Water environmental nexus-based quality and safety risk assessment for fish (Carassius auratus) in aquaculture

Abstract Freshwater aquaculture is the main form of aquaculture in inland areas, and pollution is a significant challenge. The aim of this work was to propose an effective risk assessment method for aquaculture to predict pollutant bioaccumulation in fish tissue based on water environment variables. This method was designed to assess the risk of pollutant levels in fish tissue that exceed China’s food safety standards. Firstly, field observation and investigation were conducted to analyze the migration mechanisms of the main pollutants between fish tissue and the water environment. Secondly, a classification and regression tree (CART) and generalized additive model (GAM) nexus method was used to analyze the environmental variables related to pollutants in the water environment and establish prediction models. Finally, models of the bio-reaction kinetics were established to predict the pollutant bioaccumulation in fish tissue. The experimental results indicate that the GAM models could explain 73.7%, 84.4%, and 84.5% of the deviations for the three predicted pollutants. For 90% of the sample data, the accuracy of the bioaccumulation prediction was 93.44% for volatile phenol bioaccumulation, and 90.16% for Cu and coliform bioaccumulation. The proposed risk assessment method could be extended for aquaculture applications that require monitoring of additional parameters to safeguard aquaculture quality and facilitate effective safety risk management.