Innovative soil management practices across Europe
Documentation of innovative soil management practices in Europe will provide information on regional and local practices and conditions. Online interactive maps, description, data and graphic will be accessble to the public.
The aim of the project i-SoMPE is to, as the project name indicates, document innovative soil management practices in Europe. The documentation will be used for exchange of knowledge between countries on current and innovative soil management practices and to develop a framework for assessing the current and potential area of application of soil management practices across Europe.
Regional and local collection of data for the inventory
All partners of the EJP SOIL programme contribute with data from their country and local regions. So far, 58 soil management practices, their current adoption and their potential diffusion in Europe have been documented. Small scale, local and/or highly innovative soil management practices developed by farmers, research centres or private partners are highlighted and described.
‘Direct seeding’ of a cover crop is an example of a soil management practice in Belgium, France and Germany. Cover crop grazing is mainly developed with sheep, but can be done with other animals (poultry, cattle, etc.). The choice of grazing animals depends, among other things, on the pedoclimatic conditions of the site. If the soil tends to have a low bearing capacity in winter, which is the intermediate crop season, with much humidity and rain, heavy animals like cattle risk to alter the structure of the grazed soil. With sheep there is no complication regarding this issue.
Photo: Sophie Herremans, Serveau project, Rhisnes 2020
The thorough documentation enables identifying possible constraints to be aware of in the adoption of the soil management practices. The data will be useful for assessing the potential area of application of practices.
Click here to watch the iSoMPE video.
The data will be unified in an inventory that will be published as an online interactive application, with maps, description, data and graphics. Anyone interested in agricultural soil management will be able to access the online inventory through the EJP SOIL website.
About i-SoMPE
Goal: By using a surveying approach, i-SoMPE will aim to documents innovative farming practice.
All 25 partners of EJP SOIL are involved in i-SoMPE
For further information:
Project coordinator: Frederic Vanwindekens: E-mail: f.vanwindekens@cra.wallonie.be