If the menu says “Gulf shrimp,” then the restaurant should be serving wild-caught, American shrimp. Similarly, if you are in a restaurant that uses the imagery of working shrimp boats, customers should not be offered pond-raised imports.
But are restaurants accurately describing to you what they are serving?
Over the last several months, the Southern Shrimp Alliance has partnered with SeaD Consulting to check what restaurants have been doing using newly-developed technology that permits quick, reliable, and cost-effective confirmation as to whether the shrimp being served is Litopenaeus vannamei (imported, farm-raised) or some other species. Although the testing methodology has documented widespread misleading practices at food service establishments across the Gulf and South Atlantic coasts, SeaD Consulting’s work has also demonstrated the effectiveness of state laws requiring restaurants to disclose the source of the shrimp being offered to customers.
Now, a new peer-reviewed article that will be published in the August issue of the journal Food Composition and Analysis by researchers at Florida State University provides a detailed description as to how that test works, why it is reliable and accurate, and its importance to the U.S. shrimp industry.
In the article, Nethraja Kandula, Samuel Kwawukume, and Dr. Prashant Singh of Florida State University, joined by David Williams of SeaD Consulting (Tomball, Texas), describe an assay that “is a quick and cost-effective method for identifying seafood species substitution in raw, cooked, and processed samples.” Supported by funding made available by Florida Sea Grant, the authors validated the assay using 44 raw shrimp samples, two cooked samples, and ten samples from retail establishments with “100% assay specificity.”
The article additionally describes the steps taken by the researchers to validate the developed assay, including an onsite validation at the American Shrimp Processors Association’s annual meeting and the validation of cooked shrimp sold at a restaurant chain. In confirming that the shrimp from these restaurant locations was Litopenaeus vannamei, the authors explained the practical significance of their findings:
Similarly, testing of shrimp samples (i.e., Shrimper’s Heaven, Shrimp Cktl, Bang Bang Shrimp, and Shrimper’s Net Catch) collected from three large restaurant chain stores, showed positive results for L. vannamei and all samples tested negative for Litopenaeus setiferus . . . These results further demonstrate the robustness of the shrimp testing workflow standardized in this study. These results further showcase that a restaurant chain with locations commercial shrimp fishing industry but also uses misleading terminology like “Shrimper’s Heaven” and “Shrimper’s Net Catch” on their menu to falsely imply that the foreign, farm-raised shrimp offered for sale were sourced from U.S. waters. These deceptive practices, where the restaurant chain does not have to label the country of origin of the shrimp, substantially undermine the marketing of domestic wild-caught shrimp.
The article further explains how changes in restaurant practices could significantly improve the American shrimp industry:
Pricing from Urner Barry shows that wild-caught domestic shrimp from the United States is at least one dollar per pound more expensive than farm-raised L. vannamei . . . This pricing difference is the reason many restaurants and retailers substitute domestic wild-caught shrimp with less expensive imported farm-raised shrimp, which further reduces the demand for wild-caught domestic products. The testing workflow developed in this study will enable the regulatory agencies, shrimp stakeholders, and commodity boards to perform mass shrimp species authentication in a resource-limited setting. The use of these genetic tests will decrease substitution, raising the demand and cost of U.S. wild-caught shrimp. Since domestic wild-caught shrimp currently comprises an estimated six percent of the volume of total U.S. apparent consumption of shrimp, even a modest adjustment in demand will have a substantial impact on pricing, potentially facilitating the long-term survival of the domestic shrimp industry and the American coastal communities that rely on this economic activity . . .
“Imported, pond-raised shrimp is Shrimper’s Hell, not Shrimper’s Heaven. This testing tool is a game-changer,” said John Williams, the executive director of the Southern Shrimp Alliance. “Professor Singh’s Seafood Diagnostic Laboratory at Florida State University continues to do incredible work in developing tools that provide practical support to the American shrimp industry. The Southern Shrimp Alliance is also incredibly grateful to Florida Sea Grant for the support of Professor Singh’s work.”
NOTE: The initial version of this News Alert incorrectly quoted a pre-publication version of the article. That quote has now been corrected to reflect the final public version of the article.
Access the synopsis of N. Kandula, S. Kwawukume, D. Williams, & P. Singh’s rhPCR-lateral Flow Assay for the Onsite Detection of Pacific White Shrimp, Journal of Food Composition and Analysis (Aug. 2025) here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0889157525004636
Review a pre-publication version of rhPCR-lateral Flow Assay for the Onsite Detection of Pacific White Shrimp here: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5037725
Learn more about the research advances from Professor Prashant Singh’s Seafood Diagnostic Laboratory at Florida State University here: https://shrimpalliance.com/published-academic-study-confirms-higher-prevalence-of-anti-microbial-resistant-bacteria-in-imported-farm-raised-shrimp/ and https://shrimpalliance.com/florida-state-researchers-develop-rapid-test-for-determining-shrimp-species/