Bangladesh has topped the list of 12 countries where high concentrations of Cadmium was found in rice samples during a recent study by the American Chemical Society (ACS).
Experts in the country agreed with the study.
But they said high Cadmium content in rice were confined to some regions and were not a country-wide phenomenon.
They say industrial wastes polluting the paddy fields and use of low-quality fertilisers during cultivation caused high Cadmium content in Bangladesh's rice.
The toxic metal causes cancer, heart disease and kidney diseases, they said.
The ACS study found .01 to .3 ppm Cadmium per kilogram in Bangladesh rice and the quantity, it said, was rising.
Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) recently found .0054 to .0505 ppm/kg in their own rice which they said was safe.
Sri Lanka came second in Cadmium contamination in the ACS study. The study also included Cambodia, Ghana, India, Italy, Japan, Nepal, Spain, Thailand, the USA and France.
An official of Bangladesh’s Soil Resource Development Institute (SRDI), who preferred anonymity, told bdnews24.com that the level of Cadmium contamination in rice was rising as the toxic substance was entering in the paddy fields near the industrial zones at an alarming rate.
“Low-quality TSP fertilisers and untreated wastes of garment factories, drug factories, textiles and tanneries which mix with water sources are causing high incidence of Cadmium in our rice,” he said.
Cadmium enters the rice through the plant as water from contaminated sources makes it way into the fields.
However, Sher-e-Bangla Agriculture University’s Professor Abdullahil Baque claimed that the Cadmium concentration level was not the same in rice from all regions of Bangladesh.
He told bdnews24.com that Cadmium presence was highest in the red soil of Dhaka and areas around the capital.
He also mentioned wastes of industrial zones, specially tanneries, could be the main cause for raising the level of Cadmium in rice.