PESTICIDE RESIDUES IN FOOD

This work had as objective to compare the levels of pesticide residues found in foods investigated for the of Analysis of Pesticide Residues in Foods Program (APRFP) of the National Agency of Sanitary Monitoring (ANVISA) and to evaluate the possible toxic risk of their ingestion. This work compared the data of the reports of the APRFP of 2001 and 2003, where 2.647 samples of nine cultures of vegetables and fruits had been analyzed. The toxic risk for the population of the ingestion of these residues using data of the maximum limit of residue for each pesticide and data of alimentary consumption was calculated. Also it was determined the number of pesticides which exceeded the maximum limit allowed of pesticides found in cultures where its use is not allowed. The results showed that no significant modifications in the number of residues were found in the two evaluations made for the APRFP in the years of 2001 and 2003. Amongst the 2.647 analyzed samples 2.256 pesticide residues had been detected, of these, 68% were of regular use and 32% of irregular use(89% not authorized use and 11% above of the Maximum Limit of Residues). The pesticide number that presented toxic risk for the population was of 19 in the evaluation of the report of 2001 and 16 in the 2003 report. This data allowed to conclude that foods with pesticide residues would not have to present risk for the population, requiring better supervision practices of pesticides use in agriculture.