Study on mycotoxin contamination in South African food spices

A validated QuEChERS-based method was used to investigate the occurrence of mycotoxins in 70 South African food spices [coarse chilli (n=14), ground chilli (n=4), paprika (n=7), ginger (n=5), chicken spices (n=8), onion spices (n=8), beef spices (n=5), Mexican chilli (n=9), vegetable spice (n=1), fruit chutney spices (n=4), and cheese spices (n=5)]. Mycotoxins were quantified using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Results revealed that 40% of the samples were contaminated with aflatoxin B-1, aflatoxin G(1), ochratoxin A, sterigmatocystin, 3-acetyldeoxynivalenol, fumonisin B-1, fumonisin B-2 and/or roquefortine C. The contamination levels for aflatoxin B-1 ranged from 3-19 mu g/kg; aflatoxin G(1), 10-11 mu g/kg; ochratoxin A, 4-20 mu g/kg; fumonisin B-1 104-591 mu g/kg; fumonisin B-2, 64-5,897 mu g/kg; sterigmatocystin, 11-18 mu g/kg; 3-acetyldeoxynivalenol, 42-46 mu g/kg; and roquefortine C, 17-57 mu g/kg. Mycotoxins co-occurred in 11% of the spice samples. Amongst the samples analysed in this study, paprika had the highest positives (100%) for the determined mycotoxins. Previous reports on mycotoxin contamination in spices, focused on the incidence of aflatoxins and ochratoxin A, but not on the multi-mycotoxin profile in South African spices. This study thus provides a comprehensive assessment of mycotoxin contamination of spices in South Africa