Seafood plays a vital role in global nutrition — but who gets the most value from it?
A new study published in Nature Communications reveals that developing countries get more nutrition per dollar from imported seafood than wealthier nations.
Researchers found that lower-income countries tend to spend less on non-nutritional qualities like freshness and convenience, focusing instead on affordable forms of seafood like frozen or canned fish. As a result, they receive more protein, omega-3s and essential micronutrients for every dollar spent.
“When it comes to seafood imports, developing countries get more nutritional bang for their buck,” said co-author Dr. Joshua Abbott of Arizona State University.
Seafood is the most widely traded food in the world and provides critical nutrients like vitamin B12, calcium, iron and heart-healthy fatty acids. For more than a third of the global population, it supplies at least 20% of total animal protein intake.
To assess the nutritional value of international seafood trade, researchers linked two major data sources: one tracking global seafood imports and exports, and another detailing the nutrient composition of specific species and products (e.g., fillets, frozen fish, shellfish). They analyzed more than 267,000 trade records from 2015 to 2021.
“We’re the first team to do this analysis in the seafood trade sector,” said lead author Yaqin Liu, an environmental economist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Across the board, developing countries paid less for each unit of nutrition — including protein, iron, B12, calcium and fatty acids — than developed nations. For instance, both fresh and frozen salmon contain the same nutrients, but because frozen fish is cheaper, lower-income countries get more nutrition per dollar.
“Seafood consumers in high-income countries like the United States, Japan, the European Union, and other high-income countries are paying a high premium for getting more fresh fish into their markets, even though it’s not more nutritious,” said senior author Dr. Martin Smith of Duke University. “That creates an opportunity for lower-income countries to import frozen fish for a lower price and still get that nutrition.”
While this affordability is encouraging, the researchers warn that it also highlights a risk: global supply chain disruptions could jeopardize access to these essential foods in regions where seafood is a primary source of protein and micronutrients.
“At the outset, our concern was that lower dollar value of seafood imports reflects lower nutritional content. But our study shows that’s not true,” Smith said. “Disruptions to the global seafood trade could well have negative nutritional consequences for developing countries.”
The study was supported by the Knobloch Family Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Grayce B. Kerr Fund, Oceankind and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution’s Summer Student Fellowship and Academic Programs Office.