Determination of Triazole Pesticides in the Surface Water of the Medjerda River, Tunisia

Abstract

Water is an essential part of daily life for every human and a source of wealth. The Medjerda River is the most important river and the largest water resource in Tunisia. It is used as a potable water supply and for agriculture as well as an important aquatic life place. The objective of this work is to investigate the distribution of fifteen triazole pesticides in water samples collected from the Medjerda River. The extraction of water samples was performed by liquid–liquid extraction with ethyl ether. Gas chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry (GC-MS) was used to perform the qualitative and quantitative determinations. The average concentrations of triazole pesticides were 1.47 and 24.27 ng L⁻¹. For triticonazole the concentrations ranged between 0.05 and 6.80 ng L⁻¹. The predominant triazole pesticides in the surface water were tebuconazole (0.19 to 8.04 ng L⁻¹) and fluquinconazole (0.97 to 6.96 ng L⁻¹). The levels of triazole pesticides investigated in this study pose no threat to humans and the aquatic environment. These concentrations are generally similar to the background levels from the Mediterranean Sea.

Keywords:

• Distribution
• gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS)
• Medjerda River
• triazole pesticides
• water

Acknowledgments

Special thanks were given to anonymous reviewers for their useful suggestions and comments.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Tunisia.