Monitoring aflatoxin contamination risks in red pepper spice produced in Turkey

Even though Turkey is the third leading producer of fresh pepper, currently it only supplies 3-5% ofprocessed red pepper spice in the international trade market because of high aflatoxin contamination.This study was designed to determine the presence and levels of aflatoxins in red pepper spicecollected from three major producer provinces in Southeast (K. Maras, G. Antep, Hatay-Kilis) andone province in Central Turkey (Ankara), This pilot study also included companies that are activelyinvolved in international red pepper spice trade. Nearly, half of the samples showed significant levelsof contamination above the European Standard of 5 ng/g for AFB1 and 10 ng/g for total aflatoxins.Over ninety percent of contaminated samples contained AFB1 with levels ranging from 5 to 85.55ng/g. The overall mean level of total aflatoxins was 22.I8 ng/g with the highest level being 144.41ng/g. These results indicate that there is a necessity for establishing stricter and continuous nationalsurveillance schemes for improving safely and quality of red pepper spice in Turkey.Key words: Aspergillus, aflatoxin, red pepper, food safet