1 Sofia 2005 Luca Montanarella Towards the EU Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection

2 Sofia 2005 Policies for a Sustainable Use of the Soil Resource National –USA, Germany, United Kingdom, etc…. Trans-national (regional) –EU Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection, Alpine Convention, Euro-Mediterranean Partnership Global –MEAs: UNFCCC, CBD, UNCCD

3 Sofia 2005 US Soil Conservation Act 1935 The Dust bowl

4 Sofia 2005 US Soil Conservation Act 1935 Recognition of the problem Establishment of the US Soil Conservation Service Participatory approach with strong local partnership (Soil Conservation Districts) Establishment of technical guidelines Implementation of soil conservation measures Monitoring of results

5 Sofia 2005 NRCS National Resources Inventory

6 Sofia 2005 Bruxelles, le COM(2002) 179 final COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS Towards a Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection

7 Sofia 2005 Food and other biomass production –Agriculture Storage, filtering, and transformation –Water protection Habitat and gene pool –Nature protection Physical and cultural environment for mankind –Archeology and cultural heritage Source of raw materials –Peat, Sand, Clay, etc…. Main functions of soils:

8 Sofia 2005 Threats to soil as identified in COM(2002) 179 Erosion Decline in organic matter Soil contamination Soil sealing Soil compaction Decline in soil biodiversity Salinisation Floods and landslides

9 Sofia 2005 Council June 2002 EESCSeptember 2002 CoRFebruary 2003 EPMay 2003 Opinions of EU Institutions

10 Sofia 2005 Participatory approach Soil mailbox: Soil internet site: policies: Soil Soil electronic library and discussion site: CIRCA (june 03)

11 Sofia 2005 Soil Policy Development Organisational Set-up Advisory Forum Chair DG ENV Stakeholders meetings Chair DG ENV TWG 1 Monitoring Germany/JRC Co-chair UK TWG 2 Erosion Spain/Belgium Co-chair EEB TWG 3 Organic matter France Co-chair IUSS/FEAD TWG 4 Contamination Austria/NL Co-chair EEA ISWG = Interservice Working Group TWG = Technical Working Group Commission ISWG Chair DG ENV Technical co-ordination group and secretariat Chair DG ENV TWG5 Research W. Blum/ RTD Co-chair ELO

12 Sofia

13 Sofia 2005 The Pan-European Soil Erosion Risk Assessment - PESERA - is a process-based and spatially distributed model to quantify soil erosion by water and assess its risk across Europe PESERA Soil Erosion Risk Assessment

14 Sofia 2005 PESERA Soil Erosion Risk Assessment

15 Sofia 2005 Aggregated results

16 Sofia 2005 National reports

17 Sofia 2005 Observed sediment export Sediment volume t/ha/year Erosion Amount of sediment SDR = Total volume of erosion Sediment delivery Predicted sediment export Reservoir Basin Predicted soil erosion t/ha/year

18 Sofia 2005 Validation of research - building confidence Central Belgium (Verstraeten and Poesen, K.U.Leuven) Czech Republic (Dostal et al., CVUT Prague) Spain (Avendano Salas et al., Devente, Poesen and Verstraeten) Italy (Bazzoffi et al., ISSDS, Firenze)

19 Sofia 2005 Develop regionalized approaches for risk assessment

20 Sofia 2005

21 Sofia 2005 Global soil protection policies: Synergies between the 3 Rio Conventions

22 Sofia 2005 M. Robert, 2004

23 Sofia 2005

24 Sofia 2005 European Soil Database: WRB classification

25 Sofia 2005 European land cover CORINE + USGS Eurasia Avg Annual Temp Global Historical Clim Network Soil DB 1:1M Pedo transfer rules (van Ranst, 1995) Model Spatial processing at 1km resolution soil type texture Topsoil Organic Carbon Content (30cm)

26 Sofia 2005 Organic carbon content (%) in the surface horizon (0-30 cm) of soils National Soil Organic Carbon stocks (0-30cm) in Gt Model outputAggregated results Topsoil Organic Carbon Content (30cm)

27 Sofia 2005 Stocks of C in soils (0-0.3 m) in France - Arrouays et al. (2002) 3,1 Pg OC content in topsoils (0-0.3 m) in France - European Soil Database 5,0 Pg

28 Sofia 2005 Soil carbon Initial cultivation C<0 C 0 C>0 Effect on atmospheric CO 2 ~ Management change Agricultural land Emission Sequestration time Natural land increase decrease We need to detect changes over time: Monitoring!

29 Sofia 2005 %OC FYM FYM since 1885 FYM since 1968 NPK No fertilisers or manures FYM applied at 35 t ha -1 yr -1 Goulding Monitoring SOM at Rothamsted Declining soil organic matter

30 Sofia 2005 Change in organic matter content by commune, in Brittany, between and [M. Robert, pers. comm.]

31 Sofia 2005 Member States JRC EEA Streamlining the flow of policy relevant soil information in Europe Reporting policy relevant soil data aggregated by administrative units ACCESS HARMONISATIONREPORTING Georeferenced Soil Database for Europe Soil Mapping Unit (Soilscape) Normalised Statistical Unit

32 Sofia 2005 The way forward Improve our policy relevant soil information. Delineate areas at risk of soil degradation by the various threats. Implement existing legislation and MEAs. Monitor the impact of existing legislation on soil protection. Develop (if necessary) specific legislative instruments for soil protection.