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Soils are a vital substrate for agricultural production, play a central role in regulating the global carbon budget, and are a valuable source of biodiversity. Yet estimates of the global area affected by soil and land degradation are continuing to increase. For decades, soil scientists have called for a legally binding, international policy framework to guide the sustainable use of soils, but a…

Highlights • Soils provide humans with 98.8% of our food. • Rapid population growth is unprecedented pressure on soils. • Agricultural intensification is already degrading soils unsustainably. • This degradation is decreasing the long-term ability of soils to produce food. • The Water-Food-Energy nexus must be expanded to the Water-Soil-Food-Energy nexus.

Highlights •There are more than 608 million farms in the world. •Family farms produce roughly 80% of the world’s food in value terms. •Farms smaller than 2 hectares produce roughly 35% of the world’s food. •The largest one percent of farms operating 70 percent of the its farmland. •Agricultural censuses must cover non-household farms. Numerous attempts…

Soil microorganisms, fauna and biological functions are subjected to different potential threats It is possible to map potential threats to soil biodiversity The majority of EU countries have soils with high level of risk to soil biodiversity Soil under pressure is not well protected, actions are needed to preserve soil biodiversity Because of the…

Understanding of the processes governing soil organic carbon turnover is confounded by the fact that C feedbacks driven by soil erosion have not yet been fully explored at large scale. However, in a changing climate, variation in rainfall erosivity (and hence soil erosion) may change the amount of C displacement, hence inducing feedbacks onto the land C cycle. Using a consistent biogeochemistry…