SOB4ES
SOB4ES – Integrating Soil Biodiversity to Ecosystem Services: testing cost-effectiveness of Soil Biodiversity indicators and the provision of soil biodiversity-based Ecosystem Services to build better land management solutions that effectively implement the EU Soil Strategy
- Description
The EU Soil Strategy aims for all EU soils to be healthy by 2050, providing a variety of ecosystem services. To achieve this, soil biodiversity must be integrated into land management and planning. Currently, soil biodiversity is overlooked and not integrated into EU regulations. The research project SOB4ES aims to develop a framework that includes soil biodiversity’s contribution to ecosystem services and test the cost-effectiveness of soil biodiversity indicators. SOB4ES will contribute to the Mission A Soil Deal for Europe by (1) elucidating soil biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and services for major land uses and land use intensity changes, (2) testing the cost-effectiveness of existing indicators for soil biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and services, and (3) evaluating how policy incentives may enhance protection, sustainable management and restoration of soil systems and soil health. By focusing on nine major pedoclimatic (soil type-climate) regions and land uses, SOB4ES will cover the most relevant EU conditions. SOB4ES will also analyse how soil biodiversity relates to aboveground biodiversity and ecosystem services using advanced AI-based approaches and remote sensing.
- Coordinator
- Programme
- Horizon Europe & sub-programmes
- Duration
- 60 months (June 2023 - May 2028)
- Project funding
- € 7,527,676.25
- Project partners
- 19
- Technology readiness level
- 2-4
- Project website
- https://www.sob4es.eu
