Title: Mycotoxins, how to manage a serious matter of concern in food safety

The worldwide occurrence of mycotoxin contamination of feedstuffs and the severity of mycotoxicoses in farm animals shows a tendency to increase in recent years. Many factors contribute to this increase such as the global climate change and increased international trading of feedingstuffs from different geographical origins. Blends of various raw materials in compound feed increase the risk of feed contamination with several mycotoxins. It is known that unexpected toxicity may arise due to toxicological interactions between different mycotoxins that amplify the effects of any single contaminant. In addition to reduced feed intake, lower weight gain and in some cases reduced feed efficiency, mycotoxins can also be deposited in meat, eggs and milk. This transfer of mycotoxins into food products poses a threat to human health. Increasingly food safety standards across the world are putting more emphasis on the control of mycotoxins in food and animal feed. Mycotoxin control requires proactive HACCP-based strategies to prevent fungal growth on crops on the field, at harvest, during processing, transport and storage. In addition, the use of mycotoxin binders is also an established practice in many parts of the world for further reduction of myctoxin-related risks in animal production.

A variety of approaches are used to prove the efficacy of different toxin binders. Unfortunately this sometimes creates some confusion for all parties involved in animal production. Hence, a set of suitable guidelines should be discussed for the in vitro and in vivo assessment of mycotoxin binders. In order to unequivocally prove the efficacy of a mycotoxin binder 7 parameters need to be studied: