LIFE-IP NAdapta-CC will take part in the 4th World Soil Day in Navarre

The Official Association of Agricultural Engineers of Aragon, Navarre and the Basque Country (COIAANPV), in collaboration with the Public University of Navarre (UPNA) and the Department of Rural Development and Environment (DRyMA) of the Government of Navarre have organised the 4th Conference of the World Soil Day of Navarre for this coming Wednesday, 14th December.

The event will start at 18:30 in the Nicolás García de los Salmones Hall in the Los Olivos building of the School of Agricultural Engineering and Biosciences (ETSIAB) of the UPNA in Pamplona. Attendance is free and open to all citizens. It can also be followed online. In both cases, prior registration is required at this link.

Soil nutrient loss is one of the major degradation processes threatening nutrition and is recognised as one of the most important global issues for food security and sustainability.

The lectures of the day

LIFE-IP NAdapta-CC (LIFE16 IPC/ES/000001), the project attached to the Circular Economy and Climate Change Service of the Directorate General for the Environment, will present the current context of the soil at European level and in Navarra, as well as the latest actions being carried out in the region on the adaptability of agrosystems to climate change, through management strategies implemented in this integrated European project, under the leadership of the public company INTIA and with the collaboration of NILSA and the UPNA.

The speakers will be Íñigo Virto Quecedo, head of LIFE-IP NAdapta-CC at the UPNA and university lecturer in the Department of Science, and Miguel Ángel González Moreno, coordination technician and head of communication of LIFE-IP NAdapta-CC in the Circular Economy and Climate Change Service of the Government of Navarra. Francisco Javier Eslava Lecumberri, technician at the Soil and Climatology Department of the Government of Navarra and Néstor Etxaleku López, leader of the Food and Bioeconomy Area at Zabala Innovation Consulting, also collaborated in the presentation.

Rodrigo Antón Sobejano, researcher of the Margarita Salas programme at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment (INRAE), will then talk about soil multifunctionality and ecosystem services in agricultural landscapes, as part of the work being done in the H2020 EJP SOIL SERENA project, and how it can be connected with the LIFE-IP NAdapta-CC project that is being implemented in the Autonomous Community of Navarre in terms of adaptation to climate change.

Finally, Sonia Rodríguez Cruz, scientific researcher at the Institute of Natural Resources and Agrobiology of Salamanca (IRNASA) of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), will talk about the experiences of two European projects. On the one hand, the H2020 EJP SOIL i-SoMPE project, and on the other, the H2020 EJP SOIL EOM4Soil project, both as examples of sustainable soil management practices, and in particular, on the effect of the application of external organic matter in soils under field conditions.

World Soil Day

World Soil Day 2022 has the theme 'Soils, the source of food' and aims to raise awareness of the importance of maintaining healthy ecosystems and human well-being by addressing the growing challenges in soil management, combating soil salinisation, raising soil awareness and encouraging commitment to proactively improve soil health.

The event is held annually on 5 December to highlight the importance of healthy soil and to advocate for the sustainable management of soil resources. It was in June 2013 that the FAO Conference unanimously adopted World Soil Day and called for its official adoption at the 68th UN General Assembly. In December 2013, the UN General Assembly responded by designating 5 December 2014 as the first World Soil Day.

In Navarre, the COIAANPV, the UPNA and the Government of Navarre have been organising these sessions since 2019 with the aim of bringing the importance of soils closer to society and opening up their knowledge to all citizens.