## 3 Results and Discussion
### Impacts of Intensive Management on Priority Management Areas  
An annual, systematic, and scientifically intensive survey of priority management areas was conducted using previous survey results, such as the LMO collection site type, type of crop, collection time, event name, and GIS database. A survey radius of 1 km for each priority management area was established around the LMO collection site, and suspected LMO samples and related plants were collected in the area. This strategy allows for the prompt post-management of LMO re-collection sites.  
The tendency of LMO discovery in each area was individually analyzed yearly to assess the impact of intensive management of LMO re-collection sites over eight years. A total of 198 priority management areas were assigned from 2014 to 2021, with 55 addresses in Gyeonggi-do (15), Gangwon-do (3), Chungcheong-do (13), Gyeongsang-do (10), Jeolla-do (10), and Jeju-do (4) (Figure 5). Of all the priority management areas between 2014 and 2021, no LMO was found at 21 addresses (Table S2). Repeated intensive surveys, LMO removal, and continuous post-management in the LMO re-collection areas have prevented the rediscovery of LMOs in natural ecosystems. The results of this study indicate the need for a novel priority management scheme for LMO re-collected areas. Moreover, the accumulated survey results regarding priority management can be leveraged to implement LMO safety management effectively in the natural environments of South Korea.  
\begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c c c c} \hline \hline
**Categories** & **2014** & **2015** & **2016** & **2017** & **2018** & **2019** & **2020** & **2021** & **Total** \\ \hline Roadside & 19 & 3 & 9 & 1 & 18 & 48 & 21 & 36 & 155 \\ Stockbreeding farm & 4 & 13 & 7 & 3 & 18 & 7 & 10 & 14 & 76 \\ Feed factory & 0 & 0 & 2 & 0 & 1 & 0 & 22 & 11 & 36 \\ Port & 0 & 0 & 2 & 1 & 2 & 1 & 0 & 1 & 7 \\ Other & 0 & 2 & 0 & 1 & 7 & 6 & 6 & 3 & 25 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table}
Table 2: Number of LMOs and their collection site category in priority management areas.  
Figure 5: Distribution of the priority management areas with 55 addresses in South Korea from 2014 to 2021. Information from supplementary Table S1 was reflected to show a location map of the priority management areas. The number indicates the priority management area assigned in six administrative districts; numbers 1–15 are in Gyeonggi-do (**a**), 16–18 in Gangwon-do (**b**), 19–31 in Chungcheong-do (**c**), 32–41 in Gyeongsang-do (**d**), 42–51 in Jeolla-do (**e**), and 52–55 in Jeju-do (**f**).  
Based on the study results, we suggested a novel priority management scheme that combined intensive LMO survey and post-management in LMO re-collected areas to supplement the nationwide monitoring project's weakness (Figure 2) [49]. The new priority management strategy is divided into four steps: (1) intensive survey and sampling, (2) detection and analysis, (3) revisit and survey, and (4) post-management. If repetitive spills of LMOs into the same environments occur during transportation and use, the MOE and the NIE change the nationwide monitoring process to the priority management scheme. Therefore, the new scheme has been introduced to forestall the putative risk of the LMO re-collected environments since 2014. Finally, the priority management results can be used to improve the following biosafety policy of the MOE to manage the hardened LMO spillage sites in South Korea's natural ecosystem.