Trait-based food web analysis

EFSA has received two mandates from the European Commission for the revision of the terrestrial ecotoxicology guidance document and development of an approach for the assessment of indirect effects. In this context, EFSA should support risk managers in setting Specific Protection Goals (SPGs). EFSA has identified four different lines of evidence (LoE) which should serve this purpose[1]. One of those lines of evidence concerns the building of ecological networks based on trophic interactions (i.e. food webs) to holistically explore propagation of direct effects into indirect ones. This call is intended to seek support for this specific topic. The activity will draw from previous data collections related to control plots in field studies with non-target arthropods, earthworms, and soil mesofauna as well as from vegetation surveys in arable lands. Such data include information in terms of species presence, abundance, and biomass. Furthermore, specific trait information (body size, feeding preference, habitat/stratum use, level of specialisation and dispersibility) from existing databases or public literature will be considered. Objectives: Objective 1: implementing the construction of ecologically meaningful networks, or food webs representing different EU agroecosystems (regulatory zones, crop type). Objective 2: selecting and applying appropriate metrics, to assess the background variability range of the constructed networks. Objective 3: investigating- by means of simulations - the effect of different perturbations to food networks by incrementally manipulating energy flows. This should allow evaluating holistically the indirect effect caused by certain magnitude of direct effects, thereby potentially identifying thresholds at which networks deviate from their background state due to external pressures. Selection criteria: The tenderer overall must have the ability to provide an individual or a team with extensive and demonstrable experience in the area of community ecology and/or ecotoxicology, traits-based approaches, and network analysis. Evidence requested: A list of three (3) major projects or publications related to the above-mentioned area of research carried out over the course of the past 10 years. All team members must have an excellent level of spoken and written English. For non-native speakers, this should be demonstrated by an official certificate of English proving a B2 level or at least 3 years of work or study in an English-speaking environment or by proof of (co)authorship of 7 scientific publications and/or reports in English language.