finfish species, but also crustaceans, mollusks, and new developments of seaweed products. The supplementary demand must be supplied from aquaculture, where sustainable farming by applying e.g. the principles of Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA) is needed to pay attention to environmental protection and continued biodiversity. Further, it is necessary to use all the raw materials provided such that present by-products and side streams in processing are being upgraded for a better use than today. Principles of blue biotechnology may be applied, from which also can be derived new product categories from untapped aquatic resources. The processing must also be performed according to energy optimization and the lowest possible CO2 emission. In this connection the calculation of carbon footprints or LCA must be possible, and any production must be performed such that total traceability and authenticity of the final products can be presented on demand. The most important aspects to be considered within seafood technology today are safety, healthy products and high eating quality. Safety can be divided into microbiological safety and chemical safety, meaning that the products must not contain chemical contaminants that could affect human health. Further, in some cases the presence of parasites and nematodes may lead to unexpected allergy reactions in some consumers, even if the parasites are killed in the processing operations and not presenting any safety risk per se. Seafood is healthy due to the omega-3 fatty acids and the nutritional value of vitamins, peptides and proteins. The processing technology must however be performed such that these valuable features are not lost during production. The same applies to the eating quality. Any loss of quality during processing and storage can never be regained later.