Pedosphere 13(1): 1--10, 2003
ISSN 1002-0160/CN 32-1315/P
©2003 Soil Science Society of China
Published by Elsevier B.V. and Science Press
| Land quality assessment and monitoring: The next challenge for soil science |
H. ESWARAN and J. KIMBLE |
| U.S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service, PO Box 2890, Washington DC 20013 (USA) |
| ABSTRACT |
| Sustainable land management(SLM)is the key to harmonizing environmental and ecological concernsof society with the economic realities of producing adequate food and fiber of high quality and ensuring abasic minimal quality of life. The aim of SLM is to maintain the integrity of the biophysical land resourcebase, but it can only be realized if land users understand the impacts of land management options on theirlands but also on other off-site areas and can optimize the socioeconomic and environmental benefits of theirchoice. To facilitate this, the contribution of soil survey organizations would be through the assessment andmonitoring of land quality. Land quality is a measure of the ability of land to perform specific functions and isderived by an integration of soil survey information with other environmental. and if necessary, socioeconomicinformation. The desired reliability influences the operational scale of the assessment. Such an assessmentwould assist in:1)locating homologous areas for research sites or for transferring technologies; 2) providing the geographic basis for systems analysis (e. g. by modeling); 3) serving as a basis for local, national and global resource assessment and monitoring; 4) providing an ecosystem context for land use, assessments of temporal and spatial variability, and impact of human interventions; 5) serving as a framework for more detailed assessment for all levels of interest; and 6) evaluating global issues such as food security, impacts of climate change, biodiversity monitoring, and addressing desertification. Based on an evaluation of the progress made in soil resource inventories and considering the demands of the environment focused world, the paper considers the need for countries to mount such a program. The authors believe that this is the next demand of soil science and that. we can fulfill our social contract by periodically providing such information on the state of a nation's land resource. |
| Key Words: degradation, land quality, monitoring of soils, sustainable land management |
| Citation: Eswaran, H. and Kimble, J. 2003. Land quality assessment and monitoring: The next challenge for soil science. Pedosphere. 13(1): 1-10. |
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