Documents

Over the years, the JRC has produced many publications. These are found in this section. They have been sub-divided in various categories (see Subcategory buttons below). All more than 550 documents can also be inspected irrespective of the category (see 'All documents' below).

Publications in Journals include more than 390 published papers from the Soil Group in the JRC (EU Soil Observatory). Most of the papers refer to the last 10 years (2013-2023). In many cases the papers document the datasets published in ESDAC.

As example statistics, Since the establishement of the EUSO,  the group published:

  • 23 papers in 2020,
  • 27 papers in 2021
  • 40 papers in 2022
  • 46 papers in 2023

Most of them in high impact journals including Nature Communicaitons, Climate Change, Global Change Biology, etc. Almost all the publications are Open Access. As publications, we present articles published in peer-review journals indexed in Scopus or Web of Science.

 

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EUSO Annual Bulletin - 2022
EUSO Annual Bulletin - 2022
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Scientific-Technical Reports
Year: 2023
Publisher: Publications Office of European Union
Attachments: PDF icon JRC133346.pdf

This report presents the activities of the EU Soil Observatory (EUSO) that took place during 2021. Through its five main objectives, the EUSO contributes to improving the monitoring of soils, to creating and sharing knowledge and data about EU soils, in particular producing tailored outputs in support of policy development and to the wider public. These activities feed into the overarching knowledge management objective under which the EUSO provided extensive policy support to a range of policy areas, notably the upcoming Soil Health Law and the Horizon Europe’s Soil Mission.

A key element of the EU Soil Observatory are the six EUSO Working Groups (WG) that aim to discuss policy or technical advances on a particular topic. Their activities in 2022 were diverse and ranged from providing policy support (Soil Monitoring, Soil Pollution WGs), technical progress on integration of soil data (Soil Data WG) or advancing scientific knowledge about soils (Soil Erosion WG).

This report also highlights the developments to be expected in 2023. In particular, the EUSO will produce reports on soil pollution, soil organic carbon trends, pesticides in soils, land degradation and a soil fertility index and work on the state of soil health in the EU. A key development will be the publication of the EUSO soil health dashboard. The EUSO will support dedicated Soil Mission research projects and will continue to provide support for the upcoming Soil Health Law proposal. The EUSO is also planning a 2023 EU Soil Week.

Link: https://esdac.jrc.ec.europa.eu/public_path//shared_folder/doc_pub/JRC133346.pdf

Pesticides residues in European agricultural soils
Pesticides residues in European agricultural soils
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Scientific-Technical Reports
Year: 2023
In the past 20 years, the use of pesticides in agricultural lands have been target of several European Union (EU) regulations. More recently, and in line with several EU sustainability goals, the use of pesticides has been targeted by relevant policy ambitions aiming to reduce their use and risk following health and environmental concerns. Nonetheless, the current knowledge on soil contamination by pesticides residues is limited, due to a lack of systematic soil monitoring studies addressing soil pollution, especially at EU scale.
 
To fulfil this knowledge gap, the EU Soil Observatory led a study targeting residues of active ingredients of pesticides used as crop protection products in soil samples collected from the 2018 LUCAS survey. This is the largest study providing a comprehensive characterisation on the extent of residues of active ingredients from pesticides in the soils of the EU. This work establishes an initial EU baseline, and project a future assessment of the effectiveness of EU policies and regulations targeting pesticides use and soil pollution. Moreover, this study provides the first steps on the development of risk indicators for soil, allowing to present the first temporal assessment of pesticides in EU soils following a pilot study with samples from 2015 LUCAS survey.
 
This study highlights that pesticide residues in soils are widespread in the European agricultural land (74.5% sites), whereas most of the sites (57.1%) present mixtures of substances (two or more). Additionally, an indicator of the ecotoxicological impact for soil organisms was developed. This indicator compared the concentration of these substances with the no effect concentration (NOEC)
for soil organisms, identifying areas at higher risk (1.7% sites). But also, allowed to estimate an increase in ecotoxicological risk when compared with a previous assessment (2015-2018). Finally, among the substances found was also possible to identify banned and non-approved substances in soils (12%), according to the 2018 regulations (Regulation 1107/2009),The current study brought by the EU Soil Observatory and LUCAS 2018 soil module provides a significant contribution to the status of current knowledge on soil pollution in the EU. The insights provided in this report may help identifying target policies in creating a toxic-free environment.
 
Go to the report.
Patterns in soil microbial diversity across Europe
Patterns in soil microbial diversity across Europe
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Factors driving microbial community composition and diversity are well established but the relationship with microbial functioning is poorly understood, especially at large scales. We analysed microbial biodiversity metrics and distribution of potential functional groups along a gradient of increasing land-use perturbation, detecting over 79,000 bacterial and 25,000 fungal OTUs in 715 sites across 24 European countries. We found the lowest bacterial and fungal diversity in less-disturbed environments (woodlands) compared to grasslands and highly-disturbed environments (croplands). Highly-disturbed environments contain significantly more bacterial chemoheterotrophs, harbour a higher proportion of fungal plant pathogens and saprotrophs, and have less beneficial fungal plant symbionts compared to woodlands and extensively-managed grasslands. Spatial patterns of microbial communities and predicted functions are best explained when interactions among the major determinants (vegetation cover, climate, soil properties) are considered. We propose guidelines for environmental policy actions and argue that taxonomical and functional diversity should be considered simultaneously for monitoring purposes.

Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-37937-4

Projected landscape-scale repercussions of global action for climate and biodiversity protection
Projected landscape-scale repercussions of global action for climate and biodiversity protection
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Land conservation and increased carbon uptake on land are fundamental to achieving the ambitious targets of the climate and biodiversity conventions. Yet, it remains largely unknown how such ambitions, along with an increasing demand for agricultural products, could drive landscape-scale changes and affect other key regulating nature’s contributions to people (NCP) that sustain land productivity outside conservation priority areas. By using an integrated, globally consistent modelling approach, we show that ambitious carbon-focused land restoration action and the enlargement of protected areas alone may be insufficient to reverse negative trends in landscape heterogeneity, pollination supply, and soil loss. However, we also find that these actions could be combined with dedicated interventions that support critical NCP and biodiversity conservation outside of protected areas. In particular, our models indicate that conserving at least 20% semi-natural habitat within farmed landscapes could primarily be achieved by spatially relocating cropland outside conservation priority areas, without additional carbon losses from land-use change, primary land conversion or reductions in agricultural productivity.
 

 

Soil biodiversity needs policy without borders
Soil biodiversity needs policy without borders
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Soil biodiversity is crucial for healthy soils, on which we all depend for food, human health, aboveground biodiversity, and climate control. It is well known that land use intensification, climate change, environmental pollution, and mining activities degrade soil biodiversity. However, most current and intended policies on soil protection not only lack a holistic view on how biological, physical, and chemical components of soil health are integrated but also overlook how soils across national borders and continents are connected by human activities. The challenge is to use recent advancements in understanding the distribution and functional roles of soil biodiversity in developing policy on restoring and protecting soil health across borders. Thus, policy should focus not only on soils within a nation or union of nations but also on preventing negative footprints on each other’s soils.
 
Numerous factors—such as urbanization, automation, disease outbreaks, natural disasters, and even wars—influence how land is used, which affects the capacity of soils to perform multiple functions, also called soil health (1). Searching for sustainable land use while providing food and feed for a more demanding population and dealing with growing demands on land for multiple other functions requires insights into the many factors that influence land use. Often, land use options are considered trade-offs, and the challenge is to search for win-win options, for example, climate change mitigation by biodiversity restoration. A transdisciplinary approach may help to understand possibilities and trade-offs to achieve a more sustainable society (2). Although an awareness that healthy soils are the basis of a healthy society is growing, anchoring this view into policy is still a challenge.
 
Soil protection requires an integrated legal framework to address the multitude of processes that are involved in land degradation, but most existing soil laws that should protect soils now focus on single issues, such as desertification or soil contamination. Moreover, soil protection laws are mostly national (3), although soil protection does not stop at national frontiers. For instance, current climate change caused by poor land use and industrialization outside sub-Arctic regions causes melting of the permafrost, which in turn exacerbates climate change through the release of carbon dioxide and methane to the atmosphere.
 
Although it is widely acknowledged that plants, birds, butterflies, and many other animal species need to be protected, little explicit attention exists for protecting soil biodiversity (4). The European Union (EU) Soil Strategy for 2030 (5) has been set up to combat declining soil health in Europe and beyond. The ambition is to have healthy soils in the entirety of Europe by 2050. An important aspect of this ambition is that the EU is planning to propose a binding European Soil Health Law in 2023. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first and most inclusive soil health protection law that recognizes the ecosystem services provided by healthy soils and the need to protect those services for future generations. Proposing a soil health law is an important step toward a sustainable society; however, the real challenge is to make it work.
To make the EU’s Soil Health Law operational, soil health needs to be measurable. Different from soil quality, which is largely chemical in focus and mostly used to characterize the status of soil to sustain crop productivity, soil health is a more holistic concept (6). It is based on the recognition of the ecosystem services that soils provide. As defined in the EU soil strategy, soils are healthy when they are in good chemical, biological, and physical condition and are able to continuously provide as many of the ecosystem services as possible. Soil health addresses the sustainability goals set by the United Nations (UN), which have been adopted by many countries. However, finding effective, easy-to-measure indicators for soil health is challenging, because there is no one-size-fits-all indicator for all circumstances, just as in the case of soil quality (7).
 
 
Policy implications of multiple concurrent soil erosion processes in European farmland
Policy implications of multiple concurrent soil erosion processes in European farmland
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Soil erosion is a serious threat to soil functions leading to land productivity decline and multiple off-site effects. Here we show, using a multi-model approach, the spatial risk of soil erosion by water, wind, tillage and harvesting and where the co-occurrence of these different processes is observed. Moreover, we analysed where these locations of multiple erosion co-occurrence are likely to intersect with the projected increase of dry/wet climate conditions. Of the ~110 million hectares (M ha) of arable land in the European Union, our estimates show that 43 M ha are vulnerable to a single driver of erosion, 15.6 M ha to two drivers and 0.81 M ha to three or more drivers. About 3.2 M ha of arable land are vulnerable to the possible interaction of increased flood, drought, water and wind erosion. We contend that this set of predictions serves as a basis for developing an efficient stratified monitoring network and informing targeted mitigation strategies under the Common Agricultural Policy 2023–2027. The road to the sustainable, carbon-neutral and biodiversity-friendly system of agriculture advocated for in the EU Green Deal goes through a thematic strategy for soil protection from multiple concurrent erosion processes.
 
Publisher Correction: Patterns in soil microbial diversity across Europe
Publisher Correction: Patterns in soil microbial diversity across Europe
Resource Type: Publications in Journals, Documents, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

The original version of this Article contained an error in Fig. 1a, in which part of the ‘LUCAS Vegetation cover’ legend was omitted. This has now been corrected in the PDF and HTML versions of the Article.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-39596-x

 The overlooked threat of land take from wind energy infrastructures: Quantification, drivers and policy gaps
The overlooked threat of land take from wind energy infrastructures: Quantification, drivers and policy gaps
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Wind harnessing is a fast-developing and cost-effective Renewable Energy Source, but the land impacts of wind power stations are often overlooked or underestimated. We digitized land take, i.e., the generation of artificial land, derived from 90 wind power stations in Greece constructed between 2002 and 2020 (1.2 GW). We found substantial land take impacts of 7729 m2/MW (3.5 m2/MWh) of new artificial land, 148 m/MW of new roads and 174 m/MW of widened roads on average. Models showed that the number and size of wind turbines, the absence of other existing infrastructures and the elevational difference across new access roads increased artificial land generation. The elevational difference across new and widened access roads also increased their length. New wind power stations in Greece are planned to be installed at higher elevations and in terrains facing higher risks for soil erosion and soil biodiversity. The general tendency in the European Union is to sit fewer wind power stations in mountainous and forested land. Still, this pattern is inversed in several countries, particularly in Southern Europe. After screening 29 policy and legal documents, we found that land take is indirectly inferred in the global policy but more directly in the European policy through five non-legally binding documents and three Directives. However, the current European energy policies seem to conflict with nature conservation policies, risking land take acceleration. The study provides insights for reducing land take when planning and constructing wind power stations. We underline the need for better quantification of land take and its integration in the complex process of sustainable spatial planning of investments.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030147972302128X?via%3Dihub

Towards a better understanding of pathways of multiple co-occurring erosion processes on global cropland
Towards a better understanding of pathways of multiple co-occurring erosion processes on global cropland
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Soil erosion is a complex process involving multiple natural and anthropic agents, causing the deterioration of multiple components comprising soil health. Here, we provide an estimate of the spatial patterns of cropland susceptibility to erosion by sheet and rill, gully, wind, tillage, and root crops harvesting and report the co-occurrence of these processes using a multi-model approach. In addition, to give a global overview of potential future changes, we identify the locations where these multiple concurrent soil erosion processes may be expected to intersect with projected dry/wet climate changes by 2070. Of a modelled 1.48 billion hectares (B ha) of global cropland, our results indicate that 0.56 B ha (∼36% of the total area) are highly susceptible (classes 4 and 5) to a single erosion process, 0.27 B ha (∼18% of the total area) to two processes and 0.02 B ha (1.4% of the total area) to three or more processes. An estimated 0.82 B ha of croplands are susceptible to possible increases in water (0.68 B ha) and wind (0.14 B ha) erosion. We contend that the presented set of estimates represents a basis for enhancing our foundational knowledge on the geography of soil erosion at the global scale. The generated insight on multiple erosion processes can be a useful starting point for decision-makers working with ex-post and ex-ante policy evaluation of the UN Sustainable Development Goal 15 (Life on Land) activities. Scientifically, this work provides the hitherto most comprehensive assessment of soil erosion risks at the global scale, based on state-of-the-art models.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S209563392300062X?via%3Dihub

EUSEDcollab: a network of data from European catchments to monitor net soil erosion by water
EUSEDcollab: a network of data from European catchments to monitor net soil erosion by water
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

As a network of researchers we release an open-access database (EUSEDcollab) of water discharge and suspended sediment yield time series records collected in small to medium sized catchments in Europe. EUSEDcollab is compiled to overcome the scarcity of open-access data at relevant spatial scales for studies on runoff, soil loss by water erosion and sediment delivery. Multi-source measurement data from numerous researchers and institutions were harmonised into a common time series and metadata structure. Data reuse is facilitated through accompanying metadata descriptors providing background technical information for each monitoring station setup. Across ten European countries, EUSEDcollab covers over 1600 catchment years of data from 245 catchments at event (11 catchments), daily (22 catchments) and monthly (212 catchments) temporal resolution, and is unique in its focus on small to medium catchment drainage areas (median = 43 km2, min = 0.04 km2, max = 817 km2) with applicability for soil erosion research. We release this database with the aim of uniting people, knowledge and data through the European Union Soil Observatory (EUSO).

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-023-02393-8

Let's give a voice to young soil researchers
Let's give a voice to young soil researchers
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Young soil researchers represent a generation that will respond to future soil challenges and implement connected policy developments. They will deal with emerging challenges and opportunities for soil protection, such as climate change, land use change, scenario analysis, big data, modelling integration, one health aspects, and soil living laboratories. In this context, the EU Soil Observatory (EUSO) provides an inclusive forum for participatory research in the EU and beyond. In 2021, at the first gathering of the EUSO Stakeholders Forum, young researchers were actively engaged through the establishment of the EU Young Soil Researchers Forum. This resulted in interesting presentations, discussions, and research outputs, which have been brought together in this virtual thematicissue. Similar support for young soil researchers is expected at the 2024 EUSO Stakeholders Forum.

https://bsssjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ejss.13441

Global rainfall erosivity database (GloREDa) and monthly R-factor data at 1 km spatial resolution
Global rainfall erosivity database (GloREDa) and monthly R-factor data at 1 km spatial resolution
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Here, we present and release the Global Rainfall Erosivity Database (GloREDa), a multi-source platform containing rainfall erosivity values for almost 4000 stations globally. The database was compiled through a global collaboration between a network of researchers, meteorological services and environmental organisations from 65 countries. GloREDa is the first open access database of rainfall erosivity (R-factor) based on hourly and sub-hourly rainfall records at a global scale. This database is now stored and accessible for download in the long-term European Soil Data Centre (ESDAC) repository of the European Commission's Joint Research Centre. This will ensure the further development of the database with insertions of new records, maintenance of the data and provision of a helpdesk.
 
In addition to the annual erosivity data, this release also includes the mean monthly erosivity data for 94% of the GloREDa stations. Based on these mean monthly R-factor values, we predict the global monthly erosivity datasets at 1 km resolution using the ensemble machine learning approach (ML) as implemented in the mlr package for R. The produced monthly raster data (GeoTIFF format) may be useful for soil erosion prediction modelling, sediment distribution analysis, climate change predictions, flood, and natural disaster assessments and can be valuable inputs for Land and Earth Systems modelling.
 
 Ecosystem type drives soil eukaryotic diversity and composition in Europe
Ecosystem type drives soil eukaryotic diversity and composition in Europe
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Soil eukaryotes play a crucial role in maintaining ecosystem functions and services, yet the factors driving their diversity and distribution remain poorly understood. While many studies focus on some eukaryotic groups (mostly fungi), they are limited in their spatial scale. Here, we analyzed an unprecedented amount of observational data of soil eukaryomes at continental scale (787 sites across Europe) to gain further insights into the impact of a wide range of environmental conditions (climatic and edaphic) on their community composition and structure. We found that the diversity of fungi, protists, rotifers, tardigrades, nematodes, arthropods, and annelids was predominantly shaped by ecosystem type (annual and permanent croplands, managed and unmanaged grasslands, coniferous and broadleaved woodlands), and higher diversity of fungi, protists, nematodes, arthropods, and annelids was observed in croplands than in less intensively managed systems, such as coniferous and broadleaved woodlands. Also in croplands, we found more specialized eukaryotes, while the composition between croplands was more homogeneous compared to the composition of other ecosystems. The observed high proportion of overlapping taxa between ecosystems also indicates that DNA has accumulated from previous land uses, hence mimicking the land transformations occurring in Europe in the last decades. This strong ecosystem-type influence was linked to soil properties, and particularly, soil pH was driving the richness of fungi, rotifers, and annelids, while plant-available phosphorus drove the richness of protists, tardigrades, and nematodes. Furthermore, the soil organic carbon to total nitrogen ratio crucially explained the richness of fungi, protists, nematodes, and arthropods, possibly linked to decades of agricultural inputs. Our results highlighted the importance of long-term environmental variables rather than variables measured at the time of the sampling in shaping soil eukaryotic communities, which reinforces the need to include those variables in addition to ecosystem type in future monitoring programs and conservation efforts.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gcb.16871

Spatial assessment of topsoil zinc concentrations in Europe
Spatial assessment of topsoil zinc concentrations in Europe
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Zinc (Zn) is essential to sustain crop production and human health, while it can be toxic when present in excess. In this manuscript, we applied a machine learning model on 21,682 soil samples from the Land Use and Coverage Area frame Survey (LUCAS) topsoil database of 2009/2012 to assess the spatial distribution in Europe of topsoil Zn concentrations measured by aqua regia extraction, and to identify the influence of natural drivers and anthropogenic sources on topsoil Zn concentrations. As a result, a map was produced showing topsoil Zn concentrations in Europe at a resolution of 250 m. The mean predicted Zn concentration in Europe was 41 mg kg−1, with a root mean squared error of around 40 mg kg−1 calculated for independent soil samples. We identified clay content as the most important factor explaining the overall distribution of soil Zn in Europe, with lower Zn concentrations in coarser soils. Next to texture, low Zn concentrations were found in soils with low pH (e.g. Podzols), as well as in soils with pH above 8 (i.e., Calcisols). The presence of deposits and mining activities mainly explained the occurrence of relatively high Zn concentrations above 167 mg kg−1 (the one percentile highest concentrations) within 10 km from these sites. In addition, the relatively higher Zn levels found in grasslands in regions with high livestock density may point to manure as a significant source of Zn in these soils.
 
The map developed in this study can be used as a reference to assess the eco-toxicological risks associated with soil Zn concentrations in Europe and areas with Zn deficiency. In addition, it can provide a baseline for future policies in the context of pollution, soil health, human health, and crop nutrition.
 
 

 

Forty years of soil research funded by the European Commission: Trends and future
Forty years of soil research funded by the European Commission: Trends and future
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

The European Green Deal with its high ambition has set the European Union (EU) on a promising path towards greater soil protection. The EU Soil Strategy 2030, the Biodiversity Strategy 2030, the Farm to Fork Strategy, the Zero Pollution, the Nature Restoration Law and the European Climate Law, among others, include actions to protect our soils. Research and Innovation (R&I) will play a key role in developing new knowledge and tools enabling the transition to healthy soils. The main aim of this paper is to analyse past and near-future trends in EU's funding for R&I on soil-related issues. For this purpose, a review of EU-funded soil projects was conducted based on the data available in the Community Research and Development Information Service and the official portal for European data. Our analysis shows that over the past 40 years, the EU has invested significantly in developing integrated knowledge about the relationships between soil functions and ecosystem services and how human-induced pressures affect soil health. Following the adoption of the EU Soil Thematic Strategy in 2006, there was an increase in research funding for soil-related research. Furthermore, our analysis also illustrates an interesting interplay of permanent and changing soil themes. The Horizon Europe Mission ‘A Soil Deal for Europe’, which aims to establish a network of 100 living labs and lighthouses to lead the transition towards healthy soils and safeguard human and planetary health by 2030, provides a further incentive for soil research. Together with the EU Soil Strategy 2030 and the new proposal for a Directive on Soil Monitoring and Resilience (Soil Monitoring Law), and the EU Soil Observatory (EUSO), the three instruments set up the political framework, concrete measures, and a monitoring system needed for the protection, restoration and sustainable use of soils.

https://bsssjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ejss.13423

Call for joint international actions to improve scientific understanding and address soil erosion and riverine sediment issues in mountainous regions
Call for joint international actions to improve scientific understanding and address soil erosion and riverine sediment issues in mountainous regions
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

During the International Workshop on Soil Erosion and Riverine Sediment in Mountainous Regions held in November 2022, scientists from many countries shared their state-of-the-art knowledge and brainstormed to improve scientific understanding for coping with climate change and anthropogenic impacts. Information summarized in this discussion includes proposed key scientific questions and suggested joint actions to reduce soil erosion and riverine sediment problems in mountainous regions.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iswcr.2023.04.006

Retaining natural vegetation to safeguard biodiversity and humanity
Retaining natural vegetation to safeguard biodiversity and humanity
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Global efforts to deliver internationally agreed goals to reduce carbon emissions, halt biodiversity loss, and retain essential ecosystem services have been poorly integrated. These goals rely in part on preserving natural (e.g., native, largely unmodified) and seminatural (e.g., low intensity or sustainable human use) forests, woodlands, and grasslands. To show how to unify these goals, we empirically derived spatially explicit, quantitative, area-based targets for the retention of natural and seminatural (e.g., native) terrestrial vegetation worldwide. We used a 250-m-resolution map of natural and seminatural vegetation cover and, from this, selected areas identified under different international agreements as being important for achieving global biodiversity, carbon, soil, and water targets. At least 67 million km2 of Earth's terrestrial vegetation (∼79% of the area of vegetation remaining) required retention to contribute to biodiversity, climate, soil, and freshwater conservation objectives under 4 United Nations’ resolutions. This equates to retaining natural and seminatural vegetation across at least 50% of the total terrestrial (excluding Antarctica) surface of Earth. Retention efforts could contribute to multiple goals simultaneously, especially where natural and seminatural vegetation can be managed to achieve cobenefits for biodiversity, carbon storage, and ecosystem service provision. Such management can and should co-occur and be driven by people who live in and rely on places where natural and sustainably managed vegetation remains in situ and must be complemented by restoration and appropriate management of more human-modified environments if global goals are to be realized.

https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.14040

From regional to parcel scale: A high-resolution map of cover crops across Europe combining satellite data with statistical surveys
From regional to parcel scale: A high-resolution map of cover crops across Europe combining satellite data with statistical surveys
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

The reformed Common Agricultural Policy of 2023–2027 aims to promote a more sustainable and fair agricultural system in the European Union. Among the proposed measures, the incentivized adoption of cover crops to cover the soil during winter provides numerous benefits such as improved soil structure and reduced nutrient leaching and erosion. Despite this recognized importance, the availability of spatial data on cover crops is scarce. The increasing availability of field parcel declarations in the European Union has not yet filled this data gap due to its insufficient information content, limited public availability and a lack of standardization at continental scale. At present, the best information available is regionally aggregated survey data, which although indicative, hinders the development of spatially accurate studies. In this work, we propose a statistical model relating Sentinel-1 data to the existence of cover crops at the 100-m spatial resolution over the entirety of the European Union and United Kingdom and estimate its parameters using the spatially aggregated survey data. To validate the method in a spatially-explicit way, predictions were compared against farmers' registered declarations in France, where the adoption of cover crops is widespread. The results indicate a good agreement between predictions and parcel-level data. When interpreted as a binary classifier, the model yielded an Area Under the Curve (AUC) of 0.74 for the whole country. When the country was divided into five regions for the evaluation of regional biases, the AUC values were 0.77, 0.75, 0.74, 0.70, and 0.65 for the North, Center, West, East, and South regions respectively. Despite limitations such as the lack of data for validation outside France, and the non-standardized nomenclature for cover crops among Member States, this work constitutes the first effort to obtain a relevant cover crop map at a European scale for researchers and practitioners.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.162300

Improving satellite-based global rainfall erosivity estimates through merging with gauge data
Improving satellite-based global rainfall erosivity estimates through merging with gauge data
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Rainfall erosivity is a key factor that influences soil erosion by water. Rain-gauge measurements are commonly used to estimate rainfall erosivity. However, long-term gauge records with sub-hourly resolutions are lacking in large parts of the world. Satellite observations provide spatially continuous estimates of rainfall, but they are subject to biases that affect estimates of rainfall erosivity. We employed a novel approach to map global rainfall erosivity based on a high-temporal-resolution (30-min), long-term (2001–2020) satellite-based precipitation product—the Integrated Multi-satellitE Retrievals for Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM-IMERG)—and mean annual rainfall erosivity from the Global Rainfall Erosivity Database (GloREDa) stations (n = 3286). We used a residual-based merging scheme to integrate GPM-IMERG-based rainfall erosivity with GloREDa using Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR). The accuracy of the GWR-based merging scheme was evaluated with a 10-fold cross-validation against GloREDa stations. Based on GPM-IMERG-only, the global mean annual rainfall erosivity was estimated to be 1173 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1 with a standard deviation of 1736 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1. The mean value estimated via GPM-IMERG merged with GloREDa was 2020 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1 with a standard deviation of 3415 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1. Overall, GPM-IMERG-only estimates underestimated rainfall erosivity. The underestimations were greatest in areas of high rainfall erosivity. The accuracy of rainfall erosivity estimates from GPM-IMERG merged with GloREDa substantially improved (Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency = 0.83, percent bias = −2.4%, and root mean square error = 1122 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1) compared to estimates by GPM-IMERG-only (Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency = 0.51, percent bias = 27.8%, and root mean square error = 1730 MJ mm ha−1 h−1 yr−1). Improving satellite-based global rainfall erosivity estimates through integrating with gauge data is relevant as it can contribute to enhancing soil erosion modeling and, in turn, support land degradation neutrality programs.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2023.129555

Modelling phosphorus dynamics in four European long-term experiments
Modelling phosphorus dynamics in four European long-term experiments
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Phosphorus (P) is a non-renewable geological macronutrient that plays an essential role in food security. The excessive use of P as a fertilizer and its subsequent diffuse loss leads to the deterioration of water quality, eutrophication, and loss of biodiversity. Ecosystem process-based models are a powerful tool to depict the P cycle, investigate the effects of management practices and climate change, and ultimately assess policy interventions that affect biogeochemical cycles. Of the limited number of P models in agricultural production systems, none have been tested in temperate conditions for periods of decades using long-term field experiments.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2022.103595

A field parcel-oriented approach to evaluate the crop cover-management factor and time-distributed erosion risk in Europe
A field parcel-oriented approach to evaluate the crop cover-management factor and time-distributed erosion risk in Europe
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

The crop cover-management (C-) factor in arable landscapes describes the soil erosion susceptibility associated with seasonally cultivated crops. Previous informatic and computational limitations have led many modelling studies to prescribe C-factor values and assume spatial and temporal stationarity. However, the multiple influencing factors ranging from parcel-scale crop cultivation and management to regional-scale rainfall regimes motivates new methods to capture this variation when identifying at-risk areas. Here, we define a multi-component method to derive the C-factor by associating time series of canopy and residue surface cover from Sentinel-2 and climate-specific rainfall erosivity with Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS) field parcel data from European Union member states. A scalable and standardised method is emphasised to increase the future interoperability and inter-comparability of soil erosion modelling studies deploying the C-factor. Additionally, field parcel simulation units with associated crop declarations provide a new reference scale to link predictions of soil erosion risk with specific management decisions and declarations by farmers. After implementing the method on a homogenised subsample of 8600 field parcels covering available IACS regions, several key findings are outlined: 1) time series information provides new opportunities to predict the time-criticality of erosion in specific crop cultivations, 2) the varying (a-)synchronicity between seasonal crop canopy cover and heavy rainstorms means that spatial variability is inherent within the C-factor across Europe, and 3) the addition of agricultural management practices (e.g. tillage practice descriptions) to open-access IACS repositories can facilitate more comprehensive evaluations of the C-factor and soil erosion risk.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iswcr.2022.09.005

Progress and challenges in sustainable land management initiatives: A global review
Progress and challenges in sustainable land management initiatives: A global review
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Sustainable land management (SLM) is widely recognized as the key to reducing rates of land degradation, and preventing desertification. Many efforts have been made worldwide by various stakeholders to adopt and/or develop various SLM practices. Nevertheless, a comprehensive review on the spatial distribution, prospects, and challenges of SLM practices and research is lacking. To address this gap, we gathered information from a global SLM database provided by the World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies (WOCAT) and two bibliographic databases of academic research. Over 1900 SLM practices and 1181 academic research papers from 129 and 90 countries were compiled and analyzed. Relatively better SLM dissemination was observed in dry subhumid countries and countries with medium scores on the Human Development Index (HDI), whereas dissemination and research were both lower in humid countries with low HDI values. Cropland was the main land use type targeted in both dissemination and research; degradation caused by water erosion and mitigation aimed at water erosion were also the main focus areas. Other dominant land use types (e.g., grazing) and SLM purposes (e.g., economic benefits) have received relatively less research attention compared to their dissemination. Overall, over 75 % of the 60 countries experiencing high soil erosion rates (>10 t ha−1 yr−1) also have low HDI scores, as well as poor SLM dissemination and research implying the limited evidence-based SLM dissemination in these countries. The limitation of research evidence can be addressed in the short term through integrating existing scientific research and SLM databases by adopting the proposed Research Evidence for SLM framework. There is, however, a great need for additional detailed studies of country-specific SLM challenges and prospects to create appropriate evidence-based SLM dissemination strategies to achieve multiple SLM benefits.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.160027

Wildfires in Europe: Burned soils require attention
Wildfires in Europe: Burned soils require attention
Resource Type: European Soil Database & soil properties, Documents, Publications in Journals, Datasets, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Annually, millions of hectares of land are affected by wildfires worldwide, disrupting ecosystems functioning by affecting on-site vegetation, soil, and above- and belowground biodiversity, but also triggering erosive off-site impacts such as water-bodies contamination or mudflows. Here, we present a soil erosion assessment following the 2017's wildfires at the European scale, including an analysis of vegetation recovery and soil erosion mitigation potential. Results indicate a sharp increase in soil losses with 19.4 million Mg additional erosion in the first post-fire year when compared to unburned conditions. Over five years, 44 million Mg additional soil losses were estimated, and 46% of the burned area presented no signs of full recovery. Post-fire mitigation could attenuate these impacts by 63–77%, reducing soil erosion to background levels by the 4th post-fire year. Our insights may help identifying target policies to reduce land degradation, as identified in the European Union Soil, Forest, and Biodiversity strategies.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2022.114936

Brief communication: A first hydrological investigation of extreme August 2023 floods in Slovenia, Europe
Brief communication: A first hydrological investigation of extreme August 2023 floods in Slovenia, Europe
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Extreme floods occurred from 4 to 6 August 2023 in Slovenia causing three casualties and causing total direct and indirect damage, including post-disaster needs according to the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA), close to EUR 10 billion. The atypical summer weather conditions combined with the high air and sea temperatures in the Mediterranean and the high soil moisture led to the most extreme flood event in Slovenia in recent decades. The return periods of both daily and sub-daily precipitation extremes and peak discharges reached 250–500 years, and the runoff coefficient of a typical torrential and mostly forested mesoscale catchment was around 0.5. In addition, flooding, soil erosion, mass movements and river sediment transport processes caused major damage to buildings (more than 12 000 houses) and diverse infrastructure.

https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-23-3885-2023

Climate change and cropland management compromise soil integrity and multifunctionality
Climate change and cropland management compromise soil integrity and multifunctionality
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Soils provide essential ecosystem functions that are threatened by climate change and intensified land use. We explore how climate and land use impact multiple soil function simultaneously, employing two datasets: (1) observational – 456 samples from the European Land Use/Land Cover Area Frame Survey; and (2) experimental – 80 samples from Germany’s Global Change Experimental Facility. We aim to investigate whether manipulative field experiment results align with observable climate, land use, and soil multifunctionality trends across Europe, measuring seven ecosystem functions to calculate soil multifunctionality. The observational data showed Europe-wide declines in soil multifunctionality under rising temperatures and dry conditions, worsened by cropland management. Our experimental data confirmed these relationships, suggesting that changes in climate will reduce soil multifunctionality across croplands and grasslands. Land use changes from grasslands to croplands threaten the integrity of soil systems, and enhancing soil multifunctionality in arable systems is key to maintain multifunctionality in a changing climate.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-023-01047-2

 Land-use-and climate-mediated variations in soil bacterial and fungal biomass across Europe and their driving factors
Land-use-and climate-mediated variations in soil bacterial and fungal biomass across Europe and their driving factors
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Elucidating contents and drivers of soil bacterial and fungal biomass in contrasting land uses and climates at European scale is useful to define appropriate policies for the conservation of the ecosystem services that soil microorganisms provide. Here, we aimed to (i) quantify and compare bacterial and fungal biomass in 513 European soils collected from three different land uses (forests, grasslands, and croplands) and climates (arid, temperate, and cold) through analysis of fatty acid methyl esters; (ii) model the factors controlling soil bacterial and fungal biomass; and (iii) investigating levels of bacterial and fungal biomass in cropland soils cultivated with three important crop types in Europe: cereals, oil-producing crops, and orchards. Bacterial biomass decreased with land use in the following order: grasslands > croplands > forests and was found to be the highest in temperate environments. Similar patterns were found for biomass of Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria and Actinobacteria. Soil fungal biomass was greater in forests than in croplands and grasslands and was favoured by colder environments. The fungi to bacteria ratio (F/B) decreased as follows: forests > croplands > grasslands, with soils in colder climates showing greater F/B ratios in croplands and forests. Soil texture, soil organic carbon, and nitrogen were shown to directly drive bacterial and fungal biomass. The biomass of the different microbial groups was not influenced by the crop type when only croplands were considered. Fungi appear to be more susceptible to agricultural soil use than bacteria. Moreover, agricultural use of soil seems to buffer the effect of harsh climatic conditions on soil bacterial biomass. The present study improves our understanding of the combined effects of land use and climate on soil bacterial and fungal biomass across Europe.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoderma.2023.116474

Island volcanism predicts pheomelanin-based plumage colouration in a cosmopolitan raptor
Island volcanism predicts pheomelanin-based plumage colouration in a cosmopolitan raptor
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Pheomelanin is a pigment responsible for yellowish-to-reddish colours of vertebrate teguments. Its biosynthesis is favoured under high concentration of intracellular thiols, which, in turn, can depend on the environmental exposure to sulphur. Thus, pheomelanin production should be more intense and frequent in environments characterized by high level of sulphur, such as volcanic regions. In this study, we aimed at addressing this hypothesis by investigating variation in plumage colour of insular populations of the cosmopolitan barn owl (Tyto alba species complex) according to the presence of soils of volcanic origin (i.e. andosols) and recent volcanic activity.

https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.14596

The Relevance of Geopedology for Policy Making and Soil Security
The Relevance of Geopedology for Policy Making and Soil Security
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Policy making and soil security require to address the sustainable management of soil resources at the landscape level. Therefore, geopedology can become highly relevant for effective policy making for achieving long term soil protection. The necessary pre-condition is the availability of a solid scientific basis and detailed data on the actual status and trends of soils within relevant landscapes. The recent emergence of high-resolution digital soil mapping techniques offers new possibilities for achieving such a knowledge base. Several examples from the European Union demonstrate that geopedology can be a valuable tool for understanding soil processes at the landscape level and design effective soil protection policies.

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20667-2_25

Micro-and nanoplastics in soils: Tracing research progression from comprehensive analysis to ecotoxicological effects
Micro-and nanoplastics in soils: Tracing research progression from comprehensive analysis to ecotoxicological effects
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Micro- and nanoplastics (MNPs) emissions and pollution are a growing concern due to their potential impact on ecosystems and human health, particularly in soil. This study conducts a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of 2,451 publications spanning from 2006 to 2023. The aim is to assess the research landscape, trends, contributors, and collaborative efforts related to MNPs in soil. Moreover, it examines the extensive research on the effects of MNPs on soil organisms, including earthworms, nematodes, and other fauna as well as the physical–chemical impacts, nanoscale interactions, and ecotoxicological effects on soil microorganisms. Utilizing network analysis, this study explores the global distribution of research across countries, institutions, authors, and keywords, shedding light on the interconnected scientific exploration. The findings reveal a consistent rise in research output over the past decade, reflecting worldwide interest in soil MNPs pollution. It also identifies influential authors and interdisciplinary clusters, highlighting their significant collaborations. Moreover, it pinpoints key institutions and leading journals in this area. Keyword co-occurrence and time-series analysis uncover seven significant research clusters. All provide insights into crucial MNPs aspects and their environmental and health implications. Our findings guide future research and inform strategies to combat MNPs pollution in soils, underscore the need for interdisciplinary approaches to address this complex challenge. In essence, our comprehensive bibliometric analysis serves as a valuable resource, it benefits researchers, policy stakeholders by promoting further research and guiding strategies to mitigate MNPs pollution in soils, in support of ecosystem preservation and human health protection.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolind.2023.111109

Assessing marginality of Camelina (C. sativa L. Crantz) in rotation with barley production in Southern Europe: A modelling approach
Assessing marginality of Camelina (C. sativa L. Crantz) in rotation with barley production in Southern Europe: A modelling approach
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Camelina (C. sativa L. Crantz) is a promising biofuel crop with high potential for cultivation on marginal soils. In this work, seed yields have been modelled to assess suitable areas based on experimental field trials, meteorological data from the Monitoring Agricultural ResourceS (MARS) gridded agro-meteorological in Europe, soil properties from LUCAS, topography and land cover. Potential yields for Camelina-Barley rotation (CAMBAR) were modelled for the past 20 years using the mechanistic crop growth model ARMOSA that can estimate quantitatively several soil and water parameters and future forcing scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) using the generation model HadGEM2-ES. The term marginal land is found in the literature to indicate unused agriculture land such as abandoned, underused, degraded and fallow. In this work, marginality is considered the economic feasibility of cultivation, which aims to identifying land where cost effective agricultural production is not possible under a given set of conditions. Marginal lands were identified when the average Camelina seed yield from the crop growth modelling was lower than average in European countries based on a comprehensive literature assessment. The analysis was targeted at regions with a predominantly Mediterranean climate. Simulation by the mechanistic crop model was carried out on a 25 km grid for soil texture, soil carbon average stock, slope and aspect found in the MARS agricultural area mask. Spatial data and subsequent editing and processing of each simulation were allocated to a 500 m spatial resolution via a Geographic Information Systems (GIS). The study area covers around 500,000 km2. The CAMBAR scenario obtained an average yield of 2468 kg ha-1 yr-1, with standard deviation (+- 641) due to fluctuations for extreme weather patterns. Regarding soil organic carbon (SOC), CAMBAR showed an increase of + 43 kg ha-1 yr-1, which aligns with other studies carried out in Mediterranean or continental climates under crop rotation with minimum tillage and straw retention. The results of the present scenarios showed a slight increase in SOC stock (0.1–0.15 % yr-1). In regions with sufficient precipitation throughout the crop cycle, the increase of SOC is lower than the entire study area average, and in few cases, the SOC stock was drastically decreased. However, the model shows that SOC stock can increase when Camelina is introduced in rotation with cereals in areas with high desertification risk. In Spain, in the regions of Castilla La Mancha, Castilla y León and Comunidad de Madrid accounting for 40% of the total area of investigation in Spain, equivalent to an area of 88,233 km2, the SOC increase was + 188, + 255 and + 236 kg ha-1 yr-1, respectively. The results of this work constitute a key contribution to policy development at the sub-national, national and EU level, through the investigation of low LUC/ILUC biofuel from marginal areas before these are lost due to land degradation processes and other anthropogenic impacts. Mapping the marginal areas is fundamental to showing potential for producing advanced biofuel crops.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agee.2023.108677

Climate and environmental data contribute to the prediction of grain commodity prices using deep learning
Climate and environmental data contribute to the prediction of grain commodity prices using deep learning
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Background: Grain commodities are important to people's daily lives and their fluctuations can cause instability for households. Accurate prediction of grain prices can improve food and social security.
 
Methods & Materials: This study proposes a hybrid Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM)-Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) model to forecast weekly oat, corn, soybean and wheat prices in the United States market. The LSTM-CNN is a multivariate model that uses weather data, macroeconomic data, commodities grain prices and snow factors, including Snow Water Equivalent (SWE), snowfall and snow depth, to make multistep ahead forecasts.

https://doi.org/10.1002/sae2.12041

Automatic blight disease detection in potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum, L. 1753) plants using deep learning
Automatic blight disease detection in potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum, L. 1753) plants using deep learning
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Early and late blight are two diseases which pose a huge risk to both potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum, L. 1753) crops and make farmers run at a loss. The early and automatic detection of these diseases would save time as well as enable farmers to act quickly on crops which have been affected. Machine learning and deep learning technology provide many solutions for the detection of the blight diseases in affected crops, and are common in the literature. However, explanation methods for such solutions are not common, but are necessary, considering some machine learning models are seen as black boxes. This study proposes a ResNet-9 model which detects the blight disease state of potato and tomato leaf images, which farmers can leverage. With the data obtained from the popular “Plant Village Dataset”, there were 3,990 initial training data samples. After augmenting the training set and a rigorous hyperparameter optimization procedure, the model was trained with these hyperparameter values, and examined on the test set, which contained 1,331 images. A test accuracy of 99.25%, 99.67% overall precision, 99.33% overall recall and 99.33% overall F1-score values were achieved. To fully understand the model, explanations for the proposed model were provided through saliency maps, which showed the reasoning behind the predictions of the model. It was observed that the ResNet-9 model considered the shape of the leaf, diseased areas present and general green areas of the leaf for its predictions and this makes us understand the model predictions better and see that the model behaves as expected. Our results could contribute to the testing and deployment of Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) models for classification of proximal sensing images of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum, L. 1753) plant leaves. Further studies would benefit from this modeling framework and would have the chance to test several other variables to determine the leaf infections in an earlier stage for crop protection.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atech.2023.100178

Fine earth soil bulk density at 0.2 m depth from Land Use and Coverage Area Frame Survey (LUCAS) soil 2018
Fine earth soil bulk density at 0.2 m depth from Land Use and Coverage Area Frame Survey (LUCAS) soil 2018
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Soil Bulk Density (BD) is an extremely important variable because it is an important site characterization parameter, and it is highly relevant for policy development because it is mandatory for calculating soil nutrient stocks. BD can influence soil chemical properties, land-use planning and agronomic management. The 2018 Land Use and Coverage Area Frame Survey (LUCAS) saw the unprecedented collection of BD core analysis in a subset of the locations in Europe and the United Kingdom where soil physical and chemical properties were analysed in the 2009 and the 2015 sampling campaigns. Here, we integrated the LUCAS 2018 BD sampling campaign with the mass fraction of coarse fragments previously determined in LUCAS 2009–2015 in order to provide a dataset of the volume fraction of coarse fragments and the BD of the fine earth and improve soil organic carbon (SOC) stock estimation accuracy for topsoil. BD data sampled at 0–10 and 10–20 cm were averaged to harmonize the BD with the mass fraction of coarse fragments measured in 2009, 2012 and 2015. Samples were from cropland, grassland and woodland soils, which accounted for 41%, 21% and 30%, respectively, of the total number of selected sites (n = 6059); ‘bareland’, and ‘shrubland’ accounted for 3% of the sites each, whereas ‘artificial land’ accounted for <1%. Only six samples were classified as ‘wetland’. The dataset was produced assuming the mass density of the coarse fraction to be constant across all LUCAS soil samples. We also estimated the SOC stocks associated with LUCAS 2018 BD and SOC content measurements and showed that correcting the BD by the coarse mass fraction instead of the coarse volume fraction generates SOC stock underestimation. We found the highest deviations in woodlands and shrublands. We showed that, when SOC stock is computed with coarse mass fraction, the error compared with the computation by volume may vary depending on the SOC and coarse mass fraction. This may imply a SOC stock underestimation for European soils. This dataset fits into the big framework of LUCAS soil properties monitoring and contributes both to soil awareness and soil research and assessments, which are two important objectives of the Soil Strategy and the European Soil Observatory (EUSO).

https://doi.org/10.1111/ejss.13391

Genetic variability of Chamaerops humilis (Arecaceae) throughout its native range highlights two species movement pathways from its area of origin
Genetic variability of Chamaerops humilis (Arecaceae) throughout its native range highlights two species movement pathways from its area of origin
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

The European fan palm (Chamaerops humilis, Arecaceae) is the only native palm in continental Europe, providing ecosystem services that are hard to obtain from other species. However, its populations are declining in some areas due to anthropogenic effects including climate change. Knowledge of genetic variability among natural populations is needed to establish conservation plans, to prevent genetic contamination of native stands by cultivated germplasm and to exploit it as an ornamental species. However, information on the genetic similarities among C. humilis populations is scarce. The aims of this work were to study genetic structure in C. humilis using a set of specifically designed genetic markers and to highlight genetic similarities and their relationships with geographical proximity. We sampled 301 specimens from 42 natural populations throughout the distribution area and analysed these with ten di-, tri- and tetra-nucleotide simple sequence repeats. Relationships between genetic similarities and geographical distances were analysed and populations grouped according to a genetic, geographical or national clustering. We found lower variability in populations from the eastern half of the distribution, and this lower variability was accompanied by a stronger relationship between genetic differences and spatial proximity. In addition, we found that C. humilis probably showed two patterns of spread and further differentiation: one from Morocco to southern continental Spain and then to Portugal and the Balearic Islands, and one from Morocco to Algeria, Tunisia, Sicily and continental Italy. Populations from Sardinia and France showed similarities to those from Spain and Tunisia, respectively, and may have arisen from multiple colonization events. Our results support the hypothesis that isolation on large islands may have increased diversification of the species even if all populations shared the same founder. These results have important implications for both the ecological management and the conservation of the species.

https://doi.org/10.1093/botlinnean/boac053

Short-Term Crop Residue Management in No-Tillage Cultivation Effects on Soil Quality Indicators in Virginia
Short-Term Crop Residue Management in No-Tillage Cultivation Effects on Soil Quality Indicators in Virginia
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

The use of crop residues for biofuel production has the potential to provide environmental and economic benefits to modern societies. Because of the profound impacts that crop residues have on agricultural productivity and soil health, a sustainable utilization of these residues is required. Thus, we determined crop yield and quality response for a range of biomass retention rates in grain cropping systems. Combinations of corn (Zea mays L.) stover (0, 3.33, 6.66 and 10 Mgha−1) and wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) straw (0, 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 Mgha−1) were soil applied in a corn-wheat/soybean (Glycine max L. Merr.) rotation in Virginia’s Coastal Plain. Corn stover (0, 3.33, 6.66, 10 and 20 Mg ha−1) was applied in a continuous corn cropping system in the Ridge/Valley province. For each system, residues were applied following grain harvest over two production cycles. Each experiment was conducted as a randomized complete block design with four replications. Two cycles of crop residue management, with retention rates of up to 20 Mg ha−1 of corn stover retention in Blacksburg, and up to 13 Mg ha−1 of corn stover and wheat straw in New Kent, had no effect on total nitrogen (TN) and carbon (TC) concentrations, CN ratios, bulk density (BD), soil pH, field capacity, permanent wilting point, plant available water and water aggregate stability across soil depths and aggregate sizes in Virginia. In one situation when residue management slightly affected BD (0–2.5 cm depth, NK1), differences across the sixteen total retained residues treatments were less than 5%, thus rendering them not biologically or environmentally meaningful. Overall, results of this study did not show any clear short-term impact, resulting from various rates of crop residue retention in Virginia cropping systems. These incipient negative impacts resulting from very low rates of residue return warrant further studies to corroborate whether these results are to be found following long-term scenarios of crop residue management.

https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy13030838

 

Digital soil mapping of Italy to map derived soil profiles with neural networks
Digital soil mapping of Italy to map derived soil profiles with neural networks
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

In recent years there has been an increased demand for digital soil mapping (DSM) products. DSM has become the ultimate soil spatial representation framework due to its quantitative results, replicability, and uncertainty analysis. The present study aimed to map the probability distribution of the derived soil profiles (DSPs) of soil typological units (STUs). DSPs are statistical representation of the properties of the soil profiles belonging to STUs. STUs aggregate individual profiles into a group. The criteria used for grouping were homogeneity for World Reference Base (WRB) reference soil group (WRB-RSG), qualifiers (WRB-qu), and Soil Taxonomy particle size for the family classification (USDA-PS), and the belonging to a specific Soil Region. The European Soil Regions have been suggested as the primary grouping criteria for soil mapping at the European continental scale since they define continental-scale soilscapes, distinguished mainly by their climate and geology. To map DSPs, we firstly mapped STUs. The grouping criteria of STUs were mapped at 500 m spatial resolution, using a Neural Network trained on 18,707 georeferenced and analyzed soil profiles selected from the Italian national soil database. A 10% of the soil profiles were randomly sampled using a stratified sampling approach for validation. In particular, the procedure consisted of: i) mapping the grouping criteria WRB-RSG, WRB-qu, and USDA-PS, on a 500 m national grid, through Neural Network; ii) grouping soil profiles on the base of the combinations of grouping criteria (WRB-RSG, WRB-qu, USDA-PS, and Soil Regions) as mapped with the first step at each grid node, to produce a map of Soil Typological Units (STUs); iii) calculating statistics for the soil parameters of the groups of soil profiles created, to produce a map of Derived Soil Profiles (DSPs). DSPs statistics (average, standard deviation, and sample numerosity) were elaborated for the following parameters: soil rooting depth, pH (in water), soil organic carbon, clay, silt, sand, coarse fragments, and cation exchange capacity. The maps obtained were validated against the test set. The same test set was used for the comparison with the National benchmark map (Soils Map of Italy 1:1,000,000) and with the global scale SoilGrids at 250 m spatial resolution. The overall accuracy was 45.98% for the WRB-RSG map compared with the 30.74% of WRB-RSG as mapped with the Soil Map of Italy, and 28.79% as mapped with SoilGrids; 33.07% for WRB-qu compared with the 15.69% of WRB-qu as mapped with the Soil Map of Italy, and 12.45% as mapped with SoilGrids, and 45.48% for USDA-PS, not comparable with the National and Global benchmarks. Tau statistics showed a higher accuracy Kappa of our approach than in others, due to the unbalanced classes numerosity. The predictive ability in the validation of DSPs parameters resulted in a R2 of 0.35 for clay (0.16 with SoilGrids), 0.28 for sand (0.08 with SoilGrids), 0.18 for pH in water (0.21 with SoilGrids). The proposed approach produced harmonized soil type maps with higher accuracy than the previous generation of conventional field-based soil maps for the national benchmark and the calculation of the uncertainty. The STUs express variability of soil properties between groups so their knowledge might improve our understanding of the soil distribution, the planning of their management, monitoring, and the decisions for further surveys. A future challenge will be including more dynamic parameters in the criteria used to create STU, to help monitoring soil management effects.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geodrs.2023.e00619

Soil organic carbon under conservation agriculture in Mediterranean and humid subtropical climates: Global meta‐analysis
Soil organic carbon under conservation agriculture in Mediterranean and humid subtropical climates: Global meta‐analysis
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Conservation agriculture (CA) is an agronomic system based on minimum soil disturbance (no-tillage, NT), permanent soil cover, and species diversification. The effects of NT on soil organic carbon (SOC) changes have been widely studied, showing somewhat inconsistent conclusions, especially in relation to the Mediterranean and humid subtropical climates. These areas are highly vulnerable and predicted climate change is expected to accentuate desertification and, for these reasons, there is a need for clear agricultural guidelines to preserve or increment SOC. We quantitively summarized the results of 47 studies all around the world in these climates investigating the sources of variation in SOC responses to CA, such as soil characteristics, agricultural management, climate, and geography. Within the climatic area considered, the overall effect of CA on SOC accumulation in the plough layer (0–0.3 m) was 12% greater in comparison to conventional agriculture. On average, this result corresponds to a carbon increase of 0.48 Mg C ha−1 year−1. However, the effect was variable depending on the SOC content under conventional agriculture: it was 20% in soils which had ≤ 40 Mg C ha−1, while it was only 7% in soils that had > 40 Mg C ha−1. We proved that 10 years of CA impact the most on soil with SOC ≤ 40 Mg C ha−1. For soils with less than 40 Mg C ha−1, increasing the proportion of crops with bigger residue biomasses in a CA rotation was a solution to increase SOC. The effect of CA on SOC depended on clay content only in soils with more than 40 Mg C ha−1 and become null with a SOC/clay index of 3.2. Annual rainfall (that ranged between 331–1850 mm y−1) and geography had specific effects on SOC depending on its content under conventional agriculture. In conclusion, SOC increments due to CA application can be achieved especially in agricultural soils with less than 40 Mg C ha−1 and located in the middle latitudes or in the dry conditions of Mediterranean and humid subtropical climates.

https://doi.org/10.1111/ejss.13338

What is the extension of bench terrace construction for forest plantations? The case of North Central Portugal
What is the extension of bench terrace construction for forest plantations? The case of North Central Portugal
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Over the last decades, the establishment of new fast-growing forest plantations has been prospering. Although the European continent has the lowest share worldwide of forest plantations out of its total forest area, the Portuguese reality contrasts this. Since the last century, eucalypt plantations have increased widely in Portugal, and nowadays, it represents 36% of the total country's forests. Consequently, the soils of these plantations are commonly targeted with intensive soil mobilization by heavy machinery before planting, which in the case of sloped areas, frequently results in bench terracing. This study aims to quantify the widespread bench terracing implementation over the last 20 years in the Caramulo Mountains in north central Portugal. To do so, an analysis of satellite imagery was performed with Google Earth Pro, which allowed determining the coverage of forest areas where new terraces have been implemented, and their respective temporal dynamics. These results were then compared with additional spatiotemporal databases on land cover, topography, and bedrock, in order to understand the drivers of terrace implementation. Till date, 15% of the forest area in the mountains of Caramulo is under terraces, and over the last 20 years, the construction rate of new terraced land decreased in time, from 4% between 2000 and 2004 to 2% between 2015 and 2019. Among the two bedrock types existent in the area, terracing was found nearly exclusive over schist bedrock type (97%), while few areas were implemented over granites (3%). Their distribution was found limited above 30° of slope angle while 39% were found implemented below 15° of slope angle, conflicting with literature recommendations. Terracing was also found to be a driver of land cover change in 12% of the newly constructed terraces, whereas 8% were constructed over previous pine plantations and 4% on shrublands. This study allowed identifying several knowledge gaps associated with terracing implementation. Therefore, the authors of this work suggest a multidisciplinary approach when planning new terraces for a better assessment of the benefits and impacts of such land management practices. 

https://doi.org/10.1002/ldr.4837

Impacts of barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) straw mulch on post-fire soil erosion and ground vegetation recovery in a strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo L.) stand
Impacts of barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) straw mulch on post-fire soil erosion and ground vegetation recovery in a strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo L.) stand
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Rural fires are now a major societal concern across the world, especially where fire regimes have (apparently) intensified in terms of burnt area, intensity and recurrency. Among the indirect fire effects, fire-enhanced runoff and erosion have been an important focus of post-fire land and water management, in particular through emergency stabilization of hillslopes using a range of erosion mitigation measures. The most widely applied and – scientifically tested – measure is that of mulching with agricultural straw, in spite of concerns of introducing exogenous organic material and especially seeds of non-native higher plant species, including the straw species it- or themselves. So far, field studies in the present study region of north-central Portugal have preferred using endogenous forest residues but these studies concerned forest types for which such residues are easily available. The latter, however, is not the case for strawberry tree stands, so that straw mulch was selected in this study as a cheaper alternative to eucalypt or pine residues. This - apparently, first – post-fire erosion mitigation study in a strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo L.) stand aimed to compare post-fire sediment and organic matter losses as well as ground vegetation recovery without and with applying barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) straw mulch at a low rate of 2 Mg ha−1. The experimental set-up involved a randomized block design with a total of six geotextile-bounded erosion plots of 2 m by 5 m that were organized in three blocks, were installed and mulched roughly one month after the 17-October-2017 M-fire in inland Central Portugal, and monitored at 12 irregular intervals during the first two post-fire years. The principal findings were that: (i) especially the specific sediment losses without mulching over the first post-fire year were notably higher than those reported by the prior field studies in the region, in eucalypt and maritime pine plantations; and that the - low - mulching rate: (ii) was extremely effective in reducing these first-post-fire-year losses; but (iii) did not result in changes in the cover or floristic composition of the ground vegetation cover that were noteworthy and longer-lived than the first post-fire year.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoleng.2023.107074

Response on the “Characterising wildfire impacts on ecosystem services: A triangulation of scientific findings, governmental reports, and expert perceptions in Portugal”
Response on the “Characterising wildfire impacts on ecosystem services: A triangulation of scientific findings, governmental reports, and expert perceptions in Portugal”
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023
When reading the research paper “Characterising wildfire impacts on ecosystem services: A triangulation of scientific findings, governmental reports, and expert perceptions in Portugal” we came across some misleading formulations we felt the need to refute. Particularly, in what concerns the selection of scientific publications, the 3-year delay between data collection and article publication, and the corresponding data interpretations.
 
The first issue is the choice of keywords used for the systematic search. Although the authors of the study allowed some flexibility for terms such as “fire” and “wildfire”, other terms related to “impact assessment” were not considered, which limited the number of potentially eligible studies. In an attempt to reproduce the search used by the authors, the string “TITLE-ABS-KEY (*fire AND Portugal AND impact* assess*) was used in Scopus (21/03/2023) returning 352 publications. However, the simple addition of the keyword ”monitor” or “monitoring”, which is highly connected to impact assessment (*fire AND Portugal AND monitor* OR impact* assess*), results in 14,953 publications. As an example, the authors’ search resulted in 8 publications from Vieira DCS, and in the suggested search, this number increased to 21. Moreover, we acknowledge that “ecosystem services” might be a relatively new term to be included in the search, although included in the title, but no keywords related to the target ecosystem components were used, namely soil, air, water, and/or vegetation. Thus, the search performed by the authors might not entirely suit the research targets.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2023.06.016

How much does it cost to mitigate soil erosion after wildfires?
How much does it cost to mitigate soil erosion after wildfires?
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023
Wildfires usually increase the hydrological and erosive response of forest areas, carrying high environmental, human, cultural, and financial on- and off-site effects. Post-fire soil erosion control measures have been proven effective at mitigating such responses, especially at the slope scale, but there is a knowledge gap as to how cost-effective these treatments are.
 
In this work, we review the effectiveness of post-fire soil erosion mitigation treatments at reducing erosion rates over the first post-fire year and provide their application costs. This allowed assessing the treatments’ cost-effectiveness (CE), expressed as the cost of preventing 1 Mg of soil loss. This assessment involved a total of 63 field study cases, extracted from 26 publications from the USA, Spain, Portugal, and Canada, and focused on the role of treatment types and materials, and countries.
 
Treatments providing a protective ground cover showed the best median CE (895 $ Mg−1), especially agricultural straw mulch (309 $ Mg−1), followed by wood-residue mulch (940 $ Mg−1) and hydromulch (2332 $ Mg−1). Barriers showed a relatively low CE (1386 $ Mg−1), due to their reduced effectiveness and elevated implementation costs. Seeding showed a good CE (260 $ Mg−1), but this reflected its low costs rather than its effectiveness to reduce soil erosion.
 
The present results confirmed that post-fire soil erosion mitigation treatments are cost-effective as long as they are applied in areas where the post-fire erosion rates exceed the tolerable erosion rate thresholds (>1 Mg−1 ha−1 y−1) and are less costly than the loss of on- and off-site values that they are targeted to protect. For this reason, the proper assessment of post-fire soil erosion risk is vital to ensure that the available financial, human and material resources are applied appropriately.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2023.117478

Denitrification Losses in Response to N Fertilizer Rates—Integrating High Temporal Resolution N₂O, In Situ ¹⁵N₂O and ¹⁵N₂ Measurements and Fertilizer ¹⁵N Recoveries in Intensive Sugarcane Systems
Denitrification Losses in Response to N Fertilizer Rates—Integrating High Temporal Resolution N₂O, In Situ ¹⁵N₂O and ¹⁵N₂ Measurements and Fertilizer ¹⁵N Recoveries in Intensive Sugarcane Systems
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023
Denitrification is a key process in the global nitrogen (N) cycle, causing both nitrous oxide (N2O) and dinitrogen (N2) emissions. However, estimates of seasonal denitrification losses (N2O + N2) are scarce, reflecting methodological difficulties in measuring soil-borne N2 emissions against the high atmospheric N2 background and challenges regarding their spatio-temporal upscaling. This study investigated N2O + N2 losses in response to N fertilizer rates (0, 100, 150, 200, and 250 kg N ha−1) on two intensively managed tropical sugarcane farms in Australia, by combining automated N2O monitoring, in situ N2 and N2O measurements using the 15N gas flux method and fertilizer 15N recoveries at harvest. Dynamic changes in the N2O/(N2O + N2) ratio (<0.01 to 0.768) were explained by fitting generalized additive mixed models (GAMMs) with soil factors to upscale high temporal-resolution N2O data to daily N2 emissions over the season. Cumulative N2O + N2 losses ranged from 12 to 87 kg N ha−1, increasing non-linearly with increasing N fertilizer rates. Emissions of N2O + N2 accounted for 31%–78% of fertilizer 15N losses and were dominated by environmentally benign N2 emissions. The contribution of denitrification to N fertilizer loss decreased with increasing N rates, suggesting increasing significance of other N loss pathways including leaching and runoff at higher N rates. This study delivers a blueprint approach to extrapolate denitrification measurements at both temporal and spatial scales, which can be applied in fertilized agroecosystems. Robust estimates of denitrification losses determined using this method will help to improve cropping system modeling approaches, advancing our understanding of the N cycle across scales.

https://doi.org/10.1029/2023JG007391

Combining nitrification inhibitors with a reduced N rate maintains yield and reduces N₂O emissions in sweet corn
Combining nitrification inhibitors with a reduced N rate maintains yield and reduces N₂O emissions in sweet corn
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

Intensive vegetable production is characterised by high nitrogen (N) application rates and frequent irrigations, promoting elevated nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions, a powerful greenhouse gas indicative for the low N use efficiency (NUE) in these systems. The use of nitrification inhibitors (NI) has been promoted as an effective strategy to increase NUE and decrease N2O emissions in N-intensive agricultural systems. This study investigated the effect of two NIs, 3,4-dimethylpyrazole phosphate (DMPP) and 3-methylpyrazole 1,2,4-triazole (Piadin), on N2O emissions and 15N fertiliser recovery in a field experiment in sweet corn. The trial compared the conventional fertiliser N rate to a 20% reduced rate combined with either DMPP or Piadin. The use of NI-coated urea at a 20% reduced application rate decreased cumulative N2O emissions by 51% without yield penalty. More than 25% of applied N was lost from the conventional treatment, while a reduced N rate in combination with the use of a NI significantly decreased N fertiliser losses (by up to 98%). Across treatments, between 30 and 50% of applied N fertiliser remained in the soil, highlighting the need to account for residual N to optimise fertilisation in the following crop. The reduction of overall N losses without yield penalties suggests that the extra cost of using NIs can be compensated by reduced fertiliser application rates, making the use of NIs an economically viable management strategy for growers while minimising environmentally harmful N losses from vegetable growing systems.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10705-021-10185-y

Nonlinear response of N₂O and N₂ emissions to increasing soil nitrate availability in a tropical sugarcane soil
Nonlinear response of N₂O and N₂ emissions to increasing soil nitrate availability in a tropical sugarcane soil
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Publications in Journals
Year: 2023

The reduction of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O) to dinitrogen (N2) via denitrification and N2O source partitioning between nitrification and denitrification remain major uncertainties in sugarcane systems. We therefore investigated magnitude and product stoichiometry of denitrification and production pathways of N2O from a tropical sugarcane soil in response to increasing soil nitrate (NO3) availability.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-023-03482-2

Soil zinc fertilisation does not increase maize yields in 17 out of 19 sites in Sub-Saharan Africa but improves nutritional maize quality in most sites
Soil zinc fertilisation does not increase maize yields in 17 out of 19 sites in Sub-Saharan Africa but improves nutritional maize quality in most sites
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Fertilisating crops with zinc (Zn) is considered important to enhance agricultural productivity and combat human Zn deficiencies in sub-Saharan Africa. However, it is unclear on which soils Zn fertilisation can lead to higher yields and increased grain Zn concentrations. This study aimed to find soil properties that predict where soil Zn is limiting maize yields and grain Zn concentrations, and where these respond positively to Zn fertilisation.

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-023-06050-2

Disentangling Jenny’s equation by machine learning
Disentangling Jenny’s equation by machine learning
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

The so-called soil-landscape model is the central paradigm which relates soil types to their forming factors through the visionary Jenny’s equation. This is a formal mathematical expression that would permit to infer which soil should be found in a specific geographical location if the involved relationship was sufficiently known. Unfortunately, Jenny’s is only a conceptual expression, where the intervening variables are of qualitative nature, not being then possible to work it out with standard mathematical tools. In this work, we take a first step to unlock this expression, showing how Machine Learning can be used to predictably relate soil types and environmental factors. Our method outperforms other conventional statistical analyses that can be carried out on the same forming factors defined by measurable environmental variables.

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-44171-x

Lung cancer mortality and soil content of arsenic and cadmium: an ecological study in 26 EU countries
Lung cancer mortality and soil content of arsenic and cadmium: an ecological study in 26 EU countries
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Environmental risk factors, such as exposure to air pollution, are linked with lung cancer. However, potential health impacts of exposure to carcinogenic pollutants in soil are less defined. In this ecological study, we evaluated at a regional scale potential associations between lung cancer mortality and the soil content of two carcinogens: arsenic and cadmium

https://doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckad160.1252

Evaluation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 15.3.1 indicator of land degradation in the European Union
Evaluation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 15.3.1 indicator of land degradation in the European Union
Resource Type: Documents, Publications in Journals, Maps & Documents
Year: 2023

Land degradation is the persistent reduction in the capacity of the land to support human and other life on Earth (IPBES, 2018). This process jeopardizes the provision of ecosystem services. The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 15, ‘Life on Land’, includes efforts to sustainably manage and recover natural ecosystems and restore degraded land and soil. Under the umbrella of SDG 15, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) has defined an indicator framework to monitor progress toward ‘land degradation neutrality’. We evaluated the performance of SDG 15.3.1, focusing on “…proportion of land that is degraded over the total land area” for the European Union (EU) using the TRENDS.EARTH software. We assessed the impact of alternative datasets at different spatial resolutions and policy-relevant data sources for land cover (CORINE) and soil organic carbon (SOC) stock (LUCAS). Our hypothesis was that higher spatial resolution sub-indicators would better identify the total share of degraded land and provide a clearer picture of the extent of degraded land for the target period. Land productivity trajectories were adjusted using the Water Use Efficiency index that revealed the high share of improving land reported by the NDVI trends. Therefore, it is advisable to use always a climate correction to assess land productivity trends. Replacing default datasets with alternative sub-indicators allowed the detection of 25–40% more degraded areas. Additionally, the integration with a combined proxy of land degradation (soil erosion >10 Mg ha−1 yr−1, and SOC concentration <1%) identified an additional 50% land degradation and revealed that a large extent of the EU needs restoration measures.

LUCAS 2018 Soil Module
LUCAS 2018 Soil Module
Resource Type: Maps & Documents, Documents, Scientific-Technical Reports
Year: 2022

This report accompanies the release of the soil dataset collected as part of the 2018 Land Use/Cover Area frame statistical Survey’ (generally referred to as LUCAS Soil). It presents an overview of the laboratory analysis data and provides a detailed description of the results for the European Union (EU) and the United Kingdom as it was still a Member State at the time of the survey. The report describes the spatial variability of soil properties by land cover (LC) class and a comparative analysis of the soil properties for NUTS 2 regions.

Regular monitoring provides a unique perspective on pressures affecting soils. In this respect, the soil module of LUCAS supports the specific needs of the European Commission by collecting data that characterises soil condition and health, which can be affected in relation to land use practices and other activities that are driven by specific policy instruments.
The LUCAS Soil module is the only mechanism that currently provides a harmonised and regular collection of soil data for the entire territory of the EU, addressing all major land cover types simultaneously, in a single sampling period (April – October).
At the same time, the LUCAS Soil module can support further policy needs through a flexibility that permits both the collection of new field data, if required, from new sampling sites. In turn, this can be complemented with additional laboratory analysis (e.g. micronutrients, specific pollutants). This capacity addresses the needs of a diverse policy user base and an evolving policy landscape.
The drive to collect soil samples under the umbrella of LUCAS was led initially by DG Environment, who provided funding for the 2009 survey to collect a baseline dataset on a range of soil characteristics such as organic matter content, nutrient status, fertility, acidification and soil pollution (metals). At that time, the main LUCAS survey was planned for 23 EU Member States (MS). Bulgaria and Romania were added in 2012 while Croatia, Cyprus and Malta were formally included in 2015. In the 2018 survey, all 28 MS at the time were included.
The initial premise was developed to collect samples from a depth of 20 cm following a common sampling procedure from 10% of the sites where field visits were to be carried out as part of the main LUCAS survey. In 2009, this gave around 235,000 possible locations for a nominal target of 23,500 soil samples. At the end of the survey, about 20,000 had been collected. These samples were analysed according to standard analytical methods in a single laboratory for a range of physical and chemical properties. In addition, visible and near-infrared spectra were acquired for all samples. The process was repeated in 2012 for Bulgaria and Romania, where samples were collected from about 2,000 locations. In total, 22,003 samples were analysed for 2009/2012.
In 2015, 90% of the locations sampled in 2009 and 2012 were maintained with the remaining 10% being substituted by new locations, including points at altitudes above 1,000 m, which were out of scope of the earlier surveys. In total, 21,859 samples were collected, of which 4,246 were at new locations compared with the 2009/2012 campaign. In addition, the soil module was extended by the JRC Enlargement and Integration Programme to Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia (1,015 samples were eventually collected). Switzerland also participated following standard LUCAS protocols (150 samples were collected by Agroscope).
For 2018, 27,069 locations were identified for soil sampling. A soil related activity (i.e. assessing type of erosion, organic soil check sample collection) was made at 19,345 locations (LUCAS Grid Points). After the removal of samples that could not be identified or were mislabelled or lost in transit, the LUCAS 2018 Soil Module dataset contains data for 18,984 locations.
EU Soil Observatory 2021
EU Soil Observatory 2021
Resource Type: Documents, Scientific-Technical Reports, Maps & Documents
Year: 2022

The scope of this document is to provide a synthesis of the achievements of the EU Soil Observatory (EUSO) during its first year of existence. The EUSO aims to become the principal provider of reference data and knowledge at EU-level for all matters relating to soil. The EUSO will be a dynamic and inclusive platform that supports EU soil-related policymaking by providing its stakeholder base with the knowledge and data flows needed to safeguard and restore soils.
Since its launch on December 4th 2020, most efforts have focused on defining and developing concepts associated with the main tasks of the Observatory (monitoring, dashboard, support to R&I, citizen engagement). Efforts have also been made to consolidate and enhance the capacity and functionality of the European Soil Data Centre (ESDAC), which is at the heart of the Observatory.
Major developments for 2021 included the establishment of an interservice Steering Committee (chaired by the Director of JRC Sustainable Resources Directorate), the support to the EU Mission “A Soil Deal for Europe", the development of the knowledge base on soil through research at the JRC, and the organisation of the 1st EUSO Stakeholder Forum.
The EUSO Stakeholder Forum was attended by over 1 000 participants over a three-day period in October 2021. In this sense, it succeeded in bringing a EUSO community together and in establishing a two-way dialogue with its user base. A summary of the event is presented in this report. EUSO activities will intensify in 2022.