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Occurrence of microplastics in commercial fish species from the Ethiopian rift valley's Lake Hawassa, Ethiopia
Summary
This Ethiopian study documented microplastic ingestion in two commercially important fish species in Lake Hawassa, an East African rift valley lake. It is the first such study from this region, finding plastics in catfish and tilapia that are important food sources for the local population.
Abstract Microplastics (MPs) have recently been detected as emergent pollutants in the Ethiopian rift valley lakes located close to rapidly expanding towns. We provide the first study of MPs ingestion of commercial fish species from Lake Hawassa, Ethiopia: Catfish (Clarias gariepinus) and Nile Tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus). A total of 60 individual fish species was collected from three sampling sites of lake Hawassa in October 2020. Across all sampling sites, there was a significant difference in ingested MPs between benthic omnivore catfish and pelagic Phyto planktivorous Tilapia (χ2 = 15.864, p < 0.001). The most common size of ingested MPs (84.6%) was 0.5-1 mm, with fragments (59.5%) dominating, followed by fibers (25.4%). On average, 4.03 ± 1.33 MPs with sizes ranging between 60 µm and 10.53 mm were detected per individual. White and yellow MPs were particularly numerous, accounting for 36.8% and 26.4% of the total, respectively. Because Lake Hawassa's fishery is so significant, the potential impact of MP pollution on the lake biota in general, and economically valuable fish species in particular, deserves attention, additional research, and, if possible, early mitigation.