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Forensic science, more often associated with solving murders in prime time television crime series, is now helping the United Nations fight illegal fishing, fraudulent product substitution and false documentation that not only cheat consumers but also endanger fish stocks and threaten livelihoods in developing countries.
Experts, inspectors, law enforcement officials, scientists and academics from round the world recently gathered at a UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) workshop in Rome to discuss how to enforce best practices in the $86-billion-a-year global fishing industry, using such tools as DNA analysis and chemical testing. |
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We need to push the envelope, because we can be sure that those involved in IUU fishing are doing so,” FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Department official Michele Kuruc said, referring to illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU), noting that a workshop participant related how a group convicted of illegally trading abalone confessed that they learned techniques for destroying evidence by watching CSI: Miami.
“We’re interested in promoting wider use of available forensic techniques, in particular by developing countries,” she added, stressing that the 110-million ton annual seafood industry is a major source of employment and government revenue for these countries, where many of the fishing grounds that feed the first world are found |
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