Innovations in soil health monitoring for nature and people

Soil health is the foundation of our food systems. It is also critical for climate change mitigation and adaptation, enhancing above and belowground biodiversity, contributing to ecosystem restoration goals, and increasing food and nutrition security. However, it is estimated that over 40% of the Earth’s surface is degraded, severely limiting the soil’s capacity to deliver these critical ecosystem services.

There is growing momentum around the importance of soil health, from initiatives such as 4p1000, Global Soil Partnership and the UN Food System Summit inspired Coalition of Action for Soil Health.

Investments in soil health are needed in order reach the targets of the UNFCCC, UNCCD , UNCBD as well as the UN Food Systems Summit.

These investments must focus on the barriers that are currently limiting the scaling and adoption of healthy soil practices, most notably in finance mechanisms that reward farmers, creating an enabling policy environment and application of robust monitoring techniques to track changes in soil health over time.

This session will showcase the latest advances in the monitoring of soil health and land restoration, evidence on the relationship between soil health and the provision of multiple ecosystem services, and on how these advances and evidences are informing policy interfaces. Opportunities for improving soil monitoring frameworks application and enhancing the connection of this with policy making will be further discussed during this session.

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