Hazard and Management of Emerging Environmental Pollutants in Food of China

Abstract

The occurrence of emerging environmental pollutants brings new challenges to food safety in China, which needs to be systematically researched. This study focused on the distribution, hazard characteristics, and sources of antibiotics, endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs), perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), and microplastics (MPs) in major foods such as vegetables, fruits, grains, meat, aquatic products, eggs, and milk. It was found that fluoroquinolones showed a high detection rate in aquatic products, vegetables, and milk. Fluoroquinolones were mainly derived from the use of agricultural and veterinary drugs. Bisphenol A (one of phenolic EDCs) was frequently detected in canned food and aquatic products, and nonylphenol was mostly detected in aquatic products. Both EDCs were mainly from food packages. PFCs possessed a high detection rate in aquatic products, livestock meat, poultry meat, and eggs. PFCs were mainly from wastewater treatment plants and food packages. MPs showed a very high detection rate in aquatic products, which were mainly imported by contaminated environmental media. Ingestion of environmental emerging pollutants through food may lead to disease risk of human. Thus, it is recommended to monitor more types of emerging environmental pollutants in the scope of food safety, systematically plan the scientific rules of usage of the chemicals, and formulate a multi-departmental joint management and control mechanism to better cope with the issue of food safety caused by emerging environmental pollutants and effectively ensure food safety.

Keywords

• food safety
• emerging environmental pollutants
• antibiotics
• perfluorinated compounds
• endocrine disrupting chemicals
• microplastics