Histamine content changes during processing of canned tuna by Indonesian canning factories

Abstract

An assessment was carried out on histamine content of three canning factories. These factories are located in East Java (A), Bali (B) and North Sulawesi (C). Histamine contents were assessed along various stages of their processing. Results showed that histamine contents changed during processing of canned tuna in both A and B factories and that they increased significantly especially after steaming. In contrast, decreasing histamine content was noted during processing of canned tuna at factory C. These results seem to stem from the fact that a lot of raw material was processed by factories A and B. Histamine was probably produced during delays along the processing line. This was in contrast to factory C in which a special tuna fish was processed for the study and only a small quantity of fish was going through at the time.