PAH's - Report on Seafish survey of UK seafood smoking businesses and products

Summary

Polycylic aromatic hydrocarbons (PaH's) form a large group of chemicals, some of which are known to be toxic. They are produced largely by combustion processes and are present in smoked foods. The European Commission is proposing a maximum permitted limit of 5ppb for the PaH benzo(a) pyrene (BaP) in smoked foods. To determine the potential impact of this, Seafish has carried out a survey of the size and nature of the fish smoking industry in the UK and has gathered representative samples of its products for analysis. The survey found the value of smoked fish production in the UK to be over £120 million per annum. A wide variety of products are produced from a range of fish species using modern and traditional kilns, smoked over a variety of woods. PaH analyses of 33 products showed them all to be well within the proposed EU limit of 5ppb for BaP. Only 2 products exceeded 0.5ppb and the highest level found was 1.34ppb.

Publication Reference No.

SR557

Publication date

01 January 2003