Residues detected in Aussie barley

The government has suspended purchases of Australian barley imported by Mitsubishi Corp. after two insecticide ingredients were detected in amounts three times the legal standards for residual pesticides, sources said Wednesday.

It is the first time the government, which buys barley and wheat imported by trading houses and sells them to flour mills and other companies, has suspended purchases of these grains.

The substances, amitraz and fipronil, are used to exterminate harmful insects, but the amounts detected in the barley pose no immediate health risks to humans, a health ministry official said.

The high levels of the substances were found in samples Mitsubishi asked an inspection agency to test at the request of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.

The company reported its finding to the ministry last Friday.

Mitsubishi will dispose of or use the 20,000 tons of barley it imported from Australia in April, but not in products for human consumption, sources said.

The Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare strengthened its quarantine inspections for agricultural chemicals in 2006, but amitraz and fipronil were not on the list for barley. The health ministry plans to start checking imported barley for the two substances as well.

In fiscal 2007, about 940,000 tons of barley were imported in 101 lots, about 10 percent of which were sampled for the health ministry's inspections.

The farm ministry has different testing processes for imported food. For its inspections, the ministry asks trading houses to airlift samples provided by public organizations in the exporting countries.

Amitraz and fipronil, which are registered as agricultural chemicals in Japan, were found in the farm ministry-initiated inspections of Australian barley.

The farm ministry learned that the two substances are banned for use on barley in Australia. It plans to investigate with the Australian government why the chemicals were detected on the grain.

The health ministry also conducted a sample inspection on Mitsubishi's barley, but amitraz and fipronil were not among the approximately 85 substances subject to its quarantine inspections of the grain.

The health ministry's inspections check for the two substances on some vegetables, but not for barley, a ministry official said.

Under the Food Sanitation Law, the standard level is 0.02 parts per million (ppm) for amitraz and 0.002 ppm for fipronil.

Under international standards, people weighing 60 kilograms will not suffer any health problems even if they consume up to 0.6 milligram of amitraz or 0.012 mg of fipronil daily.(IHT/Asahi: May 15,2008)