Microelement Contents of Locally Produced and Imported Wheat Grains in Yemen

Abstract

In the last few decades, wheat-based products have received considerable attention in view of their potential role in transporting of microelements into the human diet. In Yemen, bread is the staple food, produced in different kinds from local and imported wheat. Most of it is not subjected to microelemental analysis. The objective of this study is to determine quantitatively the microelement such as Fe, Cu, Mn, Zn, Co, Cd and Pb in samples of wheat grains produced locally from different cultivated regions in Yemen as well as those imported from USA and Austria. Flame atomic absorption spectrophotometry was used for analysis. The results show that the contents of the microelements in the studied samples are generally within the permissible levels except cadmium. The samples collected from middle altitude and eastern plateau the cadmium is above the permissible level.