Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
1
Symposium II
Asia-Centric Soil Informatics
Hong, S.Y.1 and Zhang , G.L.2 1National Academy of Agricultural Science, Rural Development Administration, 150 Suin-ro, Suwon 441-
707, Korea ([email protected]; (O) 82-31-290-0344; (F) 82-31-290-0282) 2Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing 210008, China ([email protected])
Scope and Objectives of the Symposium
There are regional and global needs for quantitative soil information for food production, environment monitoring and modeling to plan natural resource management and enhance soil productivity. Soil resources knowledge varies from country to country. We need to review the current status of Soil Information System (SIS) in Asian countries and share technological know-how relevant for establishing a SIS for sustainable crop production and ecosystem management. Also we will understand digital soil mapping techniques to predict soil properties including data collection, data analysis, models, and interpretation & functionality options as one of future technologies to map soils. Asian soil information working group was also organized during the workshop on “A new approach to soil information systems for natural resources management in Asian countries” which was held in November, 2008 in Japan initiated by Food & Fertilizer Technology Center (FFTC). The objectives of the workshop were to review the current status of SIS (or available soil data such as soil map) in participating Asian countries, to exchange relevant information on appropriate SIS for the participating countries, to share technological know-how relevant for establishing a SIS for sustainable crop production among the participant countries, and to discuss the possibility of establishment of an appropriate regional SIS for sustainable crop production in Asian and Pacific Council (ASPAC). GlobalSoilMap.net consortium that aims to make a new digital soil map of the world using state-of-the-art and emerging technologies for soil mapping and predicting soil properties at fine resolution was inaugurated which is an initiative of the Digital Soil Mapping Working Group of the International Union of Soil Sciences IUSS. This new global soil map will be supplemented by interpretation and functionality options that aim to assist better decisions in a range of global issues like food production and hunger eradication, climate change, and environmental degradation (www.globalsoilmap.net). The objectives of this symposium are 1) to review the current status of Soil Information System (or available soil data such as soil map) in Asian countries, 2) to share experiences on surveying and managing soil resources and the development of soil information system and technological know-how relevant for establishing a SIS for sustainable crop production and ecosystem management, and 3) to understand global activities of digital soil mapping to assist better decisions in a range of global issues including food production and hunger eradication, climate change, and environment degradation, in association with the possibility of establishment of an appropriate regional SIS and land management network for Asian countries. Key words: Asian Soil Information System and Network, Soil Resources, Food production, Soil and Agro-ecosystem Management, Digital Soil Mapping
94
2
Introduction of European Soil Portal and Soil Mapping
Panagos, P.1*, Montanarella, L.1 and Van Liedekerke, M.1 1 Land Management and Natural Hazards Unit, Institute for Environment and Sustainability Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, E. Fermi 1, Ispra(VA), IT-21027, Italy,
[email protected]; (Tel) 39-0332-7 5574; (Fax) 39-0332-786394
Abstract The European Soil Portal is the joint contribution of the European Commission and the European Soil Bureau Network (ESBN) to the building of a thematic spatial data infrastructure for soils. This portal, located at http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu , is the place in which all relevant data and information regarding soils at European level has been collected. It serves also as a vehicle to promote the activities of the European Soil Bureau Network. Spatial data collection and processing within this infrastructure is performed according to emerging ideas behind the INSPIRE Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community. INSPIRE deals, among others, with difficulties to identify, access and use available spatial information in Europe. The European Soil Portal has been considered as a success story of networking different soil information in European level. It is mainly built around the European Soil Database (ESDB), which consists of a number of components of which the Soil Geographical Database of Eurasia (SGDBE) at Scale 1:1,000,000 is one. It is a representation of the diversity and spatial variability of the soil coverage across Europe and its neighbouring countries. Key words: Soil Portal, European Soil Database, Web Services, INSPIRE, ESDAC, MEUSIS, Soil Atlas
Introduction The INSPIRE Directive intends to trigger the creation of a European spatial information infrastructure that delivers to
the users integrated spatial information services. These services should allow the users to identify and access spatial or geographical information from a wide range of sources, from the local level to the global level, in an inter-operable way for a variety of uses. The target users of INSPIRE include policy-makers, planners and managers at European, national and local level and the citizens and their organizations. Possible services are the visualization of information layers, overlay of information from different sources, spatial and temporal analysis, etc.
According to one of the INSPIRE principles, the data should be stored, made available and maintained at the most appropriate level in order to avoid duplication. The Soil Portal is the central point in the European Union for access to pan-European soil data and information related to European Soil Policies. The data structure in the European Soil Portal serves as good basis for the development of the European Soil Data Center (ESDAC) that is established within the Joint Research Centre during the European Union 7th Framework Programme (2007-2014). A number of soil related datasets have already been prepared and are available to the public user.
European Soil Database The Soil Geographical Database of Eurasia at scale 1:1,000,000 is part of the European Soil Information System
(EUSIS). It is the resulting product of a collaborative project involving all the European Union and neighbouring countries. It is a simplified representation of the diversity and spatial variability of the soil coverage. The methodology used to differentiate and name the main soil types is based on the terminology of the F.A.O. legend for the Soil Map of the World at scale 1:5,000,000. This terminology has been refined and adapted to take account of the specificities of the landscapes in Europa. It is itself founded on the distinction of the main pedogenetic processes leading to soil differentiation: brunification, lessivage, podzolisation, hydromorphy, etc.
The database contains a list of Soil Typological Units (STU). Besides the soil names they represent, these units are described by variables (attributes) specifying the nature and properties of the soils: for example the texture, the water regime, the stoniness, etc. The geographical representation was chosen at a scale corresponding to the 1:1,000,000. At this scale, it is not feasible to delineate the STUs. Therefore they are grouped into Soil Mapping Units (SMU) to form soil associations and to illustrate the functioning of pedological systems within the landscapes. Each SMU corresponds to a part of the mapped territory and as such is represented by one or more polygons in a geometrical dataset. The vector (geometric) dataset contains more than 50.000 polygons, covering 9 ha minimum area, including more than 2.000.000 vertices and covering data for 73 soil attributes.
S2I1
95
1
Figure 1: European Soil Database in Google Earth Format (KML)
The European Soil Database is the main source of information from which most other data information and services are derived: • “European Soil Database v2 Raster Library” contains raster (grid) data files with cell sizes of 1km x 1km and
10km x 10km for a large number of soil related parameters. These rasters are in the public domain access and allow expert users to use the data for instance to run soil-, water- and air related models. Both the 1km x 1km grids and the 10km x 10km ones fit with ideas from INSPIRE to develop “nested” systems for reporting and updating European soil data at different scales, according to a hierarchy of grids with a common point of origin and standardized location and size of grid cells.
• Google Earth Files (with ".kmz" extension) that correspond to 73 attribute maps derived from the European Soil Database v2 (ESDB v2) for EU27 countries. The ".kmz" files are zipped ".kml" files and are automatically unzipped when opened by the Google Earth application, which can be freely downloaded.
Web Mapping Services and Interoperability
The European Soil Portal also offers a number of on-line applications and services to the public user. Such applications as SOMIS (Soil Internet Mapping Server) and OCTOP (Organic Carbon Topsoil) Map Service come in two variants. The first as a true application, where the Map Server delivers data and determines the user interface (Figure 2). The second variant as a map service to appropriate map clients that succeed in retrieving and combining several maps from several servers and presenting them as one to the user. The latter approach of distributing geographic information via the Internet allows for real-time integration of data from around the world. Such software allows users to exchange, integrate and analyze data in new ways.
The idea behind Web Map Service (WMS) is to produce dynamically maps of spatially referenced data from geographic information. The WMS international standard defines a "map" to be a portrayal of geographic information as a digital image file suitable for display on a computer screen. The WMS specification standardizes the way in which maps are requested by clients and the way that servers describe their data holdings.
96
2
Figure 2: Map Viewer of European Soil Data Center
According to INSPIRE principles, the mapping services have been extended so that it is possible to combine layers of
maps located in different Map servers all around the World, based on internationally accepted Web Map Service (WMS) standards and specifications from the Open GIS Consortium in order to attain the maximum interoperability of data and services.
The user can use simple navigation operations such as Zooming, Panning, Layering, Identifying, Querying and may export customized maps as a PDF Map output. The user-friendly interactive operations allow the user to learn more about this environmental indicator and to raise his interest. On-line Internet information services regarding environmental indicators like Soil Organic Carbon and Soil Erosion, offer to the public added value and knowledge about common environmental problems and the potential impacts it could have on his daily life. The European Soil Portal shows the way offering soil products in even wider accepted map based environments such as the Google Earth community.
European Soil Data Center and support to European Union policies
The European Soil Data Centre (ESDAC) is the thematic centre for soil related data in Europe and has been established according to a decision taken at the end of 2005 by the European Commission's DG ENV, DG JRC, ESTAT and the European Environment Agency (the so-called "group of four" or Go4) to establish ten environmental data centres in Europe.
The European Soil Data Centre (ESDAC) hosts soil related products: Datasets, Documents, Applications, Services and other types of information such as Maps, Indicators and Graphs and provides web-based tools for the access to and the update of its contents.
Among the others, ESDAC hosts data related to Soil threats (Soil Erosion, Soil Organic Carbon Decline, Soil Compaction, Landslides, Soil Salinisation, Soil Contamination, Soil Sealing, Soil Biodiversity) as they are described in the proposal for a framework Directive (COM(2006) 232). ESDAC is the most appropriate place to organise the data collection in European Level as: • Data collection is organized in an efficient way due to past experiences. • Necessary quality assurance is performed. • All relevant data are accessible to Policy makers and furthermore to European citizens. • Technical Support is provided to data providers including Database issues, Data Exchange platforms, Metadata
Standards and Web Development. • The organization is able to collect soil data in various levels due to operation of the European Soil Bureau Network
and active participation in many European soil-related Projects European Soil Data Center will be one node in a system consisting of distributed data nodes: as a soil data node, it
will hold soil data at European level, while other soil data nodes at regional, national or global level will focus on data of different scales. This “virtual” system constitutes a suitable framework for the building of a nested system of soil data and could lay the basis for a Multi-scale European Soil Information System (MEUSIS). In order to achieve this, a common standard for the collection of harmonized soil information is to be developed and implemented. MEUSIS,
97
1
aiming to be the harmonized soil information system for Europe which potentially could streamline better the flow of information from the data producer at a local or regional scale to the data users at wider scales (National – European), will offer a number of opportunities. The parties involved in the use of such a system are the data contributors, the data users (scientists and policy makers) and the data managers, who generally speaking will only benefit from such an approach.
Information Dissemination and Awareness Raising A part of the European Soil Portal is dedicated to utilities that improve the dissemination of information to frequent
users of the site. In order improve the dissemination and distribution of information, the European Soil Portal has established an “Events” space, which documents relevant events (e.g it collects and distributes agenda’s and presentations made at various Conferences, Workshops and Meetings). The “What is New” space offers a quick view on the latest major updates of the European Soil Portal (RSS Feeds allow the maximun distribution of the updates to other portals). The “Mailing list” has been set up in order to keep interested persons up to date with the latest contents on this site. Latest developments include the distribution of a professional montly Newletter with the highlights in the portal and the easy-to-use Search Engine which performs a user fiendly search to the 40.000 resources of the portal (Documents, Reports, Data, HTML Pages, Presentations, etc..).
In the Communication (COM(2006) 231) done by the European Commission in 2006, it has underlined that little public awareness of the importance of soil protection. Measures to improve knowledge and exchange information and best practices are needed to fill this gap. To increase public awareness of the need to protect soil, the Commission encourages initiatives demonstrated in the Soil Portal: • Wide distribution of the Soil Atlas of Europe: The publication is intended for the general public, aiming to 'bridge
the gap' between soil science and public knowledge. By addressing the non-specialized audience, the Atlas increases public awareness and understanding of the diversity of soils and of the need to protect this precious resource.
• Open access to policy relevant soil information in the European Soil Portal.
Conclusions The objective of the European Soil Portal development, its open access policy and its interoperability services is to
create a geospatial one-stop data centre related to Soils at European level. Both the public European users and the specialist policy makers are now able to find and use elegantly European soil-related data and information.
The Success story of the European Soil Portal is the user assessment and the day-to-day interaction of users. Some simple figures (Visitors, Downloads, Pages viewed) in the graph below reflect the trend during the 5-year operation while the detailed study of specific statistical figures in the logs provides useful feedback for future actions.
Some key elements of this collective experience are listed below: • Usability and easy-to access • Interaction with the users and constant updates both in the contents and in the layout • Simplicity • Service oriented approach where data are not allowed to be distributed due to copyright issues • Integration with other Communities (Soil Science Societies, Soil Related bodies)
0
1.000.000
2.000.000
3.000.000
4.000.000
5.000.000
6.000.000
visitors 9.500 94.000 300.000 940.000 942.000
Download of Resources 30.600 133.300 451.000 1.017.000 1.620.000
Pages viewed 137.000 914.000 2.411.000 3.443.000 5.045.000
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008
Figure 3: Statistics about the use of European Soil Portal
98
2
References European Soil Portal. http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ GlobalSoilMap.net consortium. http://www.globalsoilmap.net INSPIRE Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an
Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community): http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu European Commission, The Communication (COM(2006) 231). One of the components of the proposed Thematic
Strategy for Soil Protection. http://ec.europa.eu/environment/soil/pdf/com_2006_0231_en.pdf Open GIS Consortium: http://www.opengeospatial.org/ Panagos, P., Van Liedekerke, M., Montanarella, L. and Jones, R.A (2008). Soil organic carbon content indicators and
web mapping applications. Environmental Modelling & Software, Elsevier LTD, Volume 23· Issue 9: pp 1207-1209
Panagos, P., Van Liedekerke, M., 2006. Mapping Services in the European Soil Portal, GEO: connexion, Volume 5, Issue 8, September 2006, Pages 42+44-45
Panagos, P., 2006. European soil database, GEO: connexion, Volume 5, Issue 7, July 2006, Pages 32-33 Panagos, P., Van Liedekerke, M., & Montanarella, L. (2006) European Soil Portal. EUR 21186 EN, Office for Official
Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg. European Soil Bureau Network, Scientific Committee. EUR 19945 Online CD-ROM (2003). The European Soil
Database (distribution version 2). http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ESDB_Archive/ESDBv2/index.htm
99
