Soil ecotoxicology in Latin America: Current research and perspectives

Abstract

Soils from some Latin American countries support the highest biodiversity levels on the planet and simultaneously have some of the most serious environmental impacts attributed to both historical and current agricultural practices and industrial activities. Soil contamination has resulted from intensive use of pesticides, extensive mining and other industrial activities, and uncontrolled management of waste within inappropriate regulatory frameworks. The present study presents an overview of the scientific research on soil ecotoxicology conducted in Latin America, summarizing the recent advances and highlighting the needs for further refinements in this research field. Most of the contributions to the scientific literature have been from Brazil. The most investigated issue is the ecotoxicity of pesticides and earthworms, which were the organisms most frequently used as test species. Needs identified by Latin American researchers include methods and procedures for: 1) identifying and collecting natural soils to be used as reference test-substrates in tests, 2) identifying and discerning the range of sensitivities of native test species to soil contaminants, 3) developing environmental guidelines applicable to tropical/subtropical conditions, and 4) developing methods and procedures for higher tier testing for full development and implementation of environmental risk assessment schemes. The protection of Latin American soils, including provision of goods and services, is currently framed in legislation and other regulations, but implementation requires significant improvement and additional training programs. Environ Toxicol Chem 2017;36:1795-1810. © 2017 SETAC.

Ecotoxicology as a tool for soil sustainability: Agrochemicals and Veterinary Pharmaceuticals in Brazil

“…Concerning Brazilian publications on soil ecotoxicology in Latin America, Niemeyer, Chelinho& Sousa(2017) presented that the largest number of the total scientific production contributions were originated in Brazil, which represents around 55%. Despite the good ranking worldwide on soil ecotoxicology publications, when it was add the word pesticide in the search, it came that Brazil is ranking the 8 th place with 69 documents of 1190 i.e., one third of China, which is the 1st on ranking, presenting 197 documents.…”

Environmental risk assessment of pesticides in tropical terrestrial ecosystems: Test procedures, current status and future perspectives

“…While in North America, Europe, and other countries like Japan and Australia, a well-established legal framework for pesticide environmental risk assessments exists, such requirements are either not available, unclear or inadequately implemented and applied in tropical countries (Albuquerque et al, 2016;Niemeyer et al, 2017;Niva et al, 2016). Therefore, the increase in pesticide use has not been properly followed with the development of studies and specific legislation to assess their environmental effects in tropical countries (Chelinho et al, 2012;Eijsackers et al, 2014;Oliveira et al, 2018).…”

“…For example, acephate and atrazine, which are banned in the European Union (EU), are the top 3 and 7 pesticides sold in Brazil, respectively (Bombardi, 2017). The risks of pesticide application to both humans (applicators and consumers) and the environment are often aggravated by the lack of https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoenv.2019.06.038 Received 16 March 2019; Received in revised form 3 June 2019; Accepted 14 June 2019 training of pesticide applicators (Niemeyer et al, 2017;Niva et al, 2016;Waichman et al, 2007). Subsequently, both soil and aquatic contamination with residues from pesticides is an increasing problem in the tropics (Carvalho, 2017).…”

The fungicide mancozeb affects soil invertebrates in two subtropical Brazilian soils

“…Chronical terrestrial ecotoxicity tests with earthworms and arthropods have been used to pesticide registration and commercialization in Europe (EC, 2009a) whereas in Latin American countries these studies are scarce or inexistent (Niemeyer et al, 2017) and in the current legislation pesticide risk to key in-soil fauna groups is not assessed. For instance, concerning soil invertebrates Brazil and Argentina performs the risk assessment of pesticides just based on lethality tests with earthworms (IBAMA, 1996;SENASA, 1995).…”