Methodological approach to risk assessment of agricultural produce non-compliances to the permitted contents of 137Cs and 90Sr in foods

Radioactive contamination of agricultural lands necessitates the need for developing robust methods, tools and techniques that could, on the one hand, minimize the levels of radionuclides in food products, and on the other hand, facilitate in making informed decisions on economic efficiency of farmland use for the production of different types of foods. Following the Chernobyl nuclear accident, significant farmland areas of the Republic of Belarus were affected by radionuclide contamination of technogenic origin. The main soil contaminants nowadays, after the decay of short-lived nuclides, are 137Cs и 90Sr. Given that a food product from a contaminated farmland may contain both radionuclides, 137Cs and 90Sr, the risk of its non-compliance with the established maximum permitted levels of contamination should be assessed not only with regard to each individual radionuclide but also for the both of them simultaneously. Using the risk matrix, significance level criteria and rank assignment, the author proposes a new methodological approach for assessing the risk of non-compliance of the produced agricultural foods to the regulatory requirements, accounting not for either but for both radionuclides (137Cs and 90Sr) simultaneously. The use of the risk assessment methodological approach for the agricultural produce non-compliances with the food safety standards regulating the contents of 137Cs and 90Sr enables one to make substantiated and scientifically justified decisions on the efficiency of landuse for the particular foodstuff production and/or identify the farmlands where radiation-associated food production restrictions could be lifted.