The latest Pesticide Residues Committee's (PRC) quarterly report found that 806 out of 1313 samples of 24 different foods tested had no detectable residues, and 477 contained levels below the maximum residues level (MRL).
However a consignment of potatoes was flagged up for its ‘higher than expected’ residue levels.
"The majority of food sampled does not contain detectable residues or any residues found are in accordance with the guidelines,” Dr Ian Brown, chairman of the committee, said.
“The PRC have looked carefully at all of the exceedances of the MRL and published a full risk assessment. We are satisfied that all the results are unlikely to be of concern for consumer health."
Brown noted that the results showed that 30 samples (2.2 per cent) contained residues in excess of the legal levels. “This is slightly more than what we usually find. PRC monitoring was effective in identifying a consignment of potatoes with higher than expected residues of a treatment used during storage,” he explained.
“Once we had the result of our analytical tests, we were able to alert PSD's enforcement branch who investigated the supplier and made sure that no further potatoes were available in the food chain. We have published a full risk assessment for this unusual incident and continue to test for this pesticide in our potato surveys.”
