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Climate, Health, and Nutrition (Oral Session 9)

(OR09-04-25) Agricultural Production Processes and Heavy Metal Contaminants in Foods for Human Consumption: A Scoping Review and Research Gap Map

Sunday, June 1, 2025
4:36 PM – 4:48 PM ET
Location: S230 CD
Objectives: Agricultural processes and other factors such as weather or industrial practices can impact heavy metal contaminants in foods. To support the US FDA’s Closer to Zero initiative, which aims to minimize contaminants in the food supply, this scoping review identified evidence that assessed agricultural practices and arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury in food.

Methods: We searched MEDLINE, Embase, CAB Abstracts, AGRICOLA, and Food Science and Technology Abstracts for primary articles published from 2013-2023. Included articles described measured contaminants in foods for human consumption related to agricultural processes. We used the extracted data to develop an interactive evidence map. Research gaps were identified when fewer than 10% of articles within an agricultural domain (crops, meats, and seafood) were reported on a given process.

Results: We identified and screened 76,587 articles, of which 10,884 were included. Research addressed agricultural processes for crops (73% of articles), seafood (21%) and meats (8%) from more than 140 countries. Most research assessed cadmium (68%), followed by lead (44%), arsenic (24%), and mercury (15%). Most articles on crops (57%) focused on soil, soil amendments, and fertilizer. Whereas most articles on seafood (49%) and meat (39%) were related to weather and the environment, including pollution.

Five agricultural process categories from each domain were determined to be research gaps. For crops, these were planting and field maintenance (6% of articles), microbial inoculation (5%), harvesting (2%), washing, storage, and waste management (2%), and pest control (1%). Gaps for seafood were on feed (9%), medications and feed additives (3%), chemotherapeutants in water (1%), fertilizer (0.4%), biologics and hormones to induce spawning (0.1%). For meats, gaps included egg production (4%), housing (3%), milk production (2%), reproduction (1%), and farm management, waste, and production scale (0.4%).

Conclusions: Our study identified several research gaps warranting further investigation, as well as areas where existing evidence might be sufficient to warrant systematic review to inform future policies related to reducing heavy metal contaminants in the global food supply.

Funding Sources: US Food and Drug Administration