Distribution of arsenic concentrations in the culture-shellfish from the southern coast of Fujian Province, China

It was undertaken (2003~2004) to investigate the distribution of arsenic concentrations in five culture-shellfish from the southern coast of Fujian Province,China.The results show that total arsenic concentrations in the five culture-shellfish vary from 0.65×10^-6 to 4.80×10^-6,with an overall average of 2.09×10^-6.The percent of organic arsenic content to the total arsenic one ranges from 61.6% to 98.2%,and the percent of inorganic arsenic is from 2.3% to 38.4%.Their average values are 88.8% and 11.2% respectively.Difference of the inter-specific distribution of the total average concentration in the culture shellfish is little in the same culture area.Overall,the total arsenic average concentration of culture-benthic shellfish in sea beach soil is higher than that of raft-culture shellfish in shallow sea.The total arsenic concentrations in the five culture-shellfish in the Quanzhou Bay,the Meizhou Bay,the Dongshan Bay and the Jiulong Estuary are high,the Weitou Bay and the Zhao'an Bay are low,and in other bays are nearly the same.The pollution index of the inorganic arsenic ranges from 0.05 to 0.76 with an overall average of 0.23.And for the total arsenic,the pollution index is from 0.06~0.48 with an overall average of 0.21.They are all below the arsenics limit of natural food sanitation quality criteria in marine bivalve.The correlation between the total arsenic in the culture-shellfish and its length is overall positive.