Industrial Use of Fish Oils
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Industrial Use of Fish Oils UNI TED STATES DEPART MENT OF THE INTERIOR FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE BUREAU OF COMMERCIAL FISHERIES Industrial Use of Fish Oils UNITED STATES DEPART MENT OF THE INTERIOR FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE BUREAU OF COMMERCIAL FISHERIES CHAPT E R 16 H. Fineberg Industrial Use of Fish Oils and A. G. Johanson I INTRODUCTION The world's waters annually produce a tremendous harwst of fish , being in 196240.4 million tons (Chapman 1965 ), close to 90,.", of which came from the oceans. The catch has doubled in the pas t 24 years and is increasing at the rate of 870 each year. The herring-like fishes, in cluding anchoveta and sardines, made up 41 % of the total in 1962 and an estimated S0 7'o + in 1964. About one-third of the total catch is used for industrial purposes, mainly as fish meal for animal feeding, and the rest as fresh, frozen, dried, or canned for food. The bulk of the fish oils of commerce are obtain ed as by-products from fish-meal production or from food fish wastes. vVorld fish-oil production was an estimated 865,000 tons in 1966. Production has increased 2S.S jr since 1961. All other oils have increased enormously also so that fish still is only 2.S 7'0 of the total edible fats and oils produced and 13.4 '70 of the in edible ones. The energy needs of the approximately three billion world population and the normally lower price of fish oils versus the major edible oils and fats such as soybean, peanut, sunflower, cottonseed, palm, butter, and lard have steered the flow into food uses. They are used overseas for shorten ing, margarine, and compound cooking-fat manufacture. Probably over 7S % is used for edible purposes, except in the United States. Out ide the United States, the fish oils are refined, selectively hydrogenated, and de odorized for these applications. Fish oils in fo od products were discontin ued in the United States very shortly after the new Food Drug, and Cosmetic Act was enacted in 1938 (Culbertson 1963). They were consid ered adulterated products because the fish raw materials u ed in their manufacture were not all edible. Among the non-edible oils and fats, fish oils rank about 8th in volume, below tallow and grease, coconut, soybean, linseed, castor, sperm, and tall oil. Supplies of fish oil could increase several fold if edible fish protein CO . I centrates now being developed by the U. S. Bureau of Commercial Fisher ies, Peru, and others become commercial on a big scale. An isopropanol extraction process is being developed at Beltsville, Iaryland, by the Bu reau (Anon. 1966B). There is currently also a great waste, through spoilage and scrapping, of fish that could be prevented and conyerted into still larger oil and meal supplies. 222 INDUSTRIAL USE OF FISH OTT.S 22.'3 TABLE 18 WURLI> ()(;LAN IISII CA I L II )')(,2 Volul11c of Catch Millions of Mctric Spccics Tons 1 Herring & anchovy 14 .6 Cod, haddock, & hake 5.51 Horse mackerel & sea perch 4 .27 Tuna and mackerel 2.38 Flat fish (halibut, ~ole, flounder) 1.2 Salmon & smelt o 55 Sharks & rays o 37 Others 6.77 35 . 65 'Jncludes 1.1 MM tons of U.S. menhaden. The composition of the world fish catch in 1962 is illustrated in Table 18. Industrial uses (Anon. 1965B) today are mainly for protective coatings on wood, metal, fiber, and concrete; lubricants, medicinals; and some soap. The last use has declined so greatly that it is only a minor one. In the United Kingdom, for example, fish oils were only 0.30/0 of the total fatty raw materials used in soap. In protective coatings, fish oils compete mainly with linseed, soybean, castor, safflo\ver, tung, and tall oils. It is the relatively low fish-oil cost contrasted to that of all other drying oils ( except tall oil) as well as the high degree of unsaturation that make fish oils so useful in this field. The unique mixture of fatty acid chain lengths makes fish oils valuable also in lubricants, greases, paper sizes, buffing agents and textile auxiliaries. TABLE 19 WORLD OIL PRICES IN 1964 Price Oil Cents per Lb. Tung 22.0 Peanut 14.3 Safflower, non-brt'ak 14 .01 Castor 12 .4 Sunflower 11 .5 Lard, prime 11.4 Linseed 10 .8 Soybean 10.4 Peru fish oil 9. 2 Menhaden 9.02 Tallow, bleachable, fancy 7.6 Tall oil 7.5 'J;'0B .San Francisco, Tanks, Dec. 20, 1965. Safflower bas become an imporlant high-quality oil for protective coatmgs m the U.S. 'The highest price in 14 years. The low in recent years was 4.6¢ in 1 %2. 221 I' If nJ ~ \\'orld oil prin ,IS of ] . liU . T)- D (lnb f 1 I\lslr, 1(' tlH' H'lalhf' IJI .trkC'l positiow; of flo;h 011 lors Tahlt· 19 ). Food dl'llI.\IICI , ill (' I\lclill ~ .d.leI .111d (; Ill' (,iI" In If' ill I.!; , ('olltrols pri("( 's for 1Il() ~ 1 of II\(· o ti , iliclu 1111 ' E~ h. tall()\\ . lard, alld tall oil an' 01 t ill l' d , h) -pr du t pri('ing str\JctllH' and slIppl , till furllw r. "h TI play and subslitlltioll of OIl(' oil for ,ll\oth 'r, d,.p ndlllg 011 r I tl' and availability in the' world m arh I . Menhaden is protected ill tlte Ilit t'd Sldte t pr pr('\('nt ellcroachmellt hy thl' tn'lll< ndom amollnt of P II ('xportr,cl inlo the world mark d. mnCE The major fish-oil-producing c:o untri('s ar' Peru, hil, I {Iwd \\ ay, outh Africa, anada, and the 'I ill d 'I. Il'. (hin nd J, p n r also big produc rs but do not engage in world trtl{h:. P fU ,lid luI Llt(, com('rs, but ha\' experi (, ll c('d a m tl'oril' iJ cr in 1 f du I 1 Peru has become the larg 'st c. porte r in the world-~lJ~ Bullion pound III 196-4, m stly anchov)" and a n estima ted 29S milll(m pound In 1 way and Iceland ar th chi f . Ollrces of h erring Oil the \\ orld II South African countric>s have an annual p roduction of appro 1In:l.l million pounds of sardin ( pilchard ) oil. 111' fish catdl i in re III TI lhe "oily" typ - th P ru\ian anchovy, American m 'nhad n oull! En n pilchard, and orth Atlantic h l'ITing. The nited lutl's in 1 "* produced 172 million I ound of In nl Id Il oil, an estimatc>d 1 5. 3 million p ounds total of all fi h oil. In th 1 ttl years, the total fi sh oil ~ produc'd ranged from 16- million ill 1 -7 t million in 1961. \1 'nhuden was 9O~ of the total, tll f m in r mainly lwrring, P,lcific sardin " and a little tUIl,l ,mel Ill,tel: r 1 ( n \ ). Th menhad en catch of th ' nited St.lt., i u (d ntlr I clustrial oil and m al production, none for edihle hsh 1I t.=. indigenous to th nited tates. • pprOXm1,(t( I)' tw -third of th from the Gulf oast, one-third from the '\mth \ tl ntic. I. k l'rn anada arc the ch it, f SOur(('s of dome ti 11 >rrin with the kast prohfic. In addition to the d Ollwo;til our ,th import 'd 3.9 million pounds of h l rrin~ oil in 1 )4, Ill. inl fT III million pounds of cod, and 7.2 of c( d Iiwr oj), IIO\\ \ r th \lIJllption of all fish oils is lo\\'er th,m till produ lion fl ur wdl thl U . l"p rts mudl 01 ib oil-I-l.5 milli n I und III 1 t 'J h ' P(' I'I1 \'ian herring 011 III y, tuaU} ha\! Inn ho\ INDUS'l1llAL us,·: OF FISrr OILS 22..5 menhaden, U.S. consumption ranged from a low of 83 million pounds in 1954 to a high of 168 million pounds in 1961. It is interesting to note that preliminary gross r('snlts from a study hy the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries (Chapman 1865 ) indicate roughly a standing crop of 4-6 million ton~ o~ aTlchovy oU southern CaliforIlia and northern Mexico, about 3 millioll tons of hake. and ahollt 11 million tOIlS for all types (maximum sustainable yield) off the U.S. coasts. Thus, a tre mendous potential for oil exists hut has still to 1)(' confirm'd or proven economically feasibl . The total actual catch was 2.26 million tOIlS in 1964. The size of the catch hasn't changed IlIuch in the last thirty years, but the composition has greatly. This i~ a complicated study and not too milch is yet known reliahl}. (,O~fPOSITJO~ There is still much to learn about fish oils evelJ though progress Ims been considerable. Hesearch interest in these oils remains high since they are the best known natural sources of long-chain, polyunsaturated fatty acids, although from a food poillt of view they are \'ery low in the normal "essential fatty acids." There is much work being dOlI(' to determine the functionality of the fish acids in human nutrition. Commercially, the composition of the oils sold is not as clearly stan dardized by trading, associatlOn, A T. I, AO ,and Federal rules and speCifications as are other industrial oils such as soybean, cottonseed, lin seed, dehydrated castor, and tung.