Resource efficient blue food production from small underutilized pelagic fish species (RE-BLUE)

Research Project, 2024 – 2027

The RE-BLUE project will explore new scalable food value chains from the large parts of the herring/sprat catches that either do not enter the food chain (whole fish landed as feed) or leave the food chain (filleting rest raw materials, also going to feed). Together, these biomass streams make up ca. 60-95% (!) of total herring/sprat catches in the countries of this consortium. Our specific aims are to design, align and combine process-steps which are tailored to tackle the very small size of the “forage fish”, the presence of enzyme-dense organs, high levels of pigments/pro-oxidants/small bones and the occasional abundance of environmental toxins like dioxins, dioxin-like PCB´s and PFAS.

The acquired results can be extended to other European small fish species regarded to be invasive or underutilized and are expected to have major societal impact related to e.g., food preparedness, public health, and national/EU policies.