Environ Monit Assess (2010) 169:37–43 DOI 10.1007/s10661-009-1148-6 Impact assessment and decontamination of pesticides from meat under different culinary processes Dwaipayan Sengupta · Md. Wasim Aktar · Samsul Alam · Ashim Chowdhury Received: 14 March 2009 / Accepted: 18 August 2009 / Published online: 16 September 2009 © Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2009 Abstract A total of 75 animals between 1.5 and 8 years old were randomly selected for the study. Of these, 57.8% were cross-bred animals and the rest were non-descript. Moreover, 61.8% of the animals under study were brought for slaughter from local sources and the rest from farm houses. Samples collected from five districts revealed con- tamination with traces of organochlorine pesti- cides (0.01–0.22 μgg −1 ) and organophosphorus pesticides (0.111–0.098 μgg −1 ). In general, all the raw meat samples possessed dichlorodiphenyl- trichloroethane at the highest level. Contami- nation was highest in cow meat samples and lowest in chicken samples. No particular district- wise trend was obtained for the pesticides selected for analysis. Subsequent decontamination study D. Sengupta · A. Chowdhury Department of Agricultural Chemistry and Soil Science, Institute of Agricultural Science, University of Calcutta, Kolkata 700019, India Md. W. Aktar (B ) Department of Agricultural Chemicals, Bidhan Chandra Krishi Viswavidyalaya, Mohanpur, Nadia 741252, West Bengal, India e-mail: wasim04101981@yahoo.co.in S. Alam Institute of Pesticide Formulation Technology, Sector-20, Udyog Vihar, Opp. Ambience Mall (on NH-8), Gurgaon 122016, Haryana, India revealed that cooking is the best option in reduc- ing pesticide load in raw meat samples. Cooked chicken is the safest foodstuff for consumption. Keywords Meat · Organochlorine · Organophosphorus · Pesticides · DDT · Contamination · Decontamination cooking Introduction Environmental contaminants have a serious effect on our general and reproductive health. The use of pest control chemicals known as pesticides is well recognized in agricultural, non-agricultural, and public health programs. There has been a rapid rise in the quantity of pesticides used in agriculture over the past 10 years (Hodgson 2003). Among the various classes of pesticides, herbicides are dominating the world market while insecticides are leading the Indian market (Adityachaudhury et al. 1997). About 50% of the insecticides in India belong to the chemi- cal group organophosphate (OP). Although the use of organochlorine (OC) insecticides has been restricted by most of the countries for their long-term persistence in the environment, their illegal use in agriculture is not uncommon (Tuncer et al. 1998) and many countries are still us- ing these chemicals in public health program.