Plant Protection Products

Development of a long term monitoring strategy of pesticide residues in Swiss soils

In 2017, the Federal Council adopted the National Action Plan for Risk Reduction and Sustainable Use of Plant Protection Products (AP PPP) (Bundesrat, 2017). With the AP PPP, NABO was commissioned to develop, together with its project partners, a concept for long-term monitoring of PSM in Swiss soils. The aim of the project is to carry out a study on the status of residues of relevant PPPs in soils and to review them regularly from 2020 onwards. For this purpose, residues of PPP active ingredients and their transformation products in the soil will be measured. This will serve as an addition to the existing measuring programs for ground- and surface water.

While NABO already monitors various soil characteristics and management data at a wide range of sites, we will expand the number of sites under AP-PPP to better cover the PPP-intensive land uses orchards, vineyards and vegetable production.

In a core work package, we concentrate on the assessment and modelling of the fate and behaviour of PPP residues. At the same time we orient ourselves on the farmers’ management data. A further focus is on the development of the method for extended multiresidue analysis.

In addition to the core work package, various specific questions in separate thematic work packages will be examined. The following topics are included:

  • Variability over time: How does the short- and mid-term variability of PPP residues in soil look?
  • Status analysis of PPP soil residues in orchards and vineyards
  • Status analysis of PPP soil residues in vegetable production
  • Status analysis of PPP soil residues in arable farming under consideration of the influence of no-till and conservation tillage (in cooperation with the Agroscope group Plant-Soil Interactions).

For the inclusion of PPP soil residues in the long-term monitoring, the existing NABO site collective and the current sampling strategy are to be supplemented based on the knowledge gained in the project.

In parallel, indicators and reference values will be developed by project partners from the Ecotoxicology centre and EnviBioSoil in order to determine the effects of PPP residues on the soil quality. Furthermore, we aim to identify measures that can help to reduce the risk on soil quality.

Last modification 19.03.2021

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