Veterinary drug residues in food: compliance rates highest for a decade

Residues of veterinary medicines and other substances found in animals and animal-derived food continue to fall in the European Union, the latest data shows.

EFSA’s monitoring data for 2020 covers 620,758 samples reported by Member States, Iceland and Norway. The percentage of samples that exceeded legally permitted maximum levels was 0.19%. This is the lowest figure for the past 11 years (when non-compliance ranged from 0.25% to 0.37%). The figure for 2019 was 0.30%.

Compared to 2017, 2018 and 2019, in 2020 compliancy rates rose for antithyroid agents, steroids and resorcylic acid lactones.

Rises in compliance were also noted for anthelmintics, organochlorine compounds, organophosphorus compounds, dyes and “other substances”, compared to 2017, 2018 and 2019.

You can browse the results in more depth using our new interactive data visualisation tool.

The data – comprising around 13 million results – are available on Knowledge Junction, EFSA’s curated, open repository, which was set up to improve transparency, reproducibility and reusability of evidence in food and feed safety risk assessments.