Category: News

Last year, a project was launched to promote increased consumption of seafood, especially among young people. Recently, students at Menntaskólinn á Akureyri and Verkmenntaskóli Akureyrar took part in a consumer survey, which is part of the project. 

Recent surveys indicate that fish consumption in Iceland has decreased considerably in recent years, most notably among younger age groups. It is important to counteract this development, both from a health point of view, as fish is generally considered harmful, but also from an economic point of view.

Although so much fish is exported from Iceland, it must not be forgotten that the domestic market is important for Icelandic fisheries and fish processing companies. Young people today are an important consumer group of the future, so it is important to consider measures to reverse this trend, through targeted education, advertising and marketing. 

The goal of the project, called Attitudes and fish consumption of young people: Improving the image of seafood is precisely to promote increased consumption of seafood through consumption surveys and promotional campaigns. As previously stated, the project began at IFL last year and is expected to be completed in 2008. Work on the projects carried out at IFL and other institutions that merged at the turn of the year will continue under the Matís brand.

Article about the project in Ægi (pdf)

The first report published by Matís ohf deals with research on how cooling speed affects the quality of lamb. It states, among other things, that in recent years, engine cooling in slaughterhouses has increased significantly and cooling in meat is therefore faster than before, which sometimes wants to reduce the quality of the meat.

The report is called Effect of chilling on lamb tenderloin and it states that the speed of cooling has a great influence on the quality of the meat and the cooling must follow the process of freezing to death in such a way that the quality of the meat is as high as possible. Too rapid cooling or freezing of lamb shortly after slaughter can cause cooling in the meat and result in stiffer (tougher) meat. According to Ásbjörn Jónsson, one of the authors of the report, better quality is achieved if you wait to freeze the meat until the process of death solidification is fully completed.

The main objective of the project was to study the texture properties (tenderness) of lamb meat at different refrigeration temperatures and times in slaughterhouses. Temperature measurements were made in dilka carcasses in the slaughterhouse of slaughterhouses at different air temperatures. Samples were taken from the vertebral body dilka carcasses after varying lengths of presence in the meat hall, and they were frozen. Texture measurements were then performed on the samples to assess the effect of cooling on the muscle. The study showed that meat stored in a meat hall and frozen the same day (after 4-5 hours) was stiffer than meat that had a longer cooling time in the meat hall after slaughter.

In addition to Ásbjörn, those who worked on the project were Óli Þór Hilmarsson and Valur Norðri Gunnlaugsson. They all worked for Matra, but started working for Matís ohf at the end of last year. The project was funded by the Agricultural Contracts Executive Committee.

Read the report

IFL recently published a report on the project Thawed salted fish in consumer packages, where, among other things, factors were studied such as how the shelf life of dehydrated cod fillets could be maximized.

As many people know, salted fish has been one of the most important exports of Icelanders since the early 19th century, and even today the export of salted seafood amounts to 15-20% of the export value of Icelandic seafood. Many consumers today do not feel they have the time or interest to spend too much time on cooking and therefore the demand for fresh, ready-made or fast-cooked foods has increased significantly. However, such foods are much more sensitive than salted or frozen and have a much shorter shelf life.

In order for salted fish to continue its market share, it is necessary to be able to offer it dehydrated and ready for boiling / frying. In order for this to be possible, it must be ensured that it has a sufficiently long shelf life as a refrigerated product.

In the new report, which bears the title Thawed, dehydrated cod fillets in consumer packages was drawn attention to, among other things, by examining in more detail the interplay between gas composition, potassium sorbate concentration and citric acid concentration with regard to factors such as microbial and chemical changes, taste, smell, texture, appearance and drip.

The project also carried out shelf life tests on dehydrated, thawed, salted fish fillets after different lengths of frozen storage, and the quality of such fillets was compared with unfrozen fillets. The effects of different raw material qualities on the shelf life of packaged products were also investigated, as well as the growth potential of several pathogens and pointing organisms in gas-packed, dehydrated fillets.

The authors of the report are Hannes Magnússon, Kolbrún Sveinsdóttir, Ása Þorkelsdóttir, Emilia Martinsdóttir, but they all work at IFL's Research Division.

A company in Australia has relied on the results of an IFL scientific article to advertise the equipment it manufactures. The main author of the article, which was recently published in the scientific journal Journal of Microbiological Methods, is Eyjólfur Reynisson, a biologist at IFL.

The Australian company is called Corbett Research and manufactures devices, tools and substrates for real-time PCR. They produce, among other things, Rotorgene3000, which is a real-time PCR device, but it was used in the study that IFL published this year. The study found that with their devices, the sensitivity of the analytical method had been highest compared to two other systems that were also tested.

The article in question is called Evaluation of probe chemistries and platforms to improve the detection limit of real-time PCR and Eyjólfur Reynisson is its main author. Other authors are MH Josefsen, M. Krause and J. Hoorfar.

Those who are interested in reading the article can go on Eyjólfur's CV page.

The project was recently completed Protein requirement of cod where ways were sought to reduce the cost of cod farming and make this young industry more profitable. Feed cost is 40-60% of the total production cost of the fire and therefore attention was focused on whether and how it could be reduced. A new IFL report presents the results of this study.

There has been a lot of talk about the alleged deplorable state of wild fish stocks recently, and the journal Science recently published a report predicting the collapse of all the world's fish stocks by the middle of this century. In fact, not everyone was prepared to accept this pessimistic forecast, including the director of the MRI.

Apart from these disputes, it is predicted that aquaculture, not least aquaculture of sea species such as cod, will grow enormously in the coming years and decades. Icelanders have been following this development closely, as have many nations in the North Atlantic, and cod farming has already begun in several places in Iceland. 

As stated earlier, feed costs are between 40-60% of the total production cost of the fire and in order to increase profitability in this industry, it is clear that there are most promising ways to reduce costs. Protein is the most expensive nutrient in feed for fish and therefore it is very important to minimize its content so that it goes primarily to building muscle and not to energy consumption, as cheaper nutrients, such as fat, can be of similar use.

In a new IFL report Protein requirements of farmed cod Among other things, a study was reported where the goal was to find the optimal protein content for two size categories of cod, on the one hand 30-100g and on the other hand 300-500g of cod. Among other things, the research showed that the larger cod's (300-500g) need for protein was less than what is normally used in factory-produced feed today. There is therefore possibly one way to reduce feed costs without compromising the quality of the cod.

Protein requirement of cod which was a two-year project funded by the AVS Fund. The project was part of a larger project, Feed for Atlantic cod, which was funded by the Nordic Industrial Development Fund October 2003 - 2006. Icelandic participants in the project were IFL, Fóðurverksmiðjan Laxá, Hólaskóli, SR mjöl, the University of Akureyri and Brim fiskeldi.

Dr. Guðrún Ólafsdóttir, a food scientist at IFL, recently received an honorary award named after Earl P. McFee. The award was presented at a celebration program in connection with the TAFT 2006 conference, which took place in Quebec City, Canada on October 29. to Nov. 1

The conference was organized WEFTA (West European Fish Technologists Association), an association of scientists in the field of fish industry research in Western Europe and AFTC (Atlantic Fisheries Technologists Conference), a similar organization of scientists on the east coast of North America and Canada.

An old dream of many scientists came true in 2003 when the TAFT 2003 (Trans Atlantic Fisheries Technology Conference) was held in Iceland, where many of the leading scientists from Europe, the United States and Canada in the field of research on seafood and its utilization came together for the first time and compared their books. IFL was responsible for organizing the conference in 2003, and it was considered so successful that another TAFT conference, which would be held in the West Sea in 2006 and Quebec City in Canada, was chosen.

The award is named after Earl P. McFee, who pioneered in the middle of the last century for frozen products from frozen fish blocks and use in fish burgers at McDonalds. The AFTC organization established The Earl P. McFee Award in 1971 for the purpose of recognizing those who deserve special credit for their research and technological development in fish and seafood processing and for promoting the interaction of scientists, industry and government. The emphasis today is on further strengthening the co-operation between AFTC and WEFTA and aiming for joint conferences and research co-operation in the field of seafood.

Many world-renowned researchers in this field have received the award in recent decades, and several of them attended TAFT 2006, including Herb Hultin (University of Massachusetts, Amherst), Tom Gill (Dalhousie University, Halifax), Michael Morrissey (Oregon State University). ), Chong Lee (University of Rhode Island), Tire C. Lanier and David Green (North Carolina State University), and Luc Leclerc (Aquatic Products Technology Center, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Quebec, Canada), who co-organized the conference with Pierre Blier (Québec University, Rimouski). Torger Börresen of the Danish Fish Research Institute DIFRES, which won the award in 2003, presented the award this time, which was in addition to the award, a small statue made by a Canadian artist of Inuit descent.

As reported here on the web earlier this year, two IFL staff went to Sri Lanka last May under the auspices of the Icelandic International Development Agency (ICEIDA) to assess the quality of fishing ports in that country and the purpose was to prepare courses to address these issues. in a better state. ÞÞSÍ's newsletter reports that the first course was recently held there.

In a news item on the IFL website th. On 5 July, the trip of Birna Guðbjörnsdóttir and Sveinn V. Árnason to Sri Lanka in May was announced, who went to get acquainted with the situation and make an assessment of the improvements that should be made in the quality of ports and fish processing in Sri Lanka. The result of that trip was the recently held course.

According to Árni Helgason, ICEIDA's Regional Director for Sri Lanka, quality degradation is a major problem in the Sri Lankan fishing industry, but it is estimated that 30-40% of catch is spoiled from the time fish is caught until it reaches the consumer's table. "Loss of value and reduced nutritional value are a lot of these reasons," says Árni, in an interview on ICEIDA's website.

The course, which IFL took part in preparing, consists of 16 lectures on various aspects of the quality of fish products and the organization of good treatment of fish in port areas. The study material was published in English, Sinhala and Tamil, which are the languages spoken in Sri Lanka. Posters were made on sinhala and Tamil and will be hung up in port areas and landing stations to promote and remind the importance of good treatment of fish.

See more about the course on the website of the Marine Research Institute of Sri Lanka (NARA).

This morning, a seminar was held at the Institute of Public Administration at H.Í. and the Association of Directors of Government Institutions, where the advantages and disadvantages of the public limited company form in public activities were discussed and compared with the traditional form of public administration. Sjöfn Sigurgísladóttir, CEO of IFL and future CEO of Matís ohf was among those who spoke at the seminar.

The seminar was held at the Grand Hotel Reykjavík and the speakers were Arnar Þór Másson, an expert in the Ministry of Finance and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Iceland, Páll Magnússon, Radio Director and Sjöfn Sigurgísladóttir, CEO of IFL and future CEO of Matís ohf.

Sjafnar's speech was entitled Public limited company publicization advantages and disadvantages and you can view slides from the presentation by click here.

Yesterday, the annual audit of the Swedish certification body SWEDAC took place due to the accreditation of service measurements at IFL. This was the 10th time that such an audit has been carried out at IFL and also the last time that IFL will merge with two other institutions in Matís ohf at the end of next year.

According to Heiða Pálmadóttir, head of IFL's Service Division, EU regulations have stipulated since 1994 that all measurements must be carried out in accredited test laboratories. In annual visits goes SWEDAC (Styrelsen för accreditering och tekninsk kontrol) including the entire quality system to verify whether it meets the requirements for accreditation.  

After the end of the year, when the new company Matís ohf takes office, it will have to apply again for accreditation, as two accredited units will then be merged.

Margareta Ottosson was the chief assessor this time and took care of the audit of chemical measurements and Ann-Charlotte Steneryd took out microbiological measurements.

These staff were satisfied with the work at IFL and also provided staff with useful information on what could be done better, but it is precisely such suggestions that have helped IFL's staff to be at the forefront of their field in recent years.

The editor of the American newspaper NYT yesterday discussed the assessment of two reputable institutions in that country about the advantages and disadvantages of eating fish. To put it bluntly, both institutions find that the benefits outweigh the potential risks.

The institutions in question are the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences (IMNAS) on the one hand and the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) on the other. In their opinion, the benefits of fish consumption far outweigh the potential risks from pollution and microbes for most people. Even "sensitive" consumers, such as pregnant women and young children, benefit from increased fish consumption, if they cut from dangerous species.

According to IMNAS 'expert group, the positive effects of fish consumption include the fact that fish contains high-quality proteins, many vitamins and minerals. They point out that pregnant women can possibly have a positive effect on the vision and development of their children's brains through fish consumption, but also warn that this group and young children eat large predatory fish such as sharks and swordfish.

The guide says that experts from HSPH take even deeper into the years and assert that even moderate fish consumption can reduce the risk of death from coronary artery disease by up to 36%. In fact, the lead author of the NYT states that there is considerable uncertainty as to whether increased fish consumption can prevent coronary artery disease in those who have had it before, and that it is also uncertain whether fish consumption reduces the risk of diabetes, various cancers and Alzheimer's disease. previously indicated.

In the end, the NYT leader encourages the labeling of seafood to be improved so that consumers can more easily understand what fish species they are buying in supermarkets and fishmongers.

Read the NYT conductor