Natural populations of Pacific whiteleg shrimp Penaeus vannamei are threatened by habitat loss and pollutants which may impact genetic diversity and disease resistance characteristics. To protect the habitat of shrimp populations and help develop a sustainable aquaculture industry, baseline information on contaminants in mangroves and shellfish is needed.
We examine the concentrations (µg/g) of 15 metals (Al, Ag, Ba, Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Hg, K, Mn, Ni, Pb, S, Se, V) in muscle of P. vannamei broodstock from three Ecuadorian provinces (Esmeraldas, Manabi, Guayas) (n=30) and El Salvador (n=8) maintained for breeding purposes under similar environmental conditions in a culture pond in Salinas, Ecuador. Guayas shrimp ranked first in number of metals with highest concentrations followed by El Salvador and Esmeraldas. Manabi shrimp ranked the lowest in metal concentrations. El Salvador shrimp had highest concentrations of four metals (Cd, Hg, Cr, Ni) that could impact reproduction, immune response, and genetic diversity. A literature review of metals contaminating shrimp using the NCBI databases (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) is also presented. The use of trace metal profiling and multivariate statistics to determine the country of origin of farm-raised penaeid shrimp has been used by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Laboratory1. Metal profiling was also used to determine the potential health risk associated with consumption of shrimp from Ecuador2.
Consumption of Ecuadorian shrimp does not pose a human health risk. Ramos-Miras et al. (2023)2 studied the presence of nine metals (As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Hg, Ni, Pb, Zn) in shrimps from Ecuador and compared them to such contents noted in other shrimp-production areas in the world to evaluate the possible risks associated with these elements for consumer health, and to relate them to potentially toxic element (PTE) contents in water, sediments and diets, and also to animal biometric parameters. The target hazard quotient (THQ) values for PTEs indicate that the consumption of shrimp muscles from Ecuador does not pose a human health risk because the values of these indices are below 1 in all cases.
References
1Ralph G Smith, Carson A Watts. 2009. Determination of the country of origin of farm-raised shrimp (family penaeide) using trace metal profiling and multivariate statistics. J Agric Food Chem. 57(18):8244-9.
2Ramos_Miras, J., M. Sanchez_Muros, P. Renteria, C. Gil de Carrasco, L. Roca_Perez, M. Boluda_Navarro, J. Pro, J. Rodríguez Martín. 2023. Potentially toxic element bioaccumulation in consumed indoor shrimp farming associated with diet, water and sediment levels. 2023. Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 30:121794–121806.