Cadmium Screening in Soils and Cacao Beans from the Main Plantation Sites in Venezuela

This work aimed to contribute to a cadmium screening in soils and cacao beans from the main plantation sites in Venezuela by Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-OES) analysis. Among them are Miranda, Sucre, Mérida-Zulia, and Barinas states, where cadmium levels fluctuated significantly. Despite the reduced number of samples and high intra-zonal variability, the soil Cd concentration in the plantations averaged 0.22 µg g^-1, lower than the recommended maximum for agricultural soils (0.43 µg g^-1). Cacao beans averaged 1.85 µg g^-1, well above the upper limit recommended by the European Cocoa Association (0.6 µg g^-1). The highest values were recorded for Miranda plantations. Soils from the plantations in Sucre, Mérida-Zulia, and Barinas have Cd concentrations below the detection limit of the ICP-OES method applied (0.035 µg g^-1). A significant correlation was detected between the total Cd content of soil and the concentration of Cd in cacao beans.