A review of Suspect and Non-target Screening of Agriculture-Related Organic Contaminants

Background

Production systems that aim to reduce waste and promote the reuse of materials contribute to more sustainable food systems. However, these approaches can also lead to the accumulation and recirculation of chemical hazards from organic waste to the soil and, ultimately, to food. To address these risks and assess the safety and effectiveness of waste reuse in agriculture, non-target screening (NTS) and suspect screening (SS) analytical methodologies are essential, as they enable the detection of chemical residues, pollutants, and unintended by-products in soil, crops, and compost.

Results

A literature review covering the period 2021–2025 was conducted to identify recent analytical advances and the application of SS and NTS strategies in food production systems. The review highlights key analytical challenges associated with traditional targeted analysis and explores the improvements achieved by SS and NTS approaches. Emphasis is placed on advancements in sample treatment (extraction and clean-up), instrumentation , and data processing and analysis tools. Furthermore, the review provides an overview of chemical hazards identified using SS and NTS methodologies within the context of agri-food systems.

Significance

The review highlights significant progress in the development of SS and NTS strategies for the identification of known and unknown hazardous chemicals. However, it also reveals a limited number of studies applying these approaches specifically within sustainable agriculture frameworks. Despite this gap, the potential of SS and NTS to support safer and more sustainable practices in agri-food systems suggests that their broader application could be of considerable interest to the scientific community in future research.