To establish an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry(ICP-MS) method for simultaneously measuring the content of 37 inorganic elements in 78 batches of Astragalus membranaceus; to understand the differences of inorganic elements in different places of origin and analyze the correlation between different elements and origin of Astragalus membranaceus by multivariate statistical analysis.Methods:A total of 47 samples of Astragalus membranaceus in Gansu Province and 31 samples outside Gansu Province were collected.The microwave digestion method was used to determine the content of the elements in Astragalus membranaceus by ICP-MS，and principal component analysis(PCA) and partial least square discriminant analysis(PLS-DA) models were applied for analysis.The hazard index evaluation method was adopted for evaluation.Results:All inorganic elements showed a good linear relationship(r>0.99); the different inorganic elements of the two groups of Astragalus membranaceus during the identification of origin were Sr，Ba，Ni，Cd，and Cr; the PCA obtained three main factors，namely F1，F2，and F3，as well as the comprehensive score Y for ranking the places of origin and evaluating the hazard index(HI).Conclusion:The proposed method is rapid，accurate，and highly sensitive，and it is suitable for measuring the content of many inorganic elements in Astragalus membranaceus.There are regional differences in inorganic elements in Astragalus membranaceus from different sources.Multivariate statistical analysis can be used to distinguish the place of origin，which is helpful to select planting areas reasonably.