Investigation of zeranol in beef of Ukrainian production and its reduction with various technological processing

Synthetic growth stimulants are widely used to get high productivity of animals. These preparations can accumulate in the meat and their residual quantities will adversely affect the health of consumers. The purpose of the work was to monitor the content of zeranol, growth stimulant of ruminants in beef which goes to meat processing enterprises of the Western region of Ukraine and to determine the effect of heat treatment on its quantity. It was found out that 29.8% of beef samples taken at meat processing enterprises contained a stimulant for the growth of ruminant zeranol. It was found that during the storage of beef samples frozen at a temperature of -18 °C with different content of zeranol there is a decrease in its number. The most intense process of destruction of zeranol occurred during the first month of storage, during this period of time the amount of zeranol is reduced by an average of 20%, regardless of the initial content. Within two months of storage of frozen beef, the content of zeranol decreases by 28.2 ±0.17%, and at the end of the sixth month its quantity decreases to 33.2 ±0.58%. It was also found that the dynamics of zeranol reducing in beef samples with large quantities (22.5 μg.kg-1) and small (2.3 μg.kg-1) were the same. It was set up that during 30 min of meat cooking there was a decrease in the content of zeranol 24.7 ±0.23% and 32.0 ±0.35% for 60 min, compared to its content in fresh meat. At the same time, when stored in the frozen state and subsequent cooking, the reduction of zeranol content in meat was 39.3 ±0.3%. Therefore, it is proposed to revise and amendments into the regulatory documents of Ukraine regarding the control and supervision of the presence of hormone (zeranol) residues in meat and meat products in order to prevent their sale and consumption by humans.