Microplastics contamination in European anchovy (Engraulis encrasicolus) from the Romanian Black Sea coast—an emerging environmental threat

Nowadays, microplastics are ubiquitous in the environment and are increasingly observed in species of economic interest such as crustaceans, mussels or fish. As a semi-enclosed sea, with a unique environment and biota inhabiting it, the Black Sea is no exception to this global issue, in recent years being considered one of the most polluted European seas.

For the first time, within this study, we investigated the accumulation of microplastics in a fish species of economic interest present in the Romanian coastal area (NW Black Sea). Microplastics presence was assessed in the gastro-intestinal tract of 90 individuals, collected from several locations on the Romanian coast (Tuzla, Agigea and Corbu), using the 10% potassium hydroxide (KOH) chemical digestion method, following MSFD TG-ML recommendations (Galgani et al., 2023).

We found a frequency of occurrence (FO%) of ingested microplastics ranging between 73 and 90%, with a mean of 1.6-3.4 items/individual, with fibers being the predominant type of ingested microplastics.

In this context, our results fill an important gap, as there was no other information on microplastics ingestion in economically valuable fish from the Romanian coast of the Black Sea.

Given the high level of microplastics in the European anchovies, an economically valuable species of fish, there is a concern and a necessity to understand the impact of microplastics on food webs and human health.