Risk assessment for pesticide contamination of groundwater with sparse available data

K. BARDOWICKS; O. HEREDIA; A. FERNÁNDEZ CIRELLI; P. BOOCHS

Viena, Austria

Otro; General Assembly of European Geosciences Union; 2009

European Geosciences Union

The contamination of the water resources by agrochemicals is recognized in industrial countries as a veryimportant environmental problem, nevertheless in most of developing and threshold countries the risks for healthand environmental problems are not considered. In these countries agrochemicals, which are forbidden since several years in Europe (e.g. atrazine), are still in use. In some threshold countries monitoring systems are already installed for nutrients (N, P) and also a few for heavy metals, but so far the contamination by pesticides is hardly ever controlled, thus there is no data available about pesticide concentrations in soil and water. The aim of this research is to develop a methodology to show farmers and other water users (water agencies, drinking water supply companies) in basins of developing or threshold countries with sparse available data the risk of contamination of the groundwater resources by pesticides.