Myctoxins remain constant issue to monitor

The report refers to the worldwide mycotoxin contamination of agricultural commodities for the period between April and June 2010.

 

In this 3-month period, a total of 2,599 analyses were carried out for the most important mycotoxins in terms of agriculture and animal production – aflatoxins (Afla), zearalenone (ZON), deoxynivalenol (DON), fumonisins (FUM) and ochratoxin A (OTA).

 

Due to the various origins of the different samples, the analysis and data were allocated to different regions: America, Asia, Oceania, Europe and Middle East.

 

Samples tested were diverse, ranging from cereals such as corn, wheat, barley and rice to processing by-products, namely soybean meal, corn gluten meal, dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) and other fodder such as straw, silage and finished feed.

 

As seen in the figure below, from the 691 survey samples analyzed 32%, 38%, 53%, 52% and 30% tested positive for contamination with Afla, ZON, DON, FUM and OTA, respectively.

 

It is obvious that mycotoxins are an ubiquitous problem as 77% of the analyzed samples show the presence of, at least, one mycotoxin.

 

The presence of more than one mycotoxin in 44% of the samples raises the attention to the problem of synergistic effects caused by multiple mycotoxins in animal feeds.

 

 

More detailed data can be obtained fromBiomin website