A new open-source tool is helping to increase the consumption of nutrient-rich fish species in malnourished communities.
FishNutrients predicts the composition of various species, such as concentrations of micronutrients and fatty acids, to develop profiles that can be used to inform dietary guidelines and fisheries management.
The data is then fed into FishBase, the global database developed in 1988 which catalogues more than 34,000 species, detailing their ecology, taxonomy, distribution, and now, nutritional value.
The 2021 World Food Prize laureate, Shakuntala Thilsted, who was present at the online launch celebrating the integration of FishNutrients and FishBase, said, “This collaboration brings a powerful new tool to the research community and will improve our understanding of the potential of diverse fish species to address malnutrition.”
Small pelagic fish are often richer in micronutrients that larger commercial species yet can be overlooked in fisheries management and dietary guidelines. Larger species are well-assessed whilst the nutrient composition of species harvested by small-scale fisheries, particularly in the tropics, is poorly understood.
The FishNutrients statistical model can help by predicting the nutritional makeup of a species by assessing a range of factors such as diet, geographic region, size and growth. FishNutrients also includes direct measurements of over 500 fish species, which were used as a baseline to determine the model’s accuracy.
