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The investigations are described carried out to track the analytical problems associated with the procedure for the mercury determination operational until recently. Solutions found for these problems finally resulted in the improved analytical procedure outlined in annex III. The new method was validated extensively by reference samples with certified mercury content and by recovery experiments. Also described are the results of the reinvestigation of the lyophilized subsamples of the duplicate 24-hour diets collected in 1984/1985. Based on the new analytical data the mercury intake of the 110 respondents sampled in 1984/1985 has been recalculated. On average, the new intake data are half those obtained in the first investigation in 1987. Avarage mercury intake found now for the 110 adult respondents, males and females, is 1.0 mug per capita per day versus 2.2 mug in 1987. Lowest mercury intake calculated now is 0.3 mug per capita per day; highest intake 7.2 mug per capita per day. In terms of tolerable daily intake (TDI) for total mercury of 43 mug for an adult of 60 kg body weight, the average (N=110) intake is 2.3% and the range 0.7 to 16.7% of the TDI.