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The decline of soil fertility is recognized by the European Union (EU) as the cause of yields reduction in many arable lands. The Soil Thematic Strategy proposed by the European Commission in 2006, identified the decline of organic matter as one of the main soil threats in EU. Organic carbon content is a recognised indicator of soil quality. Several studies have investigated this relationship through long-term field level experiments. This thesis presents a different approach: starting from data and information at EU level, a regional case study is investigated. The general objective of this thesis is to evaluate and quantify the impact of specific management practices in preserving or sequestering soil organic carbon in EU and regionally. The thesis is structured in five chapters: the first is a general introduction on the need for preserving soil organic carbon in the agricultural land and a review on the relevant legislation at international and European level. The second is a scoping chapter that presents a comparison on the available data on organic carbon content at EU level. The third chapter is a meta-analysis on soil organic carbon sequestration data available in scientific literature and reflection the management practices applied at EU scale. In the fourth chapter, the CENTURY model is applied at regional level in order to estimate the actual values of soil organic carbon stock and to model the implementation of the most promising management practices in two different climatic scenarios. The last chapter outlines the general conclusions and recommendations.

The decline in soil organic carbon (SOC) is recognized as one of the eight (8) soil threats expressed in the European Union Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection (EC, 2006). In 2010, the European Soil Data Centre (ESDAC) collected SOC and soil erosion data in collaboration with the 38 countries of the European Environment Information and Observation Network for soil (EIONET-SOIL). The data collection followed the INSPIRE specifications for a grid of 1km x 1km grid cells and the SOC data expressed the organic carbon density (t/ha) and the SOC content (%) in the 0-30cm depth range. Seven countries (Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, Netherlands, Poland and Slovakia) submitted almost complete datasets on SOC content while a further group of six countries submitted either less than 50% of their coverage or point data which needed additional spatial interpolation. The results were compared with the modeled European SOC data of OCTOP (Jones et al, 2005). The comparison concluded that the SOC (%) in the average modeled OCTOP dataset values are almost double than the collected EIONET-SOIL data in North-East and Central Europe (Panagos et al, 2013). In Netherlands and Poland, the difference is explained due to peats which have been drained in the last 20-30 years while in Denmark, Austria and Slovakia, the pedotransfer rule (PTR) of the model OCTOP had as output much higher SOC values than the ones provided by the countries. Instead, in Northern Italy both modeled and EIONET-SOIL datasets were quite close. Regarding the SOC Stocks, the sum the provided data for the 6 participating countries were: Bulgaria: 315 Tg, Denmark: 370 Tg, Netherlands: 299 Tg (77% coverage), Poland: 1,753 Tg (70% coverage), Italy: 994 Tg (57% coverage) and Slovakia: 122Tg (54% coverage). The SOC stocks were also compared with the amount of SOC in Europe based on OCTOP dataset (Schils et al., 2008). The results suggested that the current estimates of SOC Stock in Europe in the topsoil could be much less than the 73-79 Pg, as reported by Schils et al (2008). A more comprehensive pan-European estimation of SOC will take place after a new data collection round during 2013-2014 will be finished, with the expected contribution of more EIONET countries., JRC.H.5-Land Resources Management

CAPRESE has led to a better understanding of the potential of using specific land management practices in preserving and increasing the stock of organic carbon in the agricultural soils of the EU. The scientific literature relating to a range of carbon sequestration measures has been synthesised and evaluated for their potential applicability. Land management has a significant impact on SOC stocks with a number of measures clearly leading to carbon emissions. Conversely, a number of practices can be used to preserve and increase SOC levels. A novel modelling platform suggests that existing assessments of the SOC stock associated with agricultural topsoil in the EU may be over-estimating the current pool by around 24%. The project shows a topsoil SOC pool of 16 Gt., 7.4 and 5.4 Gt respectively between arable and pasture. The model shows that grassland conversion to cropland can have a strong negative impact on the overall C balance in the EU and consequently should be preserved (together with peatlands). Promising management practices for sequestering SOC include cover crops, complex rotation including residue management and reduced tillage. Such measures give C sequestration rates of up to 0.5 t C ha-1 yr-1. However, their effect was strongly dependent on the spatial and temporal extent considered and the scenarios clearly show strong regional differences in the performance of measures. An integrated approach in which measures are combined, could have a significant impact. An implementation scenario of a 12% uptake of mitigation measures gave a cumulated sequestration value of 101 Mt by 2020. Increased areas and variation in implementation patterns could give rise to higher values. Extensive and comparable data on the financial aspects of the implementation and cost-benefit of measures are limited or absent. Substantial effort is required to address these issues. Simplistic scenario analysis shows that on the basis of a conservative implementation of mitigation measures, a SOC stock with a perceived trading value of €500 million could be established by 2020. Such values imply that the implementation of the practices considered would be cost efficient compared to non-agricultural mitigation measures While calculations at farm-scale are difficult, agricultural systems and proportion of land that could be made available to SOC management schemes, there is a perceived positive cost-benefit to C preservation and mitigation measures. Return for grasslands where sequestration and preservation rates are higher would clearly be greater. A cost benefit calculated with the CAPRI (FT) model. Indicated no loss in agricultural income from a 5% conversion to grassland with in turn resulted in a value of the CO2 sequestered in the soil as €20.98 t-1 CO2. Comprehensive data on the impact of the implementation of the measures on production and the market are difficult to define as these macro-scale models do not consider the technical details associated with the specific measures that need to be applied to sequester SOC. However, the studies tend to indicate that that impacts on production could occur but these would be of low magnitude and regionally variable. From an economic perspective, the financial implications of the grassland scenario implemented in CAPRI (FT) model, it can be stated that the CAP premium implications are negligible. This is derived from the fact that as most of the direct payments premiums are now decoupled from production the change in the land use derived from the scenario setting is not affecting the total amount of the direct payments. From a policy perspective, it is important that existing good stewardship of land for maintaining existing SOC stocks should be recognised as a premium in comparison to simply sequestration of OC. Such an approach would be an incentive not to engage in conversion of organic-rich soils to other uses which could lead to a decrease in SOC stocks., JRC.H.5-Land Resources Management

MOSYSS is a project launched in June 2010 by the Agriculture, Forestation and Fisheries Department of the Marche Region in Italy. It has been coordinated by the Regional Soil Observatory as part of the assessment activities of the Rural Development Plan (RDP) Marche 2007-2013 as laid down in the Common Monitoring and Assessment Framework. Among the objectives there is the creation of a permanent soil monitoring system for the whole Marche territory, combining technical and scientific requirements (e.g. rigor and representativeness) whilst optimizing financial and organizational resources. The information obtainable from the monitoring system could potentially be upscale, on a functional basis, in other existing soil and biodiversity monitoring networks at national and European level. The main function of the project is to investigate soils starting from their intrinsic properties ( e.g. chemical, physical or biological) to obtain a detailed evaluation of their current "quality" status, and to monitor, over time, changes in these parameters by repeating the monitoring campaign at pre-established time intervals., JRC.H.5-Land Resources Management

The decrease of fertility in European soils is fully recognized both from the scientific arena and from the institutional bodies. Soil Organic Matter (SOM) decline is on the agenda of the Thematic Strategy for Soil Protection of the European Commission and the implementation of pilot Long Term Experiments (LTE) to detect Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) changes are considerably increasing. Several are the bodies that in the past have started national inventories of forested areas, REDD mechanism is nonstop aiming to reduce emissions from forest, and the role of peatlands in climate change has been widely debated. While the integration of agricultural soils, climate change influence and food security in Europe is a topic under investigation. Fighting hunger in a sustainable way is on the agenda of the European Union food security policy and the Joint Research Centre’s (JRC) role is to build a cross-disciplinary approach between the science and policy to take actions. Several studies on SOC changes and the best management for C sequestration are continuously appearing, but how to deal with a growing population and the related food demand in the context of a climate change scenario is unknown. The following paper gives an overview of the activities carried out in the JRC - SOIL Action with a specific focus on the agricultural soils and their content in Organic Carbon (OC). In the Appendix a short paragraph cover the potential application of nuclear and isotopic techniques to support the knowledge of SOM and OC sequestration dynamics., JRC.H.5-Land Resources Management

The international conference on SOIL CARBON SEQUESTRATION for climate, food security and ecosystem services – linking science, policy and action (SCS2013) took place in Reykjavik Iceland on 27. – 29. May 2013. The conference was organized by the Soil Conservation Service of Iceland, the Agricultural University of Iceland and the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission (Collaboration Agreement No 31059) in partnership with a group of international and UN agencies, universities and non-governmental organizations. The scientific soil community acknowledges that there is an urgent need to communicate better the value of soil carbon to a broader public. The message so far has not actively reached the media, the public and policy makers. The SCS2013 conference brought all together a broad different spectrum of soil carbon experts, in order to link science, policy and action on soil carbon sequestration issues. Approximately 200 people from 40 countries from all continents attended the conference: young and high level scientists; present and future leaders in restoration and land management; administrators and policymakers. The conference received extensive media coverage, both in Iceland and globally. Despite coming from different countries and backgrounds, with varied scientific interests and convictions, the overall message was that soil and his management, specifically soil carbon, needs be a substantial part of the solution in mitigating climate change, ensuring food security and providing ecosystem services. Furthermore soil conservation, preservation and restoration could be considered as “win-win” processes for meeting other goals. The SCS2013 conference represents an example of bridge between scientists, land managers and policy makers. The EC was actively involved in the conference and is still willing to bridge the communication gap between science and policy and to continue to act as interface. The conference proceedings aim to present how the potential role of soil carbon sequestration has been discussed along different sessions (forest/cropland/revegetation/desertification/wetland/rangeland/verification) and from different perspectives., JRC.H.5-Land Resources Management