Resources

Climate change adaptation, mitigation and food security may be addressed at the same time by enhancing soil organic carbon (SOC) sequestration through environmentally sound land management practices.

Julia Le Noë, Gilles Billen, Bruno Mary, Josette Garnier. Following the COP 21, it has been widely recognized that agricultural soils may contribute toward mitigating or enhancing climate change depending on their behavior as a sink or a source of carbon (C) to the atmosphere.

Emilio J. Gonzalez-Sanchez, Oscar Veroz-Gonzalez, Gordon Conway, Manuel Moreno-Garcia, Amir Kassam, Saidi Mkomwa, Rafaela Ordoñez-Fernandez, Paula Triviño-Tarradas, Rosa Carbonell-Bojollo. Africa is the smallest contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions among the continents, but the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

Policymakers and investors have perceived securing soil organic carbon as too difficult, with uncertain returns. But new technical, policy and financial opportunities offer hope for rapid progress.

Martin Wiesmeier, Livia Urbanski, Eleanor Hobley, Birgit Lang, Margit von Lützow, Erika Marin-Spiotta, Bas van Wesemael, Eva Rabot, Mareike Ließ, Noelia Garcia-Franco, Ute Wollschläger, Hans-Jörg Vogel, Ingrid Kögel-Knabner. The capacity of soils to store organic carbon represents a key function of soils that is not only decisive for climate regulation but also affects other soil functions.

Rosa Francaviglia, Claudia Di Bene, Roberta Farina, Luca Salvati & José Luis Vicente-Vicente. Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) is considered a proxy of soil health, contributing to food production, mitigation, and adaptation to climate change and other ecosystem services.

The Paris Agreement reached at the COP 21 signals the new centrality of carbon sinks, including soils, as a key means of enabling a net zero carbon global balance through the development of ‘negative emission technologies’.

Ronald Amundson and Léopold Biardeau. The need to stabilize the greenhouse gas concentrations of the atmosphere is the great environmental challenge of this century.

Josh Frydenberg, Minister for the Environment and Energy - 25/1/2018

Soils rich in organic carbon are associated with enhanced agricultural productivity, water cycling, biodiversity and climate change adaptation and mitigation.

Jérôme Balesdent, Isabelle Basile-Doelsch, Joël Chadoeuf, Sophie Cornu, Delphine Derrien, Zuzana Fekiacova & Christine Hatté. The exchange of carbon between soil organic carbon (SOC) and the atmosphere affects the climate and—because of the importance of organic matter to soil fertility—agricultural productivity.

Pierre Barré, Katell Quénéa, Alix Vidal, Lauric Cécillon, Bent T. Christensen, Thomas Kätterer, Andy Macdonald, Léo Petit, Alain F. Plante, Folkert van Oort & Claire Chenu . Our study tests the emerging paradigm that biochemical recalcitrance does not affect substantially long-term (50 years) SOC persistence.

IUCN is a membership Union uniquely composed of both government and civil society organisations. It provides public, private and non-governmental organisations with the knowledge and tools that enable human progress, economic development and nature conservation to take place together.

The “4 per Thousand” and “Adapting African Agriculture” are bold and innovative initiatives adopted at COP21 in Paris and COP22 in Marrakesh, respectively.

Nilovna Chatterjee, P.K.Ramachandran Nair,Saptarshi Chakraborty, Vimala D.Nair. The contribution of agroforestry systems (AFS) to enhance soil organic carbon (SOC) storage in soil layers due to the presence of deep tree roots are of interest in the context of promoting carbon sinks and greenhouse gas mitigation.