Use of Carabids for the Post-Market Environmental Monitoring of the Genetically Modified Crops
The publication describes use of carabids as a surrogate for the detection of unintended environmental effects of GM crops during the general post-market environmental monitoring (PMEM). The surveillance is required by EU legislation and aims to identify risks that did not become evident during the pre-market risk assessment.
Carabids play an important role in agroecosystems by contributing to the control of a wide variety of weed seeds and pest insects. Their abundance and diverse environmental requirements make them suitable bioindicators of the environmental impacts of agricultural practices. The aim of our work was to evaluate possible use of carabids as bioindicators for PMEM.
We compared three different models of the evaluation of carabid populations in the maize fields in five locations. The most appropriate model allows omission of the least abundant species and requires inclusion of 10 – 20 most abundant species. Evaluation of the carabid populations in respect to the ecological functions of species allows comparison of diverse species with similar functions in different localities. We also found that with sufficiently large data sets (collections performed at least four times during the season) it is possible to compare the significance of data from different years. The phenology of crop is not important for data collection. The geographically closest localities are best suited for the comparisons.
Our modeling shows that functional classification of a group of the most numerous species is appropriate for the PMEM analysis. Application of the proposed model to the evaluation of other data sets will verify validity of specific recommendations (minimal number of collections, species diversity and abundance, etc.).
Skoková Habuštová O., Svobodová Z., Cagáň Ľ., Sehnal F. (2017) Use of carabids for the post-market environmental monitoring of genetically modified crops. Toxins 9: 121.
