A probabilistic estimation of dietary exposure to cypermethrin residues for the Chinese population was performed. Cypermethrin residue data were obtained from the national food contamination monitoring program for 2001-2006, encompassing 14,096 samples from 36 commodities with a detection rate of 10.4%. Food consumption data were gathered from the national nutrition and health survey conducted in 2002, comprising 65,915 consumers aged 2-100 years and 3701 children of 2-6 years old. The whole country was roughly divided into six regions and the ranges of the median and of P99.9 exposure estimated for these regions were 0.018-0.026 and 3.131-7.095 µg kg(-1 )bw day(-1), respectively. Pak-choi and Chinese cabbage contributed 33.9 and 13.2%, respectively, to the cypermethrin intake for the general population, while pak-choi and citrus covered 30.7 and 22.5% of the total intake for children, respectively. The exposure of the rural population was higher than urban populations. Rural areas mainly located in the plains of central China had among the highest exposure of the six regions, accounting for 17.7% of the ARfD at P99.9, while the 99.99th percentile of exposure for children, especially rural children, far exceeded the ARfD, which is a cause for concern.
Keywords: cypermethrin; dietary exposure; probabilistic modeling; risk assessment.