Monitoring program found most food samples meet Health Canada standards

Thursday, November 27, 2014

by SUSAN MANN

The vast majority of foods tested for chemical residues in the national Canadian Food Inspection Agency testing program met existing Health Canada standards and for the three per cent of samples that failed they didn’t pose a safety concern for Canadians.

As part of its National Chemical Residue Monitoring Program, the agency found that about 97 per cent of the more than 19,000 food samples tested over a 12-month period met existing Health Canada standards for various chemicals. The program tests animal and plant-based foods for multiple chemical hazards, including pesticide and veterinary drug residues along with environmental contaminants, CFIA says in a Nov. 14 press release on its website.

Information obtained through the program allows the CFIA “to identify violations and trends and develop strategic plans to minimize potential health risks to Canadians,” the release says.

As for the three per cent of samples that failed to meet Health Canada standards, CFIA spokesperson Tammy Jarbeau says by email all violations were assessed to determine appropriate follow up actions. Those can include:

• Notify the producer or importer.
• Follow up inspections.
• Further directed sampling according to a surveillance plan.

She says follow up actions vary and depend on the magnitude of the health risk “with the objective of preventing any repeat occurrences or further distribution of the product in the marketplace.” If Health Canada determines the product failing to meet standards could pose a health risk to consumers, “a product recall may be initiated,” she says.

In this case, none of the chemical residues detected in the failed samples posed a safety concern to the public and no recalls were necessary, she notes.

Jarbeau says the failed samples didn’t meet a variety of standards and had elevated levels of pesticides or veterinary drugs residues.

In its release, CFIA says the high compliance rates across all commodities in the 2012/13 testing program whether they are domestic or imported foods “are similar to previous years.” About 120,000 tests were done from April 2012 to March 2013 on more than 19,000 food samples. The tests generated more than three million results. Samples included domestic and imported dairy products, eggs, honey, meat and poultry, fresh fruit and vegetables, processed products and maple products. BF