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ARS Home » Plains Area » Fargo, North Dakota » Edward T. Schafer Agricultural Research Center » Animal Metabolism-Agricultural Chemicals Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #280540
Title: Dioxins and other environmental contaminants in catfish from U.S. commerce

Author
item Lupton, Sara
item HUWE, JANICE - Retired ARS Employee
item ESTEBAN, EMILIO - Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS)
item MILLER, OTIS - Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS)

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 5/11/2012
Publication Date: 7/15/2012
Citation: Lupton, S.J., Huwe, J.K., Esteban, E., Miller, O. 2012. Dioxins and other environmental contaminants in catfish from U.S. commerce. Florida Pesticide Residue Workshop, July 15-18, 2012, St. Pete Beach, FL.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: The Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 (Farm Bill), amended the Federal Meat Inspection Act to provide that "catfish, as defined by the Secretary," is an amenable species and therefore subject to continuous inspection by the USDA Food Safety Inspection Service. Since few background data are available on levels of environmental contaminants in commercial catfish, an assessment of catfish products for residues of dioxins, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) was conducted. Data from this survey will establish typical background levels of these contaminants in domestically marketed catfish and may be used in risk assessments for estimating human exposures. Catfish (N=744) were collected for the 2009-2010 USDA Pesticide Data Program (PDP), and 202 were randomly chosen for dioxin, PCB, and PBDE analysis. Dioxin toxic equivalency (TEQ) concentrations ranged from non-detectable to 3.46 pg/g ww, while PCB TEQs averaged about 10% of the dioxin value. The persistent indicator PCB concentrations ranged from 9.6 – 1383 pg/g ww and were three-fold higher than PBDE sums. All values were lower than those previously reported in a small survey of wild-caught and farm-raised catfish from Mississippi in 2006; however this could be due to geographical or temporal differences or to the smaller sample size of the 2006 survey. The dioxin congener patterns observed in the PDP catfish were similar to those observed in the 2006 farmed catfish as well as catfish exposed to ball clay in the mid-1990s, although TEQs averaged 100-times lower than the ball clay contaminated catfish.