A spectrophotometric method was developed for the determination of fer
bam (iron(III) dimethyldithiocarbamate) by converting it into an iron-
phenanthroline complex, which was then absorbed on microcystalline nap
hthalene in the presence of tetraphenylborate, and the absorbance was
measured at 515 nm against a reagent blank. The molar absorptivity of
the complex was 1.2 x 10(4) 1 mol(-1) cm(-1). Ten replicate analyses o
f a sample solution containing 150 mu g of ferbam gave a relative stan
dard deviation of 0.84. Beer's law was obeyed over the concentration r
ange 22.4-372.9 mu g of ferbam. The effects of various factors such as
reagent concentration and naphthalene, shaking time and diverse ions
were studied in detail. The method is sensitive and selective and can
be applied to the direct determination of ferbam in commercial samples
and in mixtures containing various other dithiocarbamates (e.g. ziram
, zineb and maneb) in foodstuffs.