Bioindicator Systems

Many industrialized and developing countries are faced with the assessment of potential risks associated with air, water or soil pollution. To support decisions on the management of polluted sites, information is needed on the extent to which pollution adversely affects the local ecosystem. A bioindicator system is a tool to extract biological information from an ecosystem and to use that information for making scientifically based management decisions. This work provides a summary of systems developed for water, air and soil. The emphasis is on systems at the individual, population and community levels (presence of species, functional groups, taxonomic diversity and stability of food webs).