Nutritional impact of phytosanitary irradiation of fruits and vegetables February 2014 1 Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) supports and encourages the dissemination and exchange of information. Information in this presentation is provided under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia (CC BY 3.0) Licence, except for the Food Standards Australia New Zealand logo. Attribution: You may copy, distribute, transmit and adapt the material in this publication by the CC BY 3.0 licence for commercial and non-commercial purposes; but you must attribute the work in the following manner: © Food Standards Australia New Zealand. This attribution must not, in anyway, suggest that FSANZ endorses you or your use of the work. For more information email [email protected]. Third party material: To the extent that information published in this presentation contains material in which copyright is owned by a third party, the CC BY 3.0 licence would not apply to such third party material and, if you wish to re-use third party material, you may have to seek permission from the copyright owner. 2 1 Table of Contents 1 Executive Summary ..................................................................................................................... 5 2 Terminology and abbreviations ................................................................................................... 7 3 Background .................................................................................................................................. 8 3.1 Regulatory Context and Objectives .......................................................................................... 8 4 Natural variation in vitamin content of fruits and vegetables .................................................... 9 4.1 Cultivar ..................................................................................................................................... 9 4.2 Environment ...........................................................................................................................10 4.3 Ripeness..................................................................................................................................11 4.4 Post-harvest storage ..............................................................................................................11 4.5 Processing ...............................................................................................................................12 4.6 Analytical methods .................................................................................................................13 4.7 Summary ................................................................................................................................14 5 Nutrient sensitivity to irradiation ..............................................................................................15 5.1 Macronutrients and minerals .................................................................................................16 5.2 Vitamins ..................................................................................................................................16 5.2.1 Vitamin A ...................................................................................................................17 5.2.2 Vitamin C ...................................................................................................................17 5.2.3 Vitamin E ...................................................................................................................17 5.2.4 Thiamin......................................................................................................................18 5.3 Other non-vitamin bioactive compounds ..............................................................................18 5.4 Summary ................................................................................................................................19 6 Effects of irradiation on carotenoids, vitamin C and other bioactive compounds in fruit and vegetable groups ...................................................................................................................................19 6.1 Pome fruits .............................................................................................................................19 6.2 Stone fruit ...............................................................................................................................21 6.3 Berry fruit ...............................................................................................................................23 6.4 Citrus fruit ...............................................................................................................................25 6.5 Tropical fruit ...........................................................................................................................29 6.6 Other fruit ...............................................................................................................................35 6.7 Cucurbit vegetables ................................................................................................................37 6.8 Fruiting vegetables .................................................................................................................37 6.9 Other vitamins ........................................................................................................................39 6.10 Summary of data for phytosanitary irradiation doses ...........................................................40 3 6.10.1 Fruit ...........................................................................................................................40 6.10.2 Vegetables .................................................................................................................43 7 Nutritional implications of phytosanitary doses of irradiation .................................................44 7.1 Apples .....................................................................................................................................45 7.2 Apricots and Cherries .............................................................................................................45 7.3 Strawberry ..............................................................................................................................46 7.4 Kiwifruit ..................................................................................................................................47 7.5 Mandarin ................................................................................................................................47 7.6 Mango ....................................................................................................................................48 7.7 Guava and litchi ......................................................................................................................49 7.8 Other considerations ..............................................................................................................50 7.9 Summary ................................................................................................................................51 8 Conclusions and recommendations ..........................................................................................51 8.1 Recommendations for risk assessment of irradiated fruits and vegetables ..........................52 8.2 Considerations for other vitamins and other bioactive compounds .....................................52 8.3 Recommendations for data requirements .............................................................................53 9 References .................................................................................................................................55 Appendix 1 Appendix 2 Appendix 3 4 1 Executive Summary Low level ionising irradiation can be used as a phytosanitary treatment for insect pest control on fruit and vegetables. FSANZ has previously assessed the safety and nutritional impact of using ionising irradiation for phytosanitary purposes on various tropical fruits as well as tomatoes and capsicums, and found that doses of ≤1 kGy do not present a safety or nutritional risk to Australian and New Zealand consumers. It is expected that in the near future FSANZ will receive a number of applications to irradiate a variety of other fresh fruits and vegetables for quarantine purposes. The objectives of this review were to: assess the impact of phytosanitary doses of irradiation on the nutritional quality of fruit and vegetables by: o Investigating the natural variability in vitamin levels in a range of fruits and vegetables o Documenting changes in vitamin composition of fruits and vegetables following irradiation with up to 1 kGy o Considering the dietary implications of any reduction in vitamin levels following phytosanitary doses of irradiation (up to 1 kGy). Make recommendations to amend data requirements for irradiation of fruits and vegetables. Extensive natural variation occurs in the nutrient composition of individual fruit and vegetable types. The main sources of variation are cultivar, season, growing location and degree of ripeness. Post-harvest storage and processing also affect nutrient composition. Fruits and vegetables are rich sources of vitamin C and carotenes. Substantial data documents the natural variation in levels of these nutrients, with