Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SOILGUARD (Sustainable soil management to unleash soil biodiversity potential and increase environmental, economic and social wellbeing.)
Période du rapport: 2021-06-01 au 2022-11-30
The aim of SOILGUARD is to boost the sustainable use of soil biodiversity to protect soil multifunctionality and increase economic, social, and environmental wellbeing. This will be achieved by co-creating strong evidence of the links between soil management, soil biodiversity, soil multifunctionality and human wellbeing across biogeographical regions. A holistic ground-breaking Soil Biodiversity and Wellbeing Framework will provide this evidence, being validated in an innovative experimental design, combining multiple study sites across biomes and regional land degradation gradients with in-situ climate change simulations. Thus, creating the evidence to fill the gaps of knowledge and quantify the environmental, economic, and social consequences of unsustainable soil management. All knowledge co-created will be shared through SOILGUARDIANS, a predictive tool based on the causal links between soil biodiversity, soil multifunctionality and wellbeing to support stakeholders on the transition to sustainable soil management. The SOILGUARD’s network of knowledge, and the connectivity enabled by SOILGUARDIANS app will create an ecosystem of innovation for users to showcase, learn and share experiences. SOILGUARD will co-create evidence-based conservation recommendations for policies and frameworks at EU and international level and will support Member States commitments under the Global Soil Partnership. SOILGUARD has the support and engagement of the GSP, GSBI, SOIL-BON, ITPS, FAO and IPBES.
We have also produced land degradation gradients for seven EU NUTS-2 regions (in 5 biogeographical regions and 3 biomes: cropland, grassland and forest) and 3 equivalent regions in Argentina, Cameroon and Thailand. These degradation levels are calculated using information on soil carbon, soil erosion and soil texture. Land degradation maps are available for the 10 regions tackled and will be made public in SOILGUARD´s website by 2023. Across these, we have selected 234 sites where the current status of soil biodiversity, in relation to land degradation and (un)sustainable management, is being assessed. Tailor-made sampling protocols for soil biodiversity and soil multifunctionality assessment were developed and harmonized as much as possible with methods used in the SoilBON initiative, LUCAS and the Global Soil Partnership. Soil biodiversity and soil multifunctionality for each of the sites is being analysed following the framework.
To increase our understanding of the effect of climate change on soil biodiversity and soil multifunctionality, we have produced regional-specific climate projections for 7 sites distributed across the same 7 regions previously described. The calculated indexes of precipitation reduction during expected droughts were simulated in the seven countries in summer 2022 using rainout shelters. Soil samples were collected after the three-month simulation and soil biodiversity and soil multifunctionality are being analysed following the framework. The feasibility to accurately simulate heatwaves in real soil environments was studied through 5 pilot experiments in Denmark. Preparations for drought and heatwave simulations in 2023 are ongoing.
We use Nature Contributions to People, accounting for the diversity of values from a more holistic perspective. During this period, we have developed an integrated valuation approach to assess the effects of the soil management strategies and stressors. Thus, aiming to pursue a pluralistic approach to valuation to increase the understanding of how sustainable soil management impacts soil biodiversity, soil-mediated nature contributions to people and human wellbeing. Our valuation approach mixes behaviour-based methods and statement-based methods on various scales and in various regions and address different stakeholder groups.
During this period, we also worked to build the conceptual network of linked nodes which will underpin the evidence chains relating stressors, soil biodiversity, soil multifunctionality and nature contributions to people.
A first version of the Data Platform was designed and started to be implemented, a model repository is also being created and we are also starting the co-creation process of the users’ interface as first steps to create the SOILGUARDIANS app.
All the required communication tools and materials have been created, and both the communication strategy as well as the dissemination and exploitation strategy were developed and started to be implemented through communication and dissemination actions.
The key expected results, and their potential impact, until the end of the project will be: i) increased knowledge about the global distribution of soil biodiversity and its multifunctionality to increase our understanding of the current status, challenges and potential of soil biodiversity, ii) evidence on the impact of soil management practices on the environmental, economic and social value of soil-mediated nature contributions to people to quantify the consequences of unsustainable soil management and, iii) the integration of evidence chains within the SOILGUARDIANS app, and recommendations to contribute to the understanding, management and conservation of soil biodiversity.