{"id":5003,"date":"2009-10-02T09:55:24","date_gmt":"2009-10-02T15:55:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-367309-1145705.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=5003"},"modified":"2009-10-02T09:55:24","modified_gmt":"2009-10-02T15:55:24","slug":"food-supply-worries-of-an-agricultural-scientist-part-4-aflatoxin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/food-supply-worries-of-an-agricultural-scientist-part-4-aflatoxin\/","title":{"rendered":"Food Supply Worries of an Agricultural Scientist Part 4: Aflatoxin"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Field<\/a><\/p>\n

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[social_buttons]<\/p>\n

This post is going to be another struggle for balance. \u00a0The threat from this particular mycotoxin<\/a> in the food supply is a so large that it makes the risks that worry most people look tame. \u00a0It makes the subject of one of my previous posts about another mycotoxin, vomitoxin<\/a>, look like a virtual non-issue. Aflatoxin is one of the most potent acute toxins known and one of the most carcinogenic<\/a>. \u00a0Because of this the average international tolerance for aflatoxin B1 in food is 4 parts per billion (PPB). \u00a0The average tolerance for food for children is 0.2 PPB and for milk 0.05 PPB (USDA ERS publication source for this data<\/a>). \u00a0These are seriously low numbers. \u00a0I want to accurately represent the seriousness of this risk. \u00a0<\/p>\n

At the same time I also want to accurately represent the extent to which the commercial food supply is now protected from that risk. \u00a0The same ERS document above reported US crop losses in 2003 from mycotoxins in corn, wheat and peanuts of $932 million and another $466 million for testing. \u00a0That is all for preventing this toxin from getting to us. There is a lot going on in the background that few people recognize.<\/p>\n

Folks in the food industry may well ask “why even bring it up!?” \u00a0First of all, this is no secret. \u00a0My Google Alert for “Aflatoxin” sends me articles nearly every day. \u00a0Also I raise this issue to try to “calibrate\u00a0risk.” \u00a0I saw an entry in a comment string on another blog the other day where someone wrote, “I hope this is a move towards chemical-free food.” \u00a0I’ll give that person the benefit of the doubt that they know that all food is made of chemicals (proteins, fats, carbs…). \u00a0Their concern was about synthetic pesticide residues. \u00a0I doubt that they know about “chemicals” like aflatoxin. \u00a0They should. \u00a0It is thousands of times more toxic than a typical pesticide residue.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

As a 54 year-old, I grew up in a time when this toxin was barely even recognized or managed. \u00a0If you are younger the good news is that the food industry has been working hard to protect you from this risk for most or all of your life. \u00a0The bad news is that this is still one seriously nasty toxin and it is impossible to completely exclude from our food supply (it is also “equal-opportunity” for Organic or conventional, local or distant). \u00a0<\/p>\n

Aflatoxin is a fully “natural<\/a>” chemical that is an “intermediary metabolite” produced by a fungus called Aspergillus flavu<\/em>s (and some related species). \u00a0These are organisms that we plant pathologists call \u00a0“opportunistic pathogens”. \u00a0They can’t really do all that much damage to a healthy plant, but in certain plant tissues that are compromised by drought stress and\/or insect damage, this fungus can grow and make it’s deadly toxin. \u00a0Aspergillus<\/em> infection (which is most often an issue in field corn, peanuts, cotton seed,\u00a0pistachios, Brazil nuts,\u00a0and almonds) isn’t mostly a problem for yield losses. It is mainly a chemical contamination issue which hurts the grower because of “dockage.” (It really isn’t an issue for sweet corn because it is harvested before the stage where this occurs. \u00a0There are some other mycotoxins (deoxynivalenol, zearalenone and zearalenol, and occasionally fumonisin) that can occur in sweet corn, but by avoiding ears with worm damage those can be avoided.<\/p>\n

For centuries, Aflatoxin was just an unrecognized part of the food supply. \u00a0In the late 20th century it began to be recognized as an issue. \u00a0Since then there have been tests developed to detect the toxin and FDA food regulations to make sure that our exposure to this toxin is limited as much as is possible. \u00a0It doesn’t mean that there are never issues. In 2006, 76 dogs died because of aflatoxin contaminated dog food<\/a>. \u00a0Remember Peanut Corporation of America<\/a>\u00a0that knowingly shipped Salmonella contaminated peanuts and disrupted a huge part of the food supply? \u00a0As could be anticipated, that disreputable firm also shipped known aflatoxin contaminated peanuts<\/a>. \u00a0These are relatively rare events, but they are real. \u00a0The system mostly protects us from exposure to this toxin, but it isn’t perfect.<\/p>\n

For the Third World<\/a> the scenario isn’t nearly as positive. \u00a0People in Africa that depend on peanut (ground nuts) for their protein are often\u00a0poisoned (chronically and even acutely) by this toxin. \u00a0Peanut imports from India to Europe have recently dropped because of more rigorous Aflatoxin standards. \u00a0Do a Google News search for aflatoxin and you will see that this is a live issue<\/a>.<\/p>\n

There is a cool technology that might help contain this threat that I want to describe but not over-promote. \u00a0Back in 1992 or 1993 I was working at the biocontrol company, Mycogen. \u00a0I heard about an aflatoxin control method that was pioneered by Dr. Michael Cotty of the USDA. \u00a0I invited him to make a presentation to our company. \u00a0His idea was to overwhelm the natural, toxin-forming population of Aspergillus<\/em> with a naturally occuring strain of the same fungus that still infects plants but which does not make the toxin (an “atoxigenic strain”). \u00a0This was done by growing the special fungal strain on cooked rice or wheat grains and then scattering them in the field so they would make spores that would colonize most or all of the plant tissues where the toxin-producing strains could otherwise grow. \u00a0The idea was to out-compete the toxin-forming strains. \u00a0As a biologist I was highly skeptical that he could overwhelm the natural population. \u00a0It turned out that Dr. Cotty’s data was positive and it has been confirmed and improved over the years. \u00a0As someone who worked on biological controls for many years I can appreciate this all-to-rare achievement. \u00a0This approach has\u00a0now been commercialized<\/a> and has even been picked up by a major ag technology company. \u00a0Its a little tricky from the marketing point of view because the grower who would need to apply it isn’t always the party that has the economic damage from the toxin. \u00a0We’ll see how it plays out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

You might think that sounds creepy to intentionally spread a fungus, but a another, very closely related, similarly “atoxigenic”\u00a0Aspergillus, (A. niger<\/em>)<\/a> has been used for centuries to make soy sauce and more recently citric acid. \u00a0There are other fungi we use to make cheese and of course the yeast that makes our bread and wine and beer is a fungus. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Does this new biocontrol mean that aflatoxin is off of my “worry list?” \u00a0Unfortunately not. I’m encouraged that this biological control \u00a0technology might begin to further reduce the risk, but it can’t eliminate it. \u00a0 So what do I as a scientist do about this “worry?.” \u00a0I avoid peanuts or tree nuts “in the shell”. There are good methods to detect aflatoxin contamination in shelled or processed nuts and that is good. \u00a0 Unshelled nuts are on my very limited “do not eat” list along with trans-fats which I heard about and started avoiding 30 years ago. \u00a0Brazil nuts which are picked up from the jungle ground after unknown periods of residency there and opportunity for fungal infection, are absolutely on my “do not eat” list (If I’m wrong about that for the current supply I hope someone will correct me).<\/p>\n

So, bottom line, I know that the commercial food system is doing all it can to protect us from aflatoxin and doing a far better job than when I was a kid. It is still an area that needs innovation, and I’m glad there are scientists still working on it.<\/p>\n

You can certainly comment on this site or you can email me at feedback.sdsavge@gmail.com.<\/p>\n

Contaminated corn image by Pat Lipps, Ohio State University<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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