Mycobiota, mycotoxigenic fungi, and citrinin production in black olives

Olives have been reported to be a poor substrate for the production of aflatoxins. However Yassa et al., isolated A. flavus and A. parasiticus from black table olives in Egypt, from which nine strains of A. flavus and five strains of A. parasiticus were found to produce aflatoxin B sub(1) on olive paste. Toussaint and Daradimos et al. found aflatoxin B sub(1) in olive oil samples at levels of 5-10 mu g/kg and 3-46 ng/kg respectively.