Genetic Tools
Traceability in the "ocean to fork" sense relies on efficient, reliable, cost-effective technologies, enabling the independent control of compliance with rules. In the fisheries sector, this encompasses the ability to determine whether labels on fish and fish products identify the correct species, correct origin, and whether fish derive from aquaculture or the wild. Ideally, such methods should be adapted to end-users such as staff of control authorities, be applicable on whole fish as well as processed products, and swiftly lead to results. Moreover, if they are to be utilised for enforcement, these methods should be validated applying forensic standards and generate levels of confidence based on statistical analysis certainty, which are considerably higher than that required for purely scientific inference (Murphy and Morrison, 2007).
With the advent of molecular biology, molecular and genetic markers are increasingly employed both for species identification and origin assignment. It is important to understand that traceability tools for species identification and origin assignment require comprehensive reference data sets ("baselines"). When control authorities wish to test whether a fish fillet derives from the species indicated on the product label, their analytical data must be comparable to a set of validated data for species identification. This has been achieved to a great extent by the DNA barcoding approach (see below). Likewise, if the origin of a fish (product) is under investigation, fish deriving from different geographical regions must have been formerly analysed and distinct features, robust "population-level signatures", characterising these groups must be recorded.
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