Investigating the extent of mercury pollution and artisanal mining areas, case study : Syanyonja Village Busia(U).

Abstract

This research project was designed to investigate the extent of mercury pollution in water, sediment, fish and yams in Syanyonja village in order to determine whether persons are at risk from high levels of mercury contamination, the research project was conducted during the period Jan 31stmarch - 21st 2017 Firstly, the sampling sites were determined basing on the areas where mining processing using mercury was taking place Three sites were chosen and samples taken from all the sites: A total of 48 water and sediment samples were picked at intervals of 10m a distance of 40m from each site fish samples and 9 yam samples were picked. 25 questionnaires were also administered in the village. The sampling Points were noted using a GPS and a map extracted out from google earth. Results obtained showed that 28% of mercury is discharged into the water and soil during panning 83% of the sampling points have Very large mercury content compared to the water quality standard for mercury based on The. National Environment (standards for discharge of effluent into water or on land which is 0.01mg/l. The average mercury content in fish is O.06mg/kg. The weekly intake of mercury by people consuming fish from Namukombe stream is approximately 0.42mg/kg, which is approximately 40% higher than the PTWI of 0.3g for MeHg. The maximum total Hg intake for consumers on average for Syanyonja yams is higher than the Japanese safe guideline limit (0.036mg/day for an adult weighing 50kg) as well as the ProvisionalTolerable Daily Intake(PTDI) for adults 31% of the residents in Syanyonja village use stream water for domestic purpose