Abstract

The calcium and magnesium content has been determined of 61 meat samples, 17 samples of minced meat, 13 dressed meat products and 18 sausages ; total number of samples: N=109. Sampling has been spread geographically over the Netherlands as wide as practical and was preferably focussed at local butchering and/or production of sausages. Quality assurance for both elements was by analysis of the standard reference materials "Animal muscle" and "Horse kidney" of IAEA in Vienna, "Bovine liver" of NIST in Washington D.C. and "Pork muscle" of BCR in Brussels. All samples were, at least, assayed for both elements in duplicate to face the risk that inhomogeneity affects the results. On average the calcium content is 0.10 g/kg ; levels over this mean were found in only 21% of the products. The calcium levels range from 0.03 up to 1.99 g/kg with a median value of 0.06 g/kg and 0.60 g/kg for the highest but one value. The average magnesium content of meat and meat products (N=109) is 0.22 g/kg ; range 0.09-0.34 g/kg. Apart from chicken meat, the products hardly differ in magnesium content. Highest magnesium levels were found in chicken meat which contains on average 0.31 g/kg. The contents of calcium and magnesium found in the products assayed agree well with those found for similar products in the literature studied.