Soil health is foundational to sustaining biodiversity, ensuring food, and water security, mitigating climate change, and supporting human well-being. Yet, despite the centrality of soil to multiple ecosystem services, comprehensive, policy-relevant indicators of soil health are basically missing or remain fragmented across regions and disciplines. This session, "Visions for Soil Health Indicators," brings together diverse perspectives from national and international soil monitoring initiatives to explore emerging frameworks for assessing and communicating soil health. Our aim is to catalyze a robust, interdisciplinary dialogue that connects cutting-edge scientific research with actionable decision-making.
Global efforts such as the European Union’s LUCAS Soil Survey, the Global Soil Partnership (FAO), Soil BON, the U.S. National Soil Monitoring Network, and regional observatories in Africa, Latin America, and Asia offer valuable insights into the development and implementation of soil health indicators. This session will convene speakers from a range of disciplines—including soil ecology, agronomy, environmental policy, and socioeconomics—as well as representatives from governmental agencies, international organizations, land-user groups, and Indigenous communities. Contributions will explore indicator design, data harmonization, scalability, and integration into global and national environmental assessments. Special attention will be given to how soil health metrics can support decision-making for safeguarding soil biodiversity and the ecosystem services it underpins. We welcome abstracts that address methodological innovations, stakeholder engagement processes, and case studies that demonstrate how soil monitoring translates into meaningful environmental governance.