World Grain - May 2013 - 120

TECHNICAL PROFILE

Aflatoxin
a growing concern
A

s the food industry in Europe tries to cope with the
crisis of beef products contaminated with horse meat,
reports of a far more alarming nature have appeared in
newspapers throughout the world. They report the disturbing
emergence in foods and foodstuffs of the naturally occurring,
carcinogenic mycotoxin called aﬂatoxin B1. In vulnerable
humans and animals, aﬂatoxin is known to cause kidney and
liver damage, suppress the immune system and disrupt absorption of nutrients, among other problems.
Aﬂatoxin is produced by the yellow-green mold Aspergillus
ﬂavus. It can be triggered in crops stressed by severe heat and
drought, and, critically, can appear both pre- and post-harvest,
depending on conditions. Pre-harvest, the presence of aﬂatoxin is favored by high temperatures, prolonged drought conditions and high insect activity. Post-harvest, warm temperatures and high humidity provide the optimum conditions for
aﬂatoxin during storage. This heat-stable toxin can develop in
all cereals such as corn (maize), rice and wheat, and in other
dried foods such as pulses and nuts. Further, it can ﬁnd its way
into products based on these raw materials as well as into the
milk of animals fed on contaminated feed.
DROUGHT IMPACTS CORN
As a result of the prolonged period of drought in many U.S.
corn-producing states and the high rainfall and hot temperatures found in Europe during 2012, aﬂatoxin contamination
represents a worrying threat for all grain producers and the
manufacturers of corn-based products. Although the U.S. has
experienced similar drought conditions in previous years,
The 2012 drought in the U.S. caused a higher than normal amount of corn
to be afficted with aflotoxin.
120

by Nick Reynolds and Stephen Jacobs

Solutions for reducing the
carcinogenic aflatoxin is of great
value to the grain industry
such prolonged and widespread high temperatures as prevailed in 2012 have already prompted the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) to grant approval for states in its prominent corn-growing regions such as Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and
Nebraska to increase the amount of aﬂatoxin-afﬂicted corn
that can be blended with “clean” corn for use in animal feed.
However, despite the mitigating steps being taken and all of
the most optimistic projections regarding the quality of corn from
the 2012 harvest, recalls and product alerts have already begun to
spring up in newspaper headlines throughout the world.
At the end of last year, one multinational producer of sweeteners and starches adjusted its sourcing policies after discovering its U.S. corn supplies were contaminated, and in Serbia
authorities instigated inspections of the country’s entire 2012
corn crop, following reports that as much as two-thirds of it
had been contaminated with aﬂatoxin. At the beginning of
2013, alerts such as these escalated into speciﬁc product recalls, such as the Ohio-based pet food manufacturer forced to
recall ﬁve different product lines following a random in-store
inspection by the Iowa Department of Agriculture.
Milk made the headlines in Europe, where tankers of milk
contaminated with aﬂatoxin were identiﬁed and traced back
May 2013 / World Grain / www.World-Grain.com

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World Grain - May 2013

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