PESTICIDE-RESIDUES ON FIELD-SPRAYED APRICOTS AND IN APRICOT DRYING PROCESSES

The disappearance of bitertanol, diazinon, iprodione, phosalone, and p rocymidone on field-sprayed apricots and their fate during sunlight- a nd oven-drying processes were studied. After treatments in the field, diazinon disappeared completely after a week, whereas the other pestic ides at preharvest time showed residues 50% below MRLs. The pesticides decreased with pseudo-first-order kinetics and half-lives ranging fro m 9.1 to 24.4 days. The sunlight- and oven-drying processes caused the fruit to concentrate by a factor of similar to 6 times. Nevertheless, the pesticide residues present in the dried fruit were lower than in the fresh fruit. The residue decreases were higher in the sunlight pro cess than in the oven process. In the former, on average, the residues on the dried fruits were about half those on the fresh fruits, wherea s in the latter they were about equal.