Soil erosion is one of the principal drivers of land degradation, with numerous onsite effects on soil availability and quality, and off-site impacts in freshwater environments. The environmental, economic and political impacts of land degradation motivate a comprehensive scientific understanding of the physical processes controlling soil detachment, transport and deposition at a range of spatial and temporal scales. This knowledge has high relevance when developing measurement and modelling techniques, and suggesting conservation strategies to farmers, land managers and policy makers.
This session will discuss the most recent scientific developments in soil erosion sciences and closely associated land degradation processes in agriculture, forest and rangelands. Spanning across multiple disciplines, this session will naturally integrate all driving forces of erosion (hydrological, aeolian, mechanical) focussing on water, wind, tillage and harvest (SLCH) erosion as well as the numerous anthropogenic factors which interact with these processes.
The following topics will form the areas of presentation and discussion:
• Measurements - by means of field studies or laboratory experiments (e.g. from interrill to gully erosion).
• Monitoring - short to long-term assessments, by means of local assessments or remote sensing techniques.
• Modelling approaches – innovative simulation techniques from plot to global scale, addressing current and future land condition and climate change drivers.
• Mitigation and restoration – to address on-site and off-site impacts on soils and water.
Our objective is to discuss soil erosion processes and their impacts, while exploring strategies which support stakeholders (farmers, land managers or policy makers) and ongoing initiatives such as the Soil Monitoring Law in the European Union, the target of land degradation neutrality by 2030, and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021-2030).