AgriAs project on arsenic contamination concluded

The European AgriAs project investigated the presence of arsenic in European agricultural soils and water, the most significant exposure pathways for the European population, and strategies for sustainable arsenic management. The final project workshop was held in Oulanka, a town in Finnish Lapland, where all the project partners gathered from Germany, France, Sweden, Netherlands and different parts of Finland.

Toxic arsenic (compounds) in the soil and water present health risks worldwide for 220 million people. The European AgriAs project aimed to acquire reliable data about the presence of and exposure to arsenic (As), and to develop tools to address the problem. The coordinator of AgriAs was the Geological Survey of Finland. The project partners were KTH (Sweden), University of Oulu (Finland), G.E.O.S. (Germany), LEB (France), BRGM (France) and KWR (the Netherlands). KTH and KWR worked together within AgriAs to develop and test effective, innovative methods to purify water and remediate the soil.

The knowledge about arsenic removal delivered by AgriAs can also be used in Watershare. For instance, in Argentina, groundwater naturally contains high concentrations of arsenic, and Watershare members KWR and AySA have already conducted a feasibility study into cost-effective arsenic removal from groundwater in Buenos Aires.