PESTICIDE-RESIDUES IN PRUNE PROCESSING

Prunes are processed in three phases: washing, drying, and rehydration , which is performed immediately before packing. The entire drying pro cess was subdivided into six steps. In this paper each of these steps was studied separately in order to determine which could be accountabl e for residue changes. The studied pesticides were diazinon, bitertano l, iprodione, phosalone, and procymidone. Although the drying process caused a fruit concentration factor of 3, the pesticide residues on th e dried fruits were not higher than on the fresh fruits. Phosalone sho wed the same residue, while the values for procymidone, iprodione, and bitertanol were respectively 0.6, 2.3, and 3.2 times lower. The chang es in residue values caused by the different steps were not the same i n the different pesticides.