Agriculture & Food, Volume 13, 2025

Rezumat: This study aimed to assess the concentrations of selected chemical elements in the traditional Slovak sheep product - bryndza, from farms of different regions of Slovakia with organic animal farming systems, and with the assessment of the intake of these elements through the consumption of this product. Slovak bryndza is a natural white, finely spreadable ripened cheese with occasional grains, made in the traditional way - by grinding ripened sheep's lump cheese or a mixture of sheep's and cow's lump cheese. Six chemical elements (Ca, Zn, Mg, Al, Ni, Cd) were monitored in sheep´s cheese – bryndza samples (32 samples in total) and determined by the ICP-OES. Comparing the concentration of element between farms, statistically significant differences (P˂0.05) were found in the case of Ca, Zn, Mg, Al, with all concentrations of these elements being higher on organic farm from area with undisturbed environment. When evaluating the intake of essential elements, were found that if the categories of Slovak peoples with the highest need for selected essential elements consumed 100 g of bryndza cheese per day, they would meet their Ca intake 33.52%, Zn intake 12.6% and Mg intake 7.23 % through bryndza cheese from an organic farm in a region with an undisturbed environment. When estimating the intake risk of toxic elements, we wound that Al and Ni concentrations were significantly higher on a farm from a region with an undisturbed environment compared to farm with a heavily disturbed environment. Consuming 100 g of bryndza cheese per day would represent 7.36% PTWI (permissible tolerably weekly intake) for Al and 8.13% TDI (tolerable daily intake) for Ni for peoples of Slovakia, which, however, means a very low intake. From the results of the work, we can conclude that the consumption of bryndza from the monitored farms is unlikely to pose a health risk to consumers, especially based on the assessment of exposure to toxic elements, and on the contrary, it can be an important part of the diet of the population of Slovakia due to its health benefits which are high in calcium and magnesium, which is also confirmed by the results of this work.