United Kingdom
October 13, 2017
AHDB provides an annual ‘snapshot’ of contaminant levels in UK cereals as part of its commitment to the professional supply chain.
Legal limits exist for a range of contaminants to ensure cereals entering the food and feed chains meet legal compliance guideline limits and are safe for consumption.
The AHDB initiative looks at the incidence and levels of key contaminants in representative samples of UK-grown cereals (wheat, barley and oats) and co-products (wheatfeed and oatfeed) destined for milling, malt production and animal feed.
Two reports have been published recently on the AHDB website:
- The final report a the project which ran from August 2012 to August 2016
- The first annual report for the current monitoring project, which runs from August 2016 to July 2021
The data on the incidence and levels of key contaminants are used to inform the cereal industry. Current and emerging legislation and contaminant issues, which could impact on the safety of cereal-based foods and their acceptability in key home and overseas markets, are also monitored as part of the work.
Dr Dhan Bhandari, who manages grain quality research at AHDB, said: “AHDB is highly valued for its independent work on monitoring agro-chemical residues and contaminants since the mid-1980s.
“Our work provides a useful UK-based snapshot of contaminant levels as part of a national effort to monitor potential issues and deliver high-quality products to the consumer.
“It is important to stress that the results are based on a relatively low number of samples and the supply chain also conducts its own extensive tests to make sure that cereal-based foods entering the supply chain are safe.”
Each year, contaminant levels detected as part of the monitoring project will be published by AHDB at cereals.ahdb.org.uk/contaminants
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