Natural occurrence of zearalenone and trichothecene toxins in maize‐based animal feeds in zambia

Abstract A year‐long collection of maize‐based animal feed samples from the National Milling Company and mouldy maize collected from farmers fields near Lusaka were analysed for Fusarium mycotoxins. In the survey, 148 samples were tested for zearalenone, deoxynivalenol and nivalenol, and 60 samples for T‐2 toxin and diacetoxyscirpenol. Zearalenone was present up to 0.6 mg kg−1 in 17% of the feed samples, and deoxynivalenol was found at I‐0 mg kg−1 in 1.4 % of these samples. This is the first report of these toxins in animal feeds in Zambia. Zearalenone was also found in 57.6 % of the 33 mouldy maize samples collected at levels ranging from 0.08 to 6.0 mg kg−1 (mean concentration 1.11 mg kg−1), and 49.5% of these samples contained deoxynivalenol at levels ranging from 0.5 to 16.0 mg kg−1 (mean concentration 5.56 mg kg −1). T‐2 toxin and diacetoxyscirpenol were not detected.