EU Pollinator Hub

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Dataset report
Unique identifier: PLLNR314.0.0
Title: PollinERA pesticide residues
Long title: PollinERA pesticide residue concentrations in environmental matrices (SLU)
Status: Quality Validated with Peer Review
Current Version: v. 1.0
Published: 2026-08-17
Reviewed by:
Citation proposal:
EU Pollinator Hub, PollinERA: Understanding pesticide-Pollinator interactions to support ERA and policy 2026 Report of dataset PollinERA pesticide residues, v. 1.0 [PLLNR314.0.0]. EU Pollinator Hub. [2026-10-22] app.pollinatorhub.eu
Compliance with FAIR* principles
Findable
Accessible
Interoperable
Reusable
See https://www.go-fair.org/fair-principles for more information about FAIR principles
Data Quality
Under evaluation

Document history

Release

Version v. 1.0 released on 2026-08-17.

Revision

Table 1. List of revisions made to the document. Identifier of revision (No); date of revision (Date); description of revision (Description); reason for revision (Reason).
No Date Description Reason
1 2026-08-17 00:08:00 Initial release. n/a

Abbreviations

No abbreviations.

Executive summary

Data overview:

Residue concentrations per compound, sampling site, round and matrix, with limit of detection and CAS registry identifiers.

Data value:

Pesticide residue measurements that are directly comparable across three European countries, collected under a single harmonised sampling design and analysed by one laboratory. Because the sampling sites and rounds are shared with the PollinERA pollinator monitoring activities, the data support the joint analysis of chemical exposure and pollinator response, which is rarely possible with residue datasets assembled from heterogeneous sources.

Data description:

One record per compound and sample. Concentrations are reported in the unit given by the measurement unit column, together with the limit of detection of the analytical method.

Data application:

Suitable for pollinator exposure assessment, environmental risk assessment of plant protection products, parameterisation and validation of toxicokinetic-toxicodynamic (TKTD) models, spatial and temporal comparison of residue profiles between countries and matrices, and meta-analyses combining chemical and ecological monitoring data.

Unresolved issues:

Known limitations of this dataset. (1) 432 CAS Registry numbers arrived corrupted by spreadsheet date auto-conversion and were reconstructed before publication; the reconstruction is verified by the CAS check digit and by the compound names in the source file, but the corrected identifiers should be confirmed by the data owner. (2) No sampling coordinates and no taxon identifiers are included: this is a chemical residues table, so the PMS descriptors for coordinates and gbifTaxonID do not apply to it. (3) The metadata sheet of the source workbook documents a column ID (pms:ppdbID) that is not present in the data sheet, and the data sheet contains a column n that is not documented in the metadata sheet. (4) Concentrations below the limit of detection are recorded as empty values, not as zeros.

Introduction

This dataset reports pesticide residue concentrations measured in environmental matrices collected within the PollinERA project (Horizon Europe). Chemical analyses were performed by the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). The dataset links measured residue levels to the sampling sites, rounds and matrices of the PollinERA pollinator co-monitoring scheme, so that chemical exposure can be related to pollinator observations collected under the same design.

Material and methods

Data acquisition

Samples were collected in 2024 at PollinERA sites in Italy (ITA), Poland (POL) and Sweden (SWE), across two sampling rounds per site. Nine matrix types are represented, identified by the codes AN, AP, BF, HF, MT, PS, SS, WB and WS. Sampling followed the M11 protocol for pesticide and pollinator co-monitoring. Residue quantification was carried out by SLU using two analytical methods: liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC/MSMS) and gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC/MS). Each record carries the limit of detection (LOD) of the method applied and states whether the concentration was determined on dry or fresh matter.

Table 2. List of raw data and metadata files included in the dataset. Identifier of table row (No); name of the file (File); the type of the file (Type); file contains data (D); file contains metadata (M); date of upload of the file to the EU Pollinator Hub (Arrival); number of data points contained within the file (if applicable); uploaded file size.
No File Type D M Arrival Data points File size

Data preparation

The source workbook was processed with the PollinERA QA/QC module before publication. Two corrections were applied to the data. First, 432 CAS Registry numbers had been silently auto-converted into dates by a spreadsheet application and were stored as date serial numbers; the original identifiers were reconstructed from the date components and independently confirmed by their CAS check digit and by the compound names recorded in the file: dodine (CAS 2439-10-3, 252 records) and picloram (CAS 1918-02-1, 180 records). Second, one Concentration cell containing only whitespace was normalised to an empty value. Column headers were then mapped to PMS and Darwin Core descriptors, using the descriptor assignments documented in the metadata sheet of the source workbook.

Data validation

Validated with the PollinERA QA/QC module. 432 CAS registry numbers that had been auto-converted to dates by a spreadsheet were reconstructed and verified with the CAS check digit before publication.

Data analysis

The dataset contains measured values only; no aggregated statistics or derived exposure metrics are included. Each record reports a single compound measured in a single sample, together with the limit of detection of the analytical method. Values below the limit of detection are represented as empty concentration cells rather than as zeros, so non-detections must be handled explicitly and interpreted against the LOD column rather than treated as absence of the compound.

Data description

Dataset

Table 3. Summary of tables belonging to the dataset. Table row identifier (No); name of the table (Table); description of the table (Description).
No Table Description
1 PollinERA_database_residues_SL Safeguard PollinERA_database_residues_SLU_v20260701_CAS_corrected__data_pollinatorhub_ready
Table 4. Standardised metadata of the dataset. Reported parameter (Parameter); content of the parameter (Content).
Parameter Content
Unique identifier PLLNR314.0.0
Title PollinERA pesticide residues
Long title PollinERA pesticide residue concentrations in environmental matrices (SLU)
Target IRI https://app.pollinatorhub.eu/dataset-discovery/PLLNR314.0.0
Licence CC BY 4.0
DOI n/a
Created 2026-08-14
Published 2026-08-17
Contact maj.rundlof@biol.lu.se
Keywords Pesticide residues, butterflies, hoverflies, moths, pesticides, soil, water, wild bees
Data collection years n/a
Regions, the data was collected in Danmark, Italia, Polska
Abstract

Pesticide residue concentrations measured by the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in environmental matrices collected within the PollinERA project.

Table 5. Standardised metadata of the data provider EU Pollinator Hub. Reported parameter (Parameter); content of the parameter (Content).
Parameter Content
Name EU Pollinator Hub
Url
Acronym EUPH
IRI https://app.pollinatorhub.eu/data-providers/euph
Address
Country Belgium
Contact https://www.linkedin.com/company/beelife-european-beekeeping-coordination/ pollinatorhub.eu
Description

The EU Pollinator Hub (EUPH) is a data hub related to pollinators, which is provided by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

Table 6. Standardised metadata of the data provider PollinERA: Understanding pesticide-Pollinator interactions to support ERA and policy. Reported parameter (Parameter); content of the parameter (Content).
Parameter Content
Name PollinERA: Understanding pesticide-Pollinator interactions to support ERA and policy
Url
Acronym PollinERA
IRI https://app.pollinatorhub.eu/data-providers/pollinera-understanding-pesticide-pollinator-interactions-to-support-era-and-policy
Address
Country Denmark
Contact n/a
Description

This project aims to develop a population-level systems-based approach to risk and policy assessment considering multiple stressors and long-term spatiotemporal dynamics at a landscape scale and generate an open-database for pollinator/pesticide data and tools.

Recently, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) highlighted the need for a systems-based approach to the environmental risk assessment (ERA) of honey bees. EFSA’s innovative strategy emphasises the need for a realistic approach to understanding the system-level effects of pesticides on honey bees. Subsequently, this idea has been extended to environmental risk assessment in general and insect pollinators specifically, with the launch of EFSA’s IPol-ERA project to create a roadmap to systems ERA for pollinators. The crux of the systems approach is to move the RA from a laboratory-based study to one considering the ecological system and spatial and temporal scales over which pesticide exposure and effects occur. The systems approach combines an improved understanding of plant protection products' (PPP) interactive, chronic and sublethal effects on pollinators (i.e., wild and domestic bees, butterflies, moths, and hoverflies) with their ecology, behaviour, and landscape context. It opens the way towars more environmentally friendly schedules of pesticide use across the EU by avoiding the combined use of chemicals for which significant synergistic effects on pollinators are found.

Moving towards a systems-based ERA poses challenges. The PollinERA project addresses these challenges by specific objectives aiming to:

  • Fill ecotoxicological data gaps to enable realistic prediction of the source and routes of exposure and impact of pesticides on pollinators and their sensitivity to individual pesticides and mixtures.
  • Develop and test a co-monitoring scheme for pesticides and pollinators across European cropping systems and landscapes, developing risk indicators and mixture exposure information
  • Develop models for predicting pesticide toxicological effects on pollinators for chemicals and organisms, improve toxicokinetic/toxicodynamic (TKTD) and population models, and predict environmental fate.
  • Develop a population-level systems-based approach to risk and policy assessment considering multiple stressors and long-term spatiotemporal dynamics at a landscape scale and generate an open-database for pollinator/pesticide data and tools.

PollinERA will build upon the EFSA roadmaps (PERA and IPol-ERA), and ApisRAM, to implement a first systems-based set of tools for pollinator ERA beyond honey bees. Extending the landscape simulation developed in H2020 EcoStack, PoshBee and B-GOOD, it will integrate with activities in PARC 6.4.4, which aims to implement short-term improvements within the current PPP ERA framework through knowledge from modelling and monitoring. Combining in silico models for predicting toxicological effects with agent-based population models and highly detailed landscape simulation will, for the first time, provide a set of tools to tackle multiple stressors in ERA and test management strategies to reduce pesticide use and reverse the pollinator decline.

SESS coordinates this exciting HE project with a consortium comprised of 11 partners spanning 8 European countries; Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Bulgaria and Slovenia.

Tables

PollinERA_database_residues_SL

Table 7. Standardised metadata of the dataset. Reported parameter (Parameter); content of the parameter (Content).
Parameter Content
Unique identifier PLLNR314.PLLNR877.0
Name PollinERA_database_residues_SL
Target IRI https://app.pollinatorhub.eu/dataset-discovery/parts/PLLNR314.PLLNR877.0
Table Type Streaming/API
Licence CC BY 4.0
Description

Safeguard PollinERA_database_residues_SLU_v20260701_CAS_corrected__data_pollinatorhub_ready

Safeguard PollinERA_database_residues_SLU_v20260701_CAS_corrected__data_pollinatorhub_ready

Metadata

n/a
Table 8. Structural analysis of the table. Column name (Name); concise description of the column (Description); data type in which values are stored (Data type); EUPH-Descriptor (Descriptor); unit in which the values are provided (Unit).
Column Name Column Description Datatype Descriptor Unit

Metadata of individual tables can be found in Annex 1.

Descriptive measures

Table 9. Content analysis of the table. Column name (Name); range of length of characters (Length); arithmetic mean of values in column (Mean); lowest value in column (Min); first quartile of values in column (Q1); median of values in column (Median); third quartile of values in column (Q3); highest value in column (Max); number of records (Total); number and percentage (between brackets) of all values containing NULL (Missing), the value 0 (Zero), exclusively blank characters (Blank), and of distinct values including NULL, Zero and blank (Distinct).
Column Name Range Mean Minimum Q1 Median Q3 Maximum Total Missing Zero Blank Distinct

Quality measures

Table 10. Quality analysis of the table. Column name (Name); completeness of the column (Completeness); uniqueness of the column (Uniqueness); most common value in the column (Most Common Value); least common value in the column (Least Common Value).
Column Name Completeness Uniqueness Most Common Value Least Common Value

Changes made to preparatory file

N/A

Changes made to data

N/A

Unresolved issues

Missing the integration of latituted and longitude data in the dataset. Missing the integration of TaxID, representing the taxonomic taxon of the species that are related to the data. In the current case study, water and soil samples do not have a taxonID

References

  1. Anonymous Darwin Core. (En) TDWG. [2026-8-15] dwc.tdwg.org
  2. Anonymous Limit of Detection (NCIT_C120691). (En) NCI Thesaurus. [2026-8-15] purl.obolibrary.org
  3. Anonymous Pesticide analysis method vocabulary. (En) EU Pollinator Hub. [2026-8-15] app.pollinatorhub.eu
  4. Anonymous Pesticide type vocabulary. (En) EU Pollinator Hub. [2026-8-15] app.pollinatorhub.eu

Annex 1: Table column reports

Table: PollinERA_database_residues_SL