Dilution of rice with other gluten free grains to lower inorganic arsenic in foods for young children in response to European Union regulations provides impetus to setting stricter standards

Abstract

There has been an increasing realisation that young infants are exposed to elevated concentrations of the carcinogen inorganic arsenic, relative to adults. This is because many infant food products are rice based, and rice is ~10-fold elevated in inorganic arsenic compared to most other foods. The European Commission (EC) has acted on this concern setting stricter standards for infants, 100 μg of inorganic arsenic per kg of food (100 μg/kg), as compared to adults (200 μg/kg), for rice based foods, a law that was brought into place in 1st January 2016. Here we investigate how this law has impacted on inorganic arsenic in baby food products in the UK market, and compare the findings to previous baby food surveys taken before and just after the law came into place. We find that for a wide range of UK infant products that the new regulations are being adhered to, with all samples surveyed, being under 100 μg/kg inorganic arsenic. The prevalence of pure rice products had decreased in the UK, and there appears to be careful sourcing of the rice used in these products to ensure conformity with regulations. There has been an increased presence of mixed cereal products, with rice and maize as the main ingredient, appearing on the UK market, with varying rice contents for infant porridges, cakes and mueslis, with the latter being a relatively innovative product for infant foods. There was a highly significant correlation (P<0.0001) between rice content and inorganic arsenic concentration across all infant foods. When UK infant rice cakes, breakfast cereals and porridges were compare to their general, i.e. not labelled specifically for being for infant consumption, equivalent it was found that the adult foods generally exceeded the 100 μg/kg inorganic arsenic standard for infant foods. Thus, infants should not be given rice products not specifically labelled as being for them if a lower inorganic arsenic diet is to be maintained.

Global Sourcing of Low-Inorganic Arsenic Rice Grain

“…Only 5 out of 1180 samples analysed, 0.4% of samples, failed these limits. The considerations on the suitability of these standards have been made elsewhere by the authors (Carey et al 2018;Meharg and Raab 2010). The concentrations of inorganic arsenic present in the global supply-chain are problematic in the EU for the infant standard (100 μg/kg), which is half the adult standard (EU 2015).…”

“…Asian archipelago that are either under reported in the literature, or only feature in interregional comparisons to a limited extent (Adeyemi et al 2017;Adomako et al 2011;Farias et al 2015;Joy et al 2017;Otero et al 2016;Segura et al 2016). This knowledge is required to source low arsenic rice for sub-populations where the consumption of inorganic arsenic from rice is of particular concern, such as for infants and young children (Carey et al 2018). Here we set out to determine the variation in rice grain arsenic concentrations and speciation across representative growing regions globally.…”

Rice Grain Cadmium Concentrations in the Global Supply-Chain

“…Particularly of concern from cadmium exposure are infants, and stricter standards are in place in the EU for cadmium in processed baby foods (40 μg/kg) than for rice (200 μg/kg) (Commission Regulation 2006). Yet, processed foods specifically marketed at infants can be almost entirely rice, such as rice porridges and crackers, or be a major component of mixed cereal products such as porridges, snack bars rice cakes and muesli (Carey et al 2018). Thus, the finding that rice from many sources has a 10% failure rate at the infant food standard here is concerning.…”

“…As both arsenic and cadmium are problematic in rice, and can be dually elevated (Zhao and Wang 2020) they should be considered together for the risks posed to target populations. This is particularly important for the sourcing of rice for infant foods where arsenic and cadmium pose greater risks to children (Carey et al 2018;Gardener et al 2019), and where children are more exposed to dietary contaminants due to higher food consumption rates on a biomass basis (Carey et al 2018;Gardener et al 2019). To lower the contaminants that an infant is exposed to is obviously the best situation, given the uncertainties around risk assessment and standard setting.…”

Effects of Arsenic, Iron and Fertilizers in Soil on Rice in Cambodia

“…Arsenic bioaccumulation in rice is a serious threat to agricultural production and public health. 1 , 2 The primary source of arsenic in Cambodia, Bangladesh, Vietnam and other countries in South and Southeast Asia is oxidation of arsenopyrite that naturally occurs in the Himalayan Mountains. The importance of local metamorphic rocks with arsenopyrite in Cambodia is not fully documented and likely will become more important as more of these rock outcroppings are exploited for construction materials.…”