E-commerce platforms have become a significant sales channel for processed tilapia products such as frozen tilapia fillets, pickled tilapia, and canned tilapia in China. As food safety issues are worldwide concerned, the imbalance between the nutritional benefits of fish and the risk of contamination has become a major constraint on fish consumption. Therefore, it is necessary to assess the safety of tilapia products sold on e-commerce platforms. We conducted a quantitative benefit-risk assessment of arsenic and nutrient levels for tilapia products sold on Chinese e-commerce platforms using the hazard quotient (HQ). A total of 147 tilapia products were collected from the central Chinese e-commerce platforms Tmall, Taobao, and Jingdong for arsenic determination. Arsenic concentrations in tilapia products ranged from 0.004 to 0.820 mg·kg-1. The inorganic arsenic content of tilapia products was lower than the national limit (0.1 mg·kg-1). One-way analysis of variance revealed that there was no significant difference in arsenic levels in tilapia products among different regions (p > 0.05), while there was a significant difference in product form, with canned tilapia containing significantly higher arsenic levels than frozen tilapia fillets and pickled tilapia fillets (p < 0.05). We conducted an aquaculture experiment to analyze the nutrient levels of tilapia. The mean value of EPA + DHA content of tilapia was 20.634 mg·100 g-1. The HQ values of tilapia products ranged from 0.004 to 0.736. In a word, the nutritional benefits of consuming tilapia products exceed the risk of arsenic exposure. These data can help demonstrate that tilapia products are low-risk, high-yield nutritious food and provide relevant safety recommendations for consumers purchasing processed tilapia products online.
Keywords: Arsenic; Benefit and risk assessment; E-commerce platforms; Food safety; Hazard quotient; Tilapia products.
© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.