Resolutions of the 17^th World Congress of Soil Science Bangkok   Thailand 

August 14-21, 2002

DAY OF THE SOIL

The IUSS resolves that the responsible worldwide organizations are addressed to install an annual day of the soil (preferably december 5)

WORLD SOILS AGENDA

Recognizing that land users are unable to tackle the challenges of sustainable land management solely on their own initiative;

Concerned by the fact that soil and land degradation remains a largely unresolved problem of
global environmental change;

Encouraged by numerous local to national actions undertaken in many parts of the world;

Convinced of the need for concerted international action that addresses soil issues at a global level;

The IUSS decides to actively promote the "World Soils Agenda" of its Working Group
"International Actions for the Sustainable Use of Soils" (IASUS), and in particular the
following tasks:

1.        Assessing the status and trends of soil degradation at a global scale;

2.        Defining impact indicators and tools for monitoring and evaluation;

3.        Developing principles, technologies and approaches, and enabling frameworks for
           sustainable land management, with attention to more field research (soil survey
           and related activities);

4.        Identifying an international, multi-disciplinary network for soil issues;

5.        Establishing an international (inter-governmental) panel on soils;

6.        Providing guidance to develop and implement national soil policies;

7.        Promoting initiatives for sustainable land management;

8.        Ensuring inclusion of soil-related issues in development programmes;

GLOBAL ENHANCEMENT OF SOIL ORGANIC MATTER

Given

that enhanced soil organic matter reduces the net rate of increase in greenhouse gases,
 increases plant productivity, and improves environmental quality,

 that soil organic matter is a key component in nutrient cycling for crop production
and environmental quality, and is an important determinant of soil physical, chemical and
biological characteristics,

that our soils, along with water, air and sun are the major resources that sustain our food supply
and terrestrial ecosystems, and

that global climate change, food security and environmental quality are interrelated issues
of importance to all nations and our planet, and these can be favorably and
simultaneously addressed by global enhancement of soil organic matter, 

SOIL INVENTORIES FOR COMBATING FOOD INSECURITY

Recognizing

that matching crops and practices to soils and weather conditions is possible through crop
simulation models provided reliable assessment of soil and climate is locally available, and

that developments of pedotransfer functions, geostatistics, applied time series, and
regionalized variable analysis in soil science now provide rapid, cost-effective methods
for making reliable local assessments of soil and climate,

The IUSS with its historical record of achievement and world-wide leadership should take
advantage of its new scientific structure of divisions, commissions and workgroups

to initiate and sustain a world-wide multidivisional project to accelerate the development
of appropriate spatial and temporal soil inventories that match local and regional crop
production requirements, and

to cooperate with ICSU and other international organizations and agencies for combating
food insecurity in all nations.

In this context, it recognises the good efforts made by the IUSS Working Group on
Global and National Digital Data Bases on Soil and Terrain Conditions (SOTER; see
report on Symposium 44 at this Congress) in cooperation with FAO and other
international organizations, and their application in promoting world-wide
food security; it recommends that the SOTER efforts be accelerated, with the full
use of new technical methods [as outlined above], and with increased financial resources
such as to be made available in the framework of the Task Force on Hunger that forms
part of the UN Millennium Development Goals Program.

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