Ecological Concerns Caused by the Canned Tuna Industry

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Introduction
Canned tuna quickly grew into one of the most popular seafood products in the United States due to low cost, and its source of protein; making it number two in the top ten consumed sea food products (Campling et al. 2007). Harvesting of the canned Tuna species has raised significant ecological issues and concerns related with economic and environmental sustainability (WWF n.p).

Types of Canned Tuna Species
There are five main commercial tuna species: Albacore, Yellowfin, Bluefin, Big Eye, and Skipjack. The most commonly canned species though include the Albacore Tuna, the Yellowfin tuna species, and the Skipjack tuna species (Canned Tuna, 2014). The following sections provide information regarding the biological species, habitat, trade name, fishing methods and their related advantages, disadvantages and the sustainability of the various canned tuna species.

Albacore Tuna
The scientific name for the Albacore tuna is the Thunnus Alalunga. It is typically a large fish, ranging at approximately 4 to 5 feet in length and weighs roughly 80-90 pounds. It is metallic, identified by a dark blue color running along its topside and a silvery white strip marking the sides of its belly. The Albacore are found in the tropical and warm temperate oceans. The specific locations of the species include the Atlantic, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean. According to the sustainable canned tuna website, the Albacore Tuna is the most abundant and popular species of the canned fish because of its ability to survive in large populations in the temperate and tropical oceans. The trade name of the canned Albacore is the white meat tuna (Hilderbrand, 1-3).

Skipjack Tuna
Katsuwonus is the scientific name for the Skipjack tuna. It is a streaml...

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Marine Stewardship Council: Certified sustainable seafood. 2014. http://www.msc.org Miyake, Makoto, Patrice, Guillotreau, Chin-Hwa, Sun and Gakushi, Ishimura. Recent developments in the tuna industry: Stocks, fisheries, management, processing, trade and markets. Food and Agricultural Organization, 2010. http://www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1705e/i1705e.pdf Wild planet. Sustainably caught wild seafood: sustainability and fishing methods, 2014. Web. 3 April 2014. http://www.wildplanetfoods.com/Sustainability-and-Fishing-Methods.html World Wildlife Fund (WWF). Threats: overfishing, 2014. Web. 3 April 2014. http://worldwildlife.org/threats/overfishing WWF position paper. WWF statement on fish aggregation devices (fads) in tuna fisheries. 3 April 2014.
http://awsassets.panda.org/downloads/tuna_fad_position_november_2011_.pdf

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