Since the turn of the last century, the Tsumeb area was a major mining hub until 1999, and still continues to be a smelting centre for ores originating from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zambia, Mauritania, Bulgaria and Chile. This has brought about a situation where the top soils surrounding the smelter, especially in the down wind direction, are highly contaminated with lead, zinc, copper, arsenic and cadmium. The contamination of the top soils and crops is a result of historical smelter emissions as well as due to windborne dust derived from the tailings and slag dumps of the smelter complex. A total of 43 samples of vegetative material were collected in areas with potential soil contamination in the surroundings of the Tsumeb smelter complex. The samples comprise fruit crops (marula, papaya), vegetable (tomato, parsley, carrot, bean, pumpkin, chillies) and a field crop (maize). Twelve topsoil samples were collected at specific sampling sites for correlation with vegetation samples. The concentrations of arsenic, lead and cadmium of most of the fruits and vegetables (marula fruits, pumpkins, chilli, and tomato) correlate with the heavy metal values of the underlying contaminated top soils. The guideline values of the WHO (Codex Alimentarius) and EU were applied for the interpretation of eventual health risks. All plant samples are characterised by high lead concentrations exceeding the guideline values. Crops from Tsumeb-Nomtsoub and the agricultural land to the west of the smelter show critical contaminations.