Abstract
Tea is one of the most common drinks in all over the world. Rapid urbanization and industrialization in recent decades has increased heavy metals in tea and other foods. In this research, heavy metal contents such as lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd) and arsenic (As) were determined in 105 black tea samples cultivated in Guilan and Mazandaran Provinces in north of Iran and their tea infusions. The amount of heavy metals in black tea infusions were analyzed using Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectroscopy (ICP - AES).The mean ± SD level of Pb in 5, 15 and 60 min in infusion tea samples were 0.802 ± 0.633, 0.993 ± 0.667 and 1.367 ± 1.06 mg/kg of tea dry weight, respectively. The mean level of Cd in 5, 15 and 60 min in infusion tea samples were 0.135 ± 0.274, 0.244 ± 0.46 and 0.343 ± 0.473 mg/kg of tea dry weight, respectively. The mean level of As in 5, 15 and 60 min in infusion tea samples were 0.277 ± 0.272, 0.426 ± 0.402 and 0.563 ± 0.454 mg/kg of tea dry weight, respectively. Also, the results showed that the locations and the infusion times influenced upon the amount of these metals (P < 0.05).
Highlights
Tea is one of the most common drinks in all over the world, which is produced from the leaves of a shrub Camellia sinensis [1]
After drinking water, tea is the most consumed beverage in Iran. In this regard health aspects related to tea is very important and consumers should be very confident on the absence of any pollutants in black tea
The presence of any variations in metal contents in this study could be as a matter of the differences in methods of storage, tea leaf processing and the difference in soil metal concentrations
Summary
Tea is one of the most common drinks in all over the world, which is produced from the leaves of a shrub Camellia sinensis [1]. About 98% of people drink tea as the first among all beverages available to use [2]. The 75% of the estimated 2.5 million metric tons of desiccated tea that are produced annually is processed as black tea which is used by many countries [3]. About 18–20 billion cups of tea are consumed daily in the world [4]. Iran is a tea-producing country and relies on substantive imports to supplement its production to satisfy the considerable consumption needs. Iranians hold one of the highest per capita rates in tea consumption in the world, (about1.6 kg per capita consumption in the period of 2005–2007), [5]. 34 thousand hectares of lands in Guilan and Mazandaran provinces have been cultured for tea, almost half of the dry tea interior production and the remainder comes from
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