Arsenic Poisoning in Plant-Soil Environment of Bangladesh

M. Ashraf Ali, A. B. M. Badruzzaman, M. A. Jalil, M. Delwar Hossain,
M. Feroze Ahmed, Abdullah Al Masud, Md. Kamruzzaman and M.Azizur Rahman
Department of Civil Engineering, Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology, Dhaka-1000,Bangladesh

Arsenic in groundwater and its fate and transport in the environment have become matters of great concern in Bangladesh, India and several other countries. In Bangladesh, an estimated 268 upazillas out of 465 have been affected with significantly high concentrations of arsenic. In Bangladesh tubewell water extracted from shallow aquifers is the primary source of drinking/cooking water for most of its population. An estimated 7.5 to 8.0 million hand-tubewells constitute the backbone of the rural water supply in Bangladesh. Besides domestic use, huge quantities of water from shallow aquifer are also used for irrigation during the dry season. Since its detection in late 1993 in Bangladesh, much of the research works on arsenic have focused on its presence in and exposure through drinking/cooking water. However, widespread use of groundwater for irrigation suggests that ingestion of irrigated crops could be another major exposure route for arsenic. Besides, phytoxicity due to increase arsenic in soil/water and its long-term impact on agricultural yield is another major concern.

High arsenic in irrigation water and soil appears to result in higher concentration of arsenic in root, stem and leaf of rice plants. This result is in agreement with that reported by Abedin et al. (2002) based on a greenhouse study. This suggests that arsenic can be easily translocated to paddy shoot. Since rice straw is widely used as cattle feed in Bangladesh and India, high arsenic in rice stem and leaf (i.e., in straw), may result in adverse health impacts on cattle and increase human arsenic exposure via the plant-animal-human pathway.


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