In February–March 2013 several European countries, including
Romania,
,
Croatia reported nationwide contamination of
milk for human consumption (and possibly of derivative products) with
aflatoxins. The details are still scarce.
It was reported in March that
feed originating from Serbia and imported in the
Netherlands and
Germany was contaminated. It was also reported in March that tests revealed contamination in milk produced by two Dutch farms. Milk in Germany was also tested but so far is reported as not tainted. Nevertheless,
Russia announced it would ban imports from the German farms that received contaminated feed. On March 20, Romanian farmers dumped milk in protest after the government banned milk from five farms, which remain unnamed.
Danone Romania also withdrew some 75 tons of milk products from the shelves.
The European Commissions'
Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed The Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) is a system for reporting food safety issues within the European Union established by Regulation (EC) 178/2002 of 28 January 2002, which entered into force on 21 February 2002.EU MonitorRegulation 200 ...
(RASFF) has reported 10 notifications of aflatoxin B1 in maize of European origin since the last maize harvest in autumn 2012. In the 10 years prior to the last harvest—between 2001 and 2011—a total of nine cases of aflatoxins were reported in maize. Aflatoxins have been mainly an "import problem" up to now. However, global warming is increasingly affecting the mycotoxin map in Europe, producing "tropical toxins" within Europe's borders.
In Serbia the contamination turned into a political scandal after the government raised the internal milk contamination standards to tenfold of those from the EU. This higher limit however is the one practiced in the United States and two-thirds of the world.
On February 22, The Iowa Department of Agriculture found elevated Aflatoxin concentrations in dog food manufactured at a Pro-Pet facility in Kansas City, KS. The
corn
Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...
component of the dog food was reportedly contaminated with aflatoxins, though the contributing corn load passed screening at the facility. There are no reports of milk infestation in Iowa.
See also
*
2013 meat adulteration scandal
The 2013 horse meat scandal was a food industry scandal in parts of Europe in which foods advertised as containing spicy beef were found to contain undeclared or improperly declared horse meat – as much as 100% of the meat content in some ca ...
References
{{Consumer Food Safety
Food safety scandals
2013 in Romania
2013 in Serbia
2013 in Croatia
2013 scandals
Aflatoxins