Towards a control strategy for banned antibiotics and growth promoters in feed: the SIMBAG-FEED project

The main technical and scientific objective of the EU project SIMBAG-FEED (“Screening and identification methods for official control of banned antibiotics and growth promoters in feedingstuffs”) was to develop, improve and validate adequate methods for the antibiotics avoparcin, zinc-bacitracin, spiramycin, tylosin and virginiamycin, and the growth promoters carbadox and olaquindox. The effective and efficient control of the possible illegal use of these substances requires the availability of multi-screening and confirmation methods, which can be implemented in an overall control strategy. For this purpose the following techniques have been applied: microbiological inhibition, High Voltage Electrophoresis (HVE), Thin Layer Chromatography (TLC), High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) and Liquid Chromatography with Mass Spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). Method development, within-lab and between-lab