ADVANCES AND CHALLENGES IN MYCOTOXINS IN LATIN AMERICA

CHULZE , S.N

Curitiba

Conferencia; Latin American Cereal Conference; 2015

Cereals are the main components of the human and animal diets indifferent Latin-American countries.   Cereal grains may become contaminated by toxigenic species belongingmainly to the genus Aspergillus and Fusarium in the field and understorage.  Aflatoxins, trichothecenes,zearalenone and fumonisins are the main toxins detected in South America. Co-occurrence of aflatoxins and fumonisins have been observed in some countries. These compounds have been implicated as the causative agents of a varietyof animal diseases, and have been associated to some human diseases.  Health risks associated with the consumptionof cereal products contaminated with mycotoxins are worldwide recognized and inLatin America depend on the extent to which they are consumed in a diversifieddiet.  Several countries have recommendedmaximum tolerated levels for mycotoxins detected in cereals. Also, mycotoxinscontamination of cereals can cause economic losses at all levels of food andfeed production including crop and animal production, crop distribution andprocessing. Practical strategies to reduce the impact of the mycotoxins fromfeed and food are required, some progress is being made at level of individualcompound or group of compounds. Efforts in breeding for resistance to fungaland mycotoxin contamination, improving cultural practices, use of maizecontaining genes coding for insecticidal proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis  (Bt),chemical and biological control, weather-based models for predicting mycotoxins contamination  are some strategies used. Climate change canhave some impact in Latin America regarding the toxicological risk due tochanges in fungal biodiversity. Future challenges include monitoring the fungalpopulations to be aware of possible changes on the toxicological risk map. Todevelop new technology to control fungal and mycotoxin contamination duringstorage and under processing.To be able to detect masked mycotoxins during thedifferent stages of the food chain. Further risk assessment and regulatoryefforts should be established in order to ensure that mycotoxin levels incereal based foods and feeds are kept well below of those levels which canconstitute a potential hazard for human and animal health.