Abstract:
Potassium bromate is an oxidizing agent that has been used as a food additive added
to preserve flavour or improve the taste and appearance of food, mainly in the
process of making bread and baked products. The continuous consumption of
potassium bromate is hazardous to human health. The aim of this study is to assess
the safety of some bread and baked products by determining the residual potassium
bromate using a spectrophotometric method, in twenty nine bread and different
bakery products samples included; croissant, toast and cake, collected from different
bakeries in Benghazi, Libya. The obtained results indicated that, the level of residual
potassium bromate in the analyzed bread and baked samples ranged from
0.6138µg/g to 1.558µg/g, with mean concentration equal to 0.9641± 0.4 µg/g. A
significant differences were found in the potassium bromate levels of the different
analysed samples (P<0.05). The results of this study showed that the contents of
potassium bromate in all analysed baked products were higher than permissible limit
sets by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and by Libyan Standard Regulations.
The excessive consumption of potassium bromate has a highly toxic effects to
consumer`s health.
