Tracing The Sources And Fate Of Contaminants In Agroecosystems

The objective of this open access book is to present protocols, methodologies, and standard operating procedures (SOPs) used for the identification of sources, transport, and fate of agro-contaminants and illustrate them with several case studies of successful applications. The Soil and Water Management & Crop Nutrition (SWMCN) Subprogramme of the Joint Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)/International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Centre of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture, through a Coordinated Research Project (CRP) in partnership with national and international research institutes, developed and evaluated a set of analytical techniques (the toolbox). The toolbox integrates multiple isotope tracers that provide information on the origins and pathways of multiple pollutants through agro-ecosystems, thereby providing more accurate guidance on mitigations. However, land management strategies to address and control the transport of pollutants from soil to water bodies remain the shared responsibility of farm and aquaculture operators, agro-chemical manufacturers, and policymakers in food and agriculture as well as the mining sectors. This book is structured into eight chapters covering (i) an overview of the book’s content, (ii) guidelines for designing water sampling programmes, (iii) the use of mixing models applicable to tracers for water pollution studies, (iv) compound-specific isotope analyses to investigate pesticide degradation in agricultural catchments, (v) the use of stable oxygen isotope composition of phosphate to investigate phosphorous in soil-plant continuum, (vi) the use of stable sulphur isotopes to disentangle agro-pollutants from other contaminants, (vii) nuclear tools used in sediment source apportionment, and (viii) the conclusions and perspectives forward. The book offers up-to-date information, and we hope it is a great source of information for students, researchers, and policymakers. The SWMCN subprogramme thanks all the contributors involved in the preparation of this publication.

This book reviews contaminants of emerging nature affecting the agroecosystem and includes important information regarding the their sources, types, transportation, environmental threats and strategies to decontaminate the affected agroecosystems. The contents of this volume will help the policy makers and environmental engineers in combating the continuously rising threats to cultivated ecosystems.

It is hard to imagine a more concise summary of the prodigious work and voluminous publications in this field... This volume should be available to students at the undergraduate level, to those in law school, and to all seriously concerned about an extremely important problem. This review in Choice was just one of the many favourable comments that greeted the appearance of the first edition of this book when it appeared in 1977. Since then, there has been an explosion of interest in almost every aspect of research in environmental pollution. The aim of this new edition, however, remains the same i.e. to evaluate the global biological consequences of dispersal of trace elements, originally mined from localized limited deposits, in the environment. In treating the problems of metal contamination of the environment, the author considers the problems of environmental pollution involving metals and the problem of exhaustion of finite reserves of ores of metals, such as cadmium, copper, lead, mercury, nickel and zinc, as aspects of a single global problem. A broad picture is presented of the overall process of dispersal of trace elements in the environment and the biological consequences of this process are documented with the aid of an intensive list of references. The book will be invaluable as a definitive reference source covering this field of interest for a wide range of people (environmentalists and conservationists, those concerned with management of resources and waste disposal, and agricultural chemists and soil scientists.)

This volume takes a multidisciplinary approach to study and evaluate the global human vulnerability to the exposure of contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) in the natural environment. It provides a comprehensive resource on structurally diverse groups of chemical compounds that have adverse effects on the aquatic environment. It explores the global strength, environmental status, chemical risk assessment and management strategies of CECs with relevant modern techniques. The principle focus is on concurrent emerging water quality issues. It defines the impacts of the environmental exposure of trace concentrations of CECs and/or their metabolites and discusses possible technological advances to combat the emerging pollutants. It will be useful to researchers, multi-stakeholder expert groups, policymakers, and graduate students.

This document presents key messages and the state-of-the-art of soil pollution, its implications on food safety and human health. It aims to set the basis for further discussion during the forthcoming Global Symposium on Soil Pollution (GSOP18), to be held at FAO HQ from May 2nd to 4th 2018. The publication has been reviewed by the Intergovernmental Technical Panel on Soil (ITPS) and contributing authors. It addresses scientific evidences on soil pollution and highlights the need to assess the extent of soil pollution globally in order to achieve food safety and sustainable development. This is linked to FAO’s strategic objectives, especially SO1, SO2, SO4 and SO5 because of the crucial role of soils to ensure effective nutrient cycling to produce nutritious and safe food, reduce atmospheric CO2 and N2O concentrations and thus mitigate climate change, develop sustainable soil management practices that enhance agricultural resilience to extreme climate events by reducing soil degradation processes. This document will be a reference material for those interested in learning more about sources and effects of soil pollution.