Arsenic Bioaccumulation in Food Stuff, its Health Risks and Minimization through Organic Amendments

Abstract

Arsenic (As) is metalloid which is known for its toxicity and associated health risks. It is found both naturally and anthropogenically in environment the present study was conducted for quantifying the arsenic in plants, vegetables and rice and application of organic amendments to minimize the uptake of As The samples were collected from different places of District Chitral (Chitral city, Drosh, Ayun, Bumborat, Buny and Garam Cheshma). The physicochemical parameters of soil show that pH was ranged from 7.40-7.75, the organic matter (OM) ranged from 1.1-3.0 mg/kg and the electric conductivity ranges from 0.05-0.7 mS/cm. Moreover, the soil particles in the range of >1mm is 12.74 %, while in the range of 250 µm-64 µm, 10.165% average were noted. Likewise, in the range of 64 µm-20 µm, only 5.93% recorded. While, <20µm, only 0.845% has been noted. The analysis further revealed that daily intake of heavy metals in vegetable is with in permissible limits set by WHO but the health risk index is high that is above 1 in fruits vegetable and rice, in vegetables the highest value is recorded in greens which is 22.7 and 24.3 for both adults and children respectively while lowest value is recorded for cucumber which is 2.8 and 3 for children and adults respectively. Similarly, in case of fruits, the range is 14.3 and 2.6 for mulberry and apricot respectively. Likewise, in case of grains, the HRI value is 11.3 for both children and adults in Gabur while lowest value is recorder in the rice on Gharam Chashma for adults is 3.3 and 6.0 for children which is high values and can cause health risk in the study area. In the pot experiment different Verities of rice Dokri Basmati, Shadab 31 and Shaheen Basmati (V1,V2,V3 ) is cultivated and treated with organic mattes manure, organic matter peat and organic matter leaves (OMM,OMP,OML)with addition of three concentrations of As (5, 10, 15 mg/kg) . The results showed that the rice varity-1 grown in control treatment with addition of iv

OM the root length is highest which is decrease with the addition of arsenic 900>800>670>600 with As 0, 1, 2, 3 respectively the shoot length in control soil treatment found highest, whereas the spiking of soil with As at different concentrations reduced (5>10>15) the shoot length of the rice. This decreases in the length of shoot of rice may be because of the toxicity of As. During analysis, by amendments, the OMP took higher growth in case of 0 arsenic concentrations; however, the OML and OMM gain little growth. In case of variety 2 , in control soil with 0 concentration, the length of shoots grew high as compared to As1, As2 and As3, whereas by adding the organic matter (OM), the OML growth is high compared to OMP and OMM. In terms of fresh and dry weights, in arsenic 0 and arsenic 2, the OML weight is high, while in As3, the OMP weight is great. Furthermore, the results indicate that in control soil with “0” concentration of As, the growth is highest; however, by adding the As1, the growth is decreasing followed by As2 and As3 respectively. Likewise, by testing the chemical parameters in variety 2 by As0, the concentration of chlorophyll A and B are very high with As1, the concentration decreases and again rise with As 2. In terms of plant pigment in variety 2, the concentration of chlorophyll increases with the increase in As. By OMM shows the highest concentration followed by OML and OMP and all the carotenoid results designates the same values. Furthermore, in variety 3, control “0” expressed the higher concentration, while As1 show low concentration. Opposite to these, the concentration of As2 and As3 increased. In the context of H2O2, the analysis revealed that with organic matter manure (OMM), with 0 concentration of arsenic, the V2 grew high, while V1 and V3 express low arsenic concentration. Furthermore, by adding more arsenic the growth is considerably decline, along with this, by providing more arsenic (As3), the H2O2 concentration show that V1 possess slightly high concentration, whereas V2 and V3 hold a little bit low concentration. Likewise, with OMP, by the addition of As1, V1 v

express slightly low concentration, while by adding more arsenic, V1 exhibit 50% decrease. Whereas, in case of As3 the H2O2 concentration in V1 immensely increased. In terms of arsenic uptake in control, the V1 (root) results shows the lowest value i.e. 3.03, while (30.6) and As3 (110) express higher concentration values. While in terms of OMM, there is an increasing trend has been noted. The results show that As which is carcinogenic and found in study area naturally and the community is at risk so it can be remediated with the help of OM as it is a cheap and environmental friendly way and found that OML is the best organic matter for growth both in term of root length shoot length overall responsible for growth and also it help in minimization of As in all the three verities of rice which were locally cultivated in the study area.