Mycotoxins detected in chicken products fed with contaminated poultry feeds from smallholder farmers in Western Kenya

Poultry production among smallholder farmers in Western Kenya is a major enterprise, providing food, income and employment; however, birds are maintained with minimum inputs; scavenge feeds which could potentially be contaminated with mycotoxins. Feed quality impacts on growth performance, productivity, well-being, health and is key to profitability and sustainability in farming. Objectives of this study were to identify common fungal genera in indigenous chicken feeds and determine mycotoxin contamination of feeds, eggs and chicken tissues. A purposive multi-stage sampling survey design was used to collect 260 feed samples from 180 smallholder indigenous poultry farmers in Siaya, Busia and Kakamega Counties – Kenya. A total of 235 were analysed for both fungal and mycotoxin contamination. Additionally, 60 eggs and 240 chicken tissues (liver, kidney, breast and thigh muscles – n = 60 each) samples were collected. Molecular tools were used to identify fungal isolates from feeds while Competitive Enzyme-linked Immunosorbent assay was used to determine mycotoxin levels. Dominant mycotoxigenic fungal genera included Aspergillus (32%), Penicillium (29%) and Fusarium (12%).Commercial feeds were significantly (p<0.05) contaminated (44.25ppb) with aflatoxin. Posho-mill waste, sorghum, maize and sorghum mixture, maize bran and maize were significantly (p<0.05) contaminated with fumonisin. For ochratoxin A, no feed exceeded regulatory limit of 100ppb.Eggs had traces of aflatoxin while liver had the highest (4.19±0.75) followed by breast muscle (3.57±0.59); but did not exceed regulatory limits of 10 ppb. Tissues sampled from free range production system had slightly higher levels of aflatoxin than semi-free range. Smallholder poultry farmers from Western Kenya use locally available feed resources which are contaminated with mycotoxins. Preventive measures and enhanced surveillance need to be instituted to mitigate the challenge and farmers sensitized on these measures. Key words: Food safety, fungi isolates, indigenous chicken feeds, Mycotoxin contamination, Western Kenya