Soil-to-cassava transfer of naturally occurring radionuclides from communities along Ghana's oil and gas rich Tano Basin.

Soil-to-plant transfer factor (TF) is widely used to assess the impact of soil radioactivity on agricultural crops. The root crop cassava (Manihot esculenta) provides 30%-50% of the calories consumed in Sub-Saharan Africa and is widely used in South America. γ-ray analysis was used to measure activity concentrations of238 U,232 Th, and40 K in cassava root and soil. The TF values for238 U,232 Th, and40 K were in the range 0.06-0.12, 0.01-0.10 and 0.04-0.28 respectively. The median transfer factors were 0.10 (238 U), 0.04 (232 Th) and 0.08 (40 K). For238 U and232 Th, the highest TF values were 0.12 and 0.10 respectively.