Chlorpyrifos in Cattle

Discussion

Chlorpyrifos in cattle

The mean levels of Chlorpyrifos residues in meat samples of cattle collected from north-east were non-significantly different than those collected from the south-west of Faisalabad city, 0.297 ± 0.006 ppm, and 0.373 ± 0.001 ppm, during the months of July, 2009 to December, 2009 (Table 1). These values of present study are higher than their corresponding values in literature. No difference in concentration of chlorpyrifos was observed in muscle, kidney, liver and lung of cattle during summer and winter, while Pagliuca et al. (2006) reported the progressive decrease of positive samples from Autumn to Spring and their results was confirmed by Gazzotti et al. (2008). Chlorpyrifos was found almost 15% of the analyzed samples and its detected value was many times more than the MRL value established by USFDA. In some studies conducted in milk the main pesticide pollutant was chlorpyrifos (Gazzotti et al., 2008) and its contamination ranged from 5 to 18 mg/kg. In a bioaccumulation experiments, fish meat was detected to accumulate chlorpyrifos up to 5.9 ng/g (Varo et al., 2002).

Lembda-cyhalothrin in cattle

The values of Lembda-cyhalothrin residues in cattle meat from north-east are higher than those in the meat from south-west of Faisalabad city, 4.790 ppm and 4.521 ppm, respectively (Table 1). Lembda-cyhalothrin concentration remained same during summer and winter seasons in muscle, kidney, liver and lung samples of cattle. Lembda-cyhalothrin was proportionally highest in frequency in meat as compared to other pesticides and was detected almost 25% of samples, this high frequency could be explained by its wide use as an insecticide and ectoparasite on livestock (Gazzotti et al., 2008), contrary ...

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...endosulfan than those collected from three sites in north-east of Faisalabad city.

• The residues of chlorpyrifos, cypermethrin, lambda-cyhalothrin and endosulfan in the meat of cattle remained same in summer and in winter seasons.

Recommendations:

The concentration of all pesticides residues found in the current study is alarming. The higher concentration of pesticides residues poses a potential threat to both livestock and human beings. Our data deserves a particular attention. All those products which surpass the permissible limits may be declared unhygienic for their associated toxicological risks. Both the public and private sectors must cooperate in tackling the problem jointly.

Acknowledgements:

Financial support by the Higher Education Commission Islamabad, Government of

Pakistan vide research project number 20-726 is highly acknowledged.