Evaluation of the heavy metal levels from selected food cultivars, from coal mining communities of Enugu State, Nigeria

Abstract

Food cultivars from Akwuke, Ngwo and Udi were analyzed for their heavy metal content using the atomic absorption spectrometry (AAS). The mean concentrations of Manganese in leafy vegetable ranges from 1170±6.20µg/g and in chromium from 110±0.0 µg/g, in lead from 320±210, in cadmium from 30±10 µg/g and nickel from 10±0 µg/g all in Akwuke. The transfer factors results for the three communities shows that the pumpkin leafy have the highest transfer factor for manganese, 2.6 in Akwukeand chromium yam 2.465 in Udi, while Nickel has the least transfer factor in all the food cultivars in the three communities with 0 result. This study has revealed high concentration of manganese, lead, chromium cadmium and nickel in food cultivars in the three studied area Akwuke, Ngwo and Udi, all in Enugu State. Though the concentrations of these heavy metals were not high in any of the soil samples, but high concentration of these heavy metals, compared to WHO/FAO in food cultivars were observed, especially in Udi and Ngwo community. Keywords: Heavy metal, levels, food cultivars, Enugu State and Nigeria