Radionuclides of both natural and human made origin exist throughout the environment. These radionuclides can be transferred to plants and animals that are consumed by humans, thereby resulting in exposure to ionizing radiation and an internal radiation dose. This Safety Report provides information on the observed distributions of concentrations of natural radionuclides in various food products, on the use of ‘total diet’ and other studies to assess ingestion doses, and on radionuclide concentrations in natural mineral waters. Different dose assessment methodologies are presented and the advantages and disadvantages of each is discussed, along with approaches used for managing non-radioactive contaminants in food. This publication is jointly sponsored by the IAEA, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Health Organization. It is intended to support Member States in the assessment and management of radionuclides in food, and the alignment of national policies with Requirement 51 of IAEA Safety Standards Series No. GSR Part 3, related to radionuclides in food and drinking water.

• 1. INTRODUCTION
  • 1.1. Background
    • 1.1.1. Radionuclides in food
    • 1.1.2. IAEA Safety Standards
    • 1.1.3. Exposure situations
    • 1.1.4. Existing international guidance
    • 1.1.5. Justification of protective actions and optimization of protection and safety
  • 1.2. Objective
  • 1.3. Scope
  • 1.4. Structure
• 2. RADIONUCLIDES IN FOOD
  • 2.1. Sources of radionuclides in food
    • 2.1.1. Cosmogenic and primordial radionuclides
    • 2.1.2. Authorized discharges
    • 2.1.3. Nuclear fallout
    • 2.1.4. Unregulated activities
    • 2.1.5. Large scale accidental releases
  • 2.2. National and international reviews
    • 2.2.1. Natural radionuclides
    • 2.2.2. Human-made radionuclides
  • 2.3. Summary
• 3. ESTIMATION OF DIETARY INTAKES
  • 3.1. Introduction
  • 3.2. Food consumption data
    • 3.2.1. Indirect methods
    • 3.2.2. Direct methods
    • 3.2.3. International food consumption data
  • 3.3. Dietary sampling methods
    • 3.3.1. Total diet and market basket studies
    • 3.3.2. Duplicate diet and canteen meal studies
    • 3.3.3. Monitoring of individual food products
    • 3.3.4. Summary of dietary sampling methods
    • 3.3.5. Other approaches
    • 3.3.6. Discussion
• 4. ANALYSIS OF DIETARY EXPOSURE STUDIES AND PATHWAYS
  • 4.1. Introduction
  • 4.2. Dietary dose studies
    • 4.2.1. Literature survey
    • 4.2.2. Total doses
    • 4.2.3. Doses as a function of radionuclide
    • 4.2.4. Comparison with UNSCEAR estimates
    • 4.2.5. Doses as a function of age
    • 4.2.6. Doses as a function of dietary survey type
    • 4.2.7. Discussion
  • 4.3. Natural radionuclides in natural mineral water
    • 4.3.1. Literature survey
    • 4.3.2. Results
    • 4.3.3. Dose from natural mineral waters
    • 4.3.4. Discussion
  • 4.4. Aquaculture
    • 4.4.1. Fishery products
    • 4.4.2. Aquatic plants
    • 4.4.3. Discussion
  • 4.5. Wild foods
    • 4.5.1. Natural radionuclides in terrestrial wild foods
    • 4.5.2. Human-made radionuclides in wild foods
    • 4.5.3. Discussion
• 5. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF MEASUREMENT DATA for NATURAL radionuclides in food
  • 5.1. Introduction
    • 5.1.1. Background
    • 5.1.2. Data description
  • 5.2. Data collection
    • 5.2.1. Published data from scientific literature
    • 5.2.2. Monitoring programme data from Member States
  • 5.3. Statistical analysis
    • 5.3.1. Statistical analysis of published and Member State datasets
    • 5.3.2. Statistical analysis of merged datasets
    • 5.3.3. Results of statistical analyses
• 6. SUMMARY
  • 6.1. Introduction
  • 6.2. Potassium-40
  • 6.3. Uranium and thorium series radionuclides in food
  • 6.4. Other radionuclides in food
  • 6.5. Activity concentrations in individual foods
  • 6.6. Dietary studies
  • 6.7. Knowledge gaps
• AppendixLITERATURE REVIEW AND DATA COMPILATION
• REFERENCES
• Annex I ANALYTICAL TECHNIQUES TO IDENTIFY AND QUANTIFY RADIONUCLIDES IN FOOD
• Annex II STATISTICAL ANALYSES OF NATURAL RADIONUCLIDES IN FOOD
• Annex III EXPLORING THE DISTRIBUTION OF 210Po IN MOLLUSCS
• LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
• CONTRIBUTORS TO DRAFTING AND REVIEW