European database of processing factors for pesticides residues in food

EFSA is regularly evaluating pesticide occurrence data in food generated under the official monitoring programs of Member States with respect to consumer exposure and risk assessment. Most of these data refer to raw commodities (RAC) because maximum residue levels established under European legislation reflect pesticide residues only in the RAC. However, food processing operations can have decisive effects on pesticide residue levels and therefore consumer exposure. This database has been developed to compile validated processing factors for pesticide residues in food in line with the EFSA food classification and description system (FoodEx2).

This update fixes a problem that caused some median processing factors to display a "<" qualifier when it was not necessary. The calculated values for the processing factors were not affected by this error and remain unchanged from the previous release

The database is complemented by the following publications:

Background Document on the EU Database of Processing Factors for Pesticide Residues

Compendium of Representative Processing Techniques Investigated in Regulatory Studies for Pesticides

Linking Processed Foods and Processing Techniques to the FoodEx2 Coding System