Last week French retailers were informed by the French health authorities that they are no longer permitted to market imported smoked tuna fillets. The “Direction Générale de L’alimentation†of the French Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Rural affairs stated that they want to eliminate the risk of histamine contamination in swordfish and tuna fillets.
The authorities state that the use of carbon monoxide on tuna meat could masque deterioration of the product quality and freshness, which could create a favorable climate for the development of histamine. As a result of this, they have ordered all retailers, and fishmongers in France who market chilled tuna steaks, to withdraw this product from the market, and test the product in their stock on histamine.
The reasons for these actions are, according to the authorities, new alerts from other EU member states in regard to the occurrence of high histamine in smoked swordfish and tuna steaks from various origins. They also refer to the regulations by the EU Commission of April 7 and July 17th 2003, regulation 91/493/CEE, which forbids the utilization of the smoking process, due to lack of scientific recognition for this method.
The recall refers not only to product smoked by carbon monoxide, but also clearsmoke, or any other artificial smoking process.
The move is a blow to the fresh tuna market. Increasingly smoked tuna found its way in France, due to it’s fresh and attractive color, compared to the darker, rusted color of non-smoked fresh tuna fillets.
Hyperlink to French regulation: Direction Générale de L’alimentation