Food Safety of Thailand’s Pineapples, Bananas, and Dragon Fruits from Pesticide Contamination: a Study Using GC-MS Analysis

Pesticides are used extensively in agriculture, raising issues about food safety. Currently, consumers are notably concerned by pesticide contamination when eating fruits and vegetables. Food safety information on certain produce is important to encourage consumers to eat more fruits and vegetables. This study’s purpose was to determine whether three commonly consumed Thai fruits – pineapple, banana, and dragon fruit – are safe to eat. The effectiveness of peeling as a method to remove pesticide residues was also investigated. The monitoring of pesticide residues for these three fruits purchased from markets in Thailand was done by determining the pesticide contents of collected fruit samples by GC-MS analysis. The detection rate of pesticide residues was very high at 96% in both the pineapple and dragon fruit samples studied. On the other hand, the detection rate of pesticide residues in the banana samples was more moderate at 26%. The number of samples that were found to have residues that exceeded the maximum residue limits (MRL) was also considerably high. In the case of the pineapple and dragon fruit samples, 96 and 70% of them had residues that exceeded the MRL respectively. Only 9% of the banana samples had pesticide residues that exceeded the MRL. These findings indicate that the extent of pesticide contamination in pineapples and dragon fruits is greater than that observed in the banana samples. After the process of peeling, the pesticide residues were significantly reduced in all three fruits. This suggests the pesticide residues reside mostly in the peel of pineapple, banana, and dragon fruit. Therefore, in practice, it is safe to eat pineapple, banana, and dragon fruit in Thailand because these fruits are always served without their peel.