The May edition of the EU Soil Observatory (EUSO) newsletter is now available, providing the latest highlights and insights on soil-related research and policy developments within the European Union.
This report highlights the main activities and outcomes of EUSO in 2025. During this period, the EUSO continued to be the principal provider of soil-related data and policy support at the EU-level. The Bulletin provides an overview of the policy support provided by the EUSO as well as its activities regarding EU-wide soil monitoring and sharing data and knowledge about EU soils. The report also highlights the 55 scientific papers, 10 technical reports and 15 datasets published by EUSO in 2025.
This dataset contains the concentrations of a set of heavy metals from samples taken during the LUCAS 2009/2012 and 2018 campaigns. For 2009/2012 there are ca 21000 records covering 14 elements. For 2018 there are ca 1000 records covering 11 elements. The data and metadata are now available on ESDAC.
EUSO Forum 2026 - Call for abstracts: How can AI help us to achieve healthy soils?
The first part of the EUSO Stakeholders Forum 2026 will take place in June, and will focus on the role of AI-driven technologies to achieve healthy soils by 2050. The online event will highlight the possible role AI tools can play in soil health assessments and in extrapolating soil health data in time and space. It will also discuss AI-driven decision support systems to support sustainable soil management.
Call for presentations: We invite specialists with innovative AI-oriented solutions on soil health to provide a title plus an abstract (300 words) for a presentation by 27.05.2026 to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
More information about the call for contributions and the relevant topics can be found in the EUSO Stakeholders Forum 2026 page - PART II
Agendas and registration form will be available soon.
Soil Monitoring Law - EUSO/EEA Technical Workshop
Shaping Europe’s soil future starts here with the launch of the EUSO/EEA Technical Workshop. A dynamic series of webinars from May through the autumn, bringing together leading experts, policymakers, and stakeholders. Co‑organised with DG ENV and the EEA, the first webinar, held on 20 May, will be dedicated to the scientific knowledge for setting non-binding sustainable target values (STVs) and operational trigger values (OTVs) of the Soil Monitoring Law for soil contamination (metals) in the morning, and soil erosion in the afternoon.Link to Stakeholders page and Agenda
Relaunch of the EUSO data collection on erosion plot data (EU_ERPlot initiative)
Our data compilation and harmonisation is progressing, however, our analysis indicates that a significant portion of data is still out there. As a result, we will re-open the call for contributions in order to target data generated over the past 10 years.EU_ERPlot is a collaborative European network bringing together researchers to build an open-access database of soil erosion measurements at plot scale. Led by the EU Soil Observatory, this voluntary, unfunded initiative aims to bring together datasets from across Europe to improve our understanding of soil erosion under diverse environmental, land use, and climate conditions. All significant contributors will be acknowledged and invited as co-authors in the first EU_ERPlot data publication.
By addressing a specific request from the European Parliament, the European Commission (EC) Joint Research Centre (JRC) aims at enhancing the understanding of drought effects and impacts on soil productivity in the European Union (EU), more in general on soil health, and at looking at measures that can reduce the associated risks. Such evidence will contribute to shape the path of the EU towards building drought resilience and enhancing its preparedness. It will also contribute to the objectives of the recently launched Water Resilience Strategy.
