Project manager: Leonello Serva Corresponding author: ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS DEVELOPMENT FOR ITALIAN SOILS (SIAS - PROJECT): FROM REGIONAL DATA TO HARMONISED NATIONAL INFORMATION SIAS Network A. Di Fabbio, M. Di Leginio, F. Fumanti, I. Rischia & L. Serva (APAT); P. Giandon & I. Vinci (ARPAV); I. Chiucchiarelli & S. Santucci (ARSSA Abruzzo); G. Aramini & R. Paone (ARSSA Calabria); A. Cocchiarella (ARSIAM Molise); M. Tiberi, G. Ciabocco & L. Rossini (ASSAM Marche); P. Bazzoffi (CRA - ISSDS, Firenze); S. Brenna (ERSAF Lombardia); S. Barbieri & G. Michelutti (ERSA Friuli Venezia Giulia); M. Piazzi & P. Martalò (IPLA Piemonte); L. Montanarella & P. Panagos (JRC-IES, Ispra); M. Thalheimer (Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano); G. Orsingher (Provincia Autonoma di Trento); L. Viviano (Regione Basilicata); A. DAntonio & M. R. Ingenito (Regione Campania); M. Guermandi, N. Laruccia & N. Filippi (Regione Emilia-Romagna); F. Bellino (Regione Puglia); G. Loj (Regione Sardegna); F. Guaitoli, M. G. Matranga (Regione Siciliana); A. Vinci & L. Gardin (Regione Toscana); G. Primieri (Regione Umbria); S. Madrau (Università di Sassari). Erosion and loss of organic matter are two of the threats identified by the European Communication Towards a Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection (2002/179). According to the recent Proposal of Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing a framework for the protection of soil (COM 2006/232) Member States shall identify the risk areas for soil erosion and soil organic matter decline using at least elements like soil typological units, soil texture, soil organic carbon, soil density, etc. The Italian policy making and scientific community is also currently very much interested in erosion and organic matter content of soils. The SIAS project aims to build soil environmental indicators (erosion and organic matter content) based on organisation of regional data (1: soil map) and according with the directive proposal for establishing an infrastructure for spatial information in Europe (INSPIRE). The main actors of the SIAS project are: the Italian Agency for Environmental Protection and for Technical Services (APAT) is the financing body. It contributes, in collaboration with CRA-ISSDS, in defining the methodological approach and assist in developing the indicators; the Regional Agency for Environmental Protection of Veneto (ARPAV) is the technical co-ordinator. It organises data collection and participates to decisions about the methodological approach on erosion and organic matter content of soil indicators. Finally, it will elaborate erosion and organic matter content of soils related to territorial area in agreement with the common strategy of environmental indicators development. the Regional Soil Surveys are supplier of the data. They moreover participate to decisions about methodological approach on erosion and organic matter content. Finally, they will elaborate erosion and organic matter content of soils related to their territorial areas in agreement with the common strategy for environmental indicators development. JRC, Land Management and Natural Hazards Unit, provides the technical support and implementation of the methodology to upscale the data in European level. The development of soil environmental indicators will be based on clustering of regional data. INTRODUCTION METHODOLOGY Fig. 1. Examples of up-scaled data related to potential erosion (USLE): a) cell size = 250 m x 250 m b) cell size = 1km x 1 km. Land Resources and Soil Protection Department Geological Survey of Italy Italian Agency for Environmental Protection and Technical Services Partner contribution is crucial for the development of the exchange format, which is initially set as a basic group of features and, lately, better defined, taking into account both the different partner experience and the differences in soil data availability. The shared approach makes the exchange format an effective tool for building up a common harmonised information system. Methodological approach will be therefore based on using a reference cell of adequate dimensions (grid size = 1 km x 1 km) to which pedological information is linked on the basis of INSPIRE criteria. This could be the first step to reach an harmonisation of soil information in Italy periodically updated by regional soil surveys that are the producers of soil related information in the country. First examples show that up-scaling from 1: to a grid of 1km x 1km doesnt involve an important loss of information (Fig. 1). The following table shows some comparisons between different scales and statistical approaches: the best way to approximate regional data is to consider the frequency distribution (pixel size = 1 km x 1 km). RELEVANCE a) b) POTENTIAL EROSION 250 m1 Km Average 1 Km + Frequency 5 Km Average 5 Km + Frequency None Very low02021 Low23212 Moderate Slightly high High Very high Extremely high10100 The main results of the SIAS project will be: an exploiting at most the existing regional information; a low-cost harmonisation of pedological data; a first step towards interregional harmonisation of selected indicators (soil erosion and organic matter content) with a common methodology shared by regional experts; the final product will be certified by regions (which are also the data owner) and the output will be coherent with regional thematic maps.