Are you actually getting what you ordered?
Nearly half the time, you are not — if you are out in town and going for some sushi, that is.
A four-year study published by UCLA and Loyola Marymount University on Wednesday, Jan. 11 found that 47 percent of sushi served at 26 restaurants in Los Angeles from 2012 to 2015 was mislabeled.
In their random visits, the researchers discovered that sushi represented as tuna was nearly always tuna. But other sushi passed off as other kinds of fish were an entirely different story: 43 halibut orders and 32 red snapper orders served to them were some other type of fish, with a staggering 90 percent of the halibut orders were discovered to be flounder.
Salmon, too, was mislabeled in around one out of 10 times.
“Fish fraud could be accidental, but I suspect that in some cases the mislabeling is very much intentional, though it’s hard to know where in the supply chain it begins,” warned UCLA professor and senior author Paul Barber, speculating that mere mislabeling would not be as widespread as found in certain species.
Undermining Eco Regulations
The team, which used DNA barcoding to identify the fish accurately, cited skirting environmental regulations in the so-called “fish fraud.”
Two samples of tuna turned out to be Atlantic bluefin tuna and southern bluefin tuna, which are species categorized as endangered and critically endangered. Seven out of nine yellowfin tuna orders, on the other hand, emerged as bigeye, deemed already vulnerable and overharvested.
Forty percent of halibut orders were actually flounder species considered near-threatened or overfished.
The mislabeling could actually hurt the diners, the researchers said further, pointing to pregnant women and small children who need to avoid mercury-laden fish, and customers simply trying to avoid consuming threatened species.
The international fish trade is now pegged at $135 billion in worth. Back in December, the Obama administration launched a program targeting illegal fishing and seafood fraud in the United States, with a special focus on commonly mislabeled or overfished seafood. The rule began to be enforced in Jan. 1, with fraudsters possibly slapped with legal action or getting their wares seized.
‘Fish Fraud’ In Restos And Grocery Stores
The UCLA researchers tested a total of 364 samples of 10 widely used fish varieties for sushi in their endeavor. Part of why the project reached four years was the involvement of some marine sciences students, who went to sushi places that ranked high on review site Yelp to order particular fish types on the menu and take samples for testing.
The identities of the sushi restaurants that were part of the study were not released, with the researchers expressing interest in working with some of the establishments to test their fish shipments and identify where the fraud takes place.
Barber said the mislabeling is so rampant that one would believe “even the restaurants are being duped.”
Even high-end grocery stores are probably not spared as a year’s worth of sushi sampling in such places showed similar mislabeling trends, suggesting a potential “bait-and-switch” issue in the supply chain, the authors added.
The findings were discussed in the journal Conservation Biology.
