I n thi s i ssue
European funding plays an important role in Polish industry development Poland – In June Poland became the thirteenth country to join Eurofish, an occasion which is marked by the coverage of Poland in this issue. The feature opens with an interview with Mr Kazimierz Plocke, Secretary of State, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, who shares his thoughts on some of the issues that either impact or have the potential to influence the Polish fisheries sector. Through the coverage it is possible to see the important role played by European funding mechanisms in the development and modernisation of the Polish industry. Read more on page 46 PathogenCombat – An EU-funded project, which brought together scientists and industry from sixteen European states and Australia, PathogenCombat has several research teams working on new and traditional ways to inactivate pathogens that render food unsafe for consumption. The researchers efforts attempted to answer two basic questions, firstly, how reliable are the inactivation steps in combination with growth inhibiting factors such as CO2 enriched atmosphere during packaging? And secondly, how do pathogens react to the often only sub-lethal treatments? Read about the impact of mild processing techniques on pathogens and how treatment methods often need to be combined to be effective in this article by Dr Manfred Klinkhardt on page 12 Spain – The Spanish market for seafood is characterised not only by large volumes but also a wide variety of fish and seafood. Domestic fishery production reached a peak of 1.4 million tonnes in 1975 but has declined steadily since. Per capita fish and seafood consumption has been increasing however as Spaniards become more aware of the health benefits of fish and to sustain this demand imports have climbed from 136,000 tonnes in 1976 to 1.6 million tonnes in 2009. The fish is sold through a well developed system of auctions, wholesale markets, traditional central markets, and finally, the retail system. The fishing fleet as in other parts of Europe has been sharply reduced from about 20,000 vessels in the 80s to 13,000 vessels today. The freshwater aquaculture sector is made up mainly of rainbow trout, which has seen a decline in production due to a combination of factors, in particular, competition with imported whitefish fillets. Read more on page 20 Fish processing equipment – Fish processing machinery has been evolving steadily over the years. Today there is hardly a task that cannot be performed by a machine, whether it is heading, gutting filleting, pin bone removing, trimming or cutting. Even the removal of delicate internal organs or roe sacs can be safely left to a machine. Equipment manufacturers can combine the machines that perform the various operations into one processing line. This has its advantages, but can also be a drawback for the processor. But there is no denying that machines mean speed and precision, consistent quality, as well as improved hygiene in a processing operation. Read more on page 58 www.eurofishmagazine.com
Eurofish Magazine 4 / 2010
3