Pesticide residue control in the years 1988-1989 in Italy

The paper reports the monitoring for pesticide residue contamination of foodstuffs carried out in the years 1988-1989 by the Italian peripheral laboratories officially commissioned for the task. The tables show the analytical data for each class of substrate versus the limits in force at the time. 2506 food samples and 555 samples from the environment were analysed and a total of 16,259 determinations made. The residues were absent in 90% of the cases; the percentage of irregularities was 1.52%. These results confirm the data obtained in previous years, which is particularly significant considering the much larger number of analytical determinations performed this time. It has been deemed convenient to survey specific types of foodstuffs (for example, cereals and animal products) by examining a larger number of samples.