LANDMARK 1

Figure 1: Project partner representation across bio-geographical zones of Europe (with inclusion ofChina and Brazil). Red circles indicate partner organisation location, blue circles represent large-scaleagricultural field experiments, available to the project, green circles represent national (international)datasets available to the project team.

Co-ordinator: Dr Rachel Creamer, Lead Soil Scientist, Teagasc, Johnstown Castle, Wexford, Ireland.

Table of Contents:

Proposal Section Page

Cover Page 1

List of Participants 2

1. Excellence

1.1 Objectives 3

1.2 Relation to the work programme 4

1.3 Concept and approach 6

1.4 Ambition 12

2. Impact

2.1 Expected impacts 13

LAND Management: Assessment, Research, Knowledge base:

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Table 1: List of participants

No Participant organisation name Type of Organisation Country

1 Teagasc – the Agriculture and Food DevelopmentAuthority (Co-ordinator)

Applied ResearchInstitute and ExtensionServices

Ireland

2 University of Copenhagen Academia Denmark

3 Joint Research Centre, Ispra (Soil Action) Policy Advice EuropeanCommission(self-funding)

4 CIRCA Group Europe Ltd. SME Ireland

5 Wageningen University and Research Academia Netherlands

6 RIVM: National Institute for Public Health and theEnvironment

Applied ResearchInstitute

Netherlands

7 Szent Istvan University Academia Hungary

8 University of Ulster Academia United Kingdom

9 University of Antwerp Academia Belgium

10 Assemblée Permanente des Chambres d'Agriculture(APCA)

Extension Services &Farmer Representatives

France

11 Chambers of Agriculture Lower Saxony Extension Services &Farmer Representatives

Germany

12 Landwirtschaftskammer Österreich (LKÖ)(Austrian Chambers of Agriculture)

Extension Services &Farmer Representatives

Austria

13 Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES) Applied ResearchInstitute

Austria

14 INRA (The French National Institute for AgriculturalResearch)

Applied ResearchInstitute

France

15 Chinese Academy of Sciences Academia China (self-funding)

16 Sao Paulo University Academia Brazil (self-funding)

17 Eidgenoessische Technische Hochschule Zurich (ETH,Zurich)

Academia Switzerland(self-funding)

18 University of Agricultural Sciences and VeterinaryMedicine Cluj-Napoca

Academia Romania

19 Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet (Swedish University ofAgricultural Sciences)

Academia Sweden

20 Jozef Stefan Institute Academia Slovenia

21 University of Parma Academia Italy

22 University of Seville Academia Spain

23 Cranfield University Academia United Kingdom

Additional organisations have agreed to be proactive stakeholders/advisory committee members in the eventthat the LANDMARK proposal is successful. These include: 1) COPA-COGECA 2) The European Environment Agency3) DG Environment 4) DG Agriculture. Their roles within LANDMARK are described in Table 4.

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1. ExcellenceLANDMARK brings together a strong multi-actor consortium to address the programme topic SFS-04-2014: Soilquality and function. Soil quality is an account of the soil’s ability to provide ecosystem services by performing arange of functions under changing conditions (Tóth et al., 2007). The term soil quality is used to define a widerange of management/legislative/policy instruments. In LANDMARK, soil quality will specifically refer to themanagement of soil functions on agricultural soils. These functions are: i) primary productivity; ii) waterregulation and purification; iii) carbon sequestration and regulation; iv) habitat for biodiversity and v) nutrientcycling and provision. All soils are capable of performing all functions simultaneously, but the management of asoil can change this performance, either by changing the balance between the five functions, or byincreasing/decreasing a selective function, e.g. the frequency of mechanical soil disturbances (ploughing) mayinadvertently affect the function ‘nutrient cycling’. Previous research and policies have mostly focused on theprovision of single soil functions, or threats to soil functionality. This has resulted in incoherent advice/regulationspertaining to soil management (e.g. agronomic advice may differ from environmental advice), as well as non-alignment of EU policies aimed at managing soil quality. The proposed Soil Framework Directive, which was aimedat managing threats to soil quality, has been withdrawn. Preparations are now underway for the development ofnew EU policies with the aim of incentivising the sustainable management of soils across Europe.

The overall aim of LANDMARK is to provide the scientific evidence base to support the development of suchpolicies. Specifically, the project outcomes will facilitate: 1) best soil management practices; 2) monitoring of soilquality and soil functions and 3) the ex-post and ex-ante assessments of existing and potential policy instruments,respectively. Together, these three LANDMARK outcomes will provide the knowledge base for optimisation of soilfunctions at local, regional and EU scales.

In order to deliver on this promise, LANDMARK brings together multiple actors (academia, research institutes,extension services, farm organisations, policy makers) and disciplines (e.g. pedology, agronomy, hydrology, soilphysics, chemistry and biology, agricultural economics, advanced data analysis and spatial modeling). As aconsortium, LANDMARK has unique access to a rich array of large-scale experiments, international researchnetworks and national and EU soil datasets. Therefore, the ambition of LANDMARK is not to reinvent the wheel,but instead to develop for the first time a coherent scientific framework for the quantification and managementof the five aforementioned soil functions for the wide range of farming systems and pedo-climatic conditionsacross Europe, underpinned by the outcomes and data of decades of European research and stakeholderexperience. The timeline for LANDMARK is 4.5 years which facilitates a number of PhD projects to be includedwithin the project timeframe.

1.1 Objectives

The scientific objective of LANDMARK is to:Comprehensively quantify the current and potential supply of soil functions across the EU, as determined by soilproperties (soil diagnostic criteria), land use (arable, grassland, forestry) and soil management practices.

The specific project objectives of LANDMARK are to:1. Develop a toolkit for soil management that optimises soil functions, both from an agronomic and

ecosystem function perspective, and that sustains soil functions by mitigating threats to soil quality;2. Design a monitoring scheme for Soil Functions that is applicable at regional scale, for a range of soil types,

land uses and pedo-climatic zones;3. Develop a policy framework for ‘Functional Land Management’ at European scale, that aims to optimise

the sustainable use of Europe’s soil resource.

To deliver on these specific project objectives, LANDMARK is structured along three straight ‘Lines of Sight’ fromthe project objectives to project outcomes. We will refer to these Lines of Sight as ‘Project Nodes’. Each Nodeaddresses one of the three project objectives, and Node Leaders are responsible for ensuring that the outputs ofall workpackages are aligned to the overall outcomes of the three Nodes (see Figure 5 in Section 1.3.2).

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Node 1) Develop a toolkit for farmers that provides a menu of user-friendly soil management strategies, rankedby cost-effectiveness, to assess and manage the soil functions on their farm (local scale). Tools for assessment willinclude simple on-site methods such as the Visual Soil Assessment (VSA) (FAO, 2008)) to assess soil structuralquality and the function ‘water regulation & purification’, or the application of a soil index for biodiversity toassess habitat status for key soil biota (e.g. Gardi et al., 2002). The results from these on-farm assessments will beused as input data for existing soil-plant/crop-atmosphere models to combine crop growth measurements andsoil processes for prediction of primary productivity (Porter & Christensen, 2013) and the other soil functions (e.g.Bennetzen et al., 2012). LANDMARK will bring the output of these methods and models together into a MarginalAbatement Cost Curve (MACC) for soil management, as well as a practical framework and (online) handbook ormobile app for farmers. Farmers and extension services participating in LANDMARK will be actively involved indeveloping and testing these tools. Node 1 will be co-ordinated by Prof Dr John Porter (University ofCopenhagen), with input from all partners, with relevant experience in this area, specifically the agriculturalchambers and extension services (major partners: 1, 10, 11 12) and will utilise large scale agricultural researchfarms/facilities (partners: 5, 8, 9, 13, 18, 19, 22) which include tillage (conservation and conventional systems fora range of crops), grass (grazed systems, feed systems).

Node 2) Assessment of the range of soil functions associated with different soil types, land-uses across the rangeof European major climatic zones (Boreal, Atlantic, Continental, Mediterranean and Pannonian) (regional scale).This requires further research into the role of soil quality indicators for the assessment of soil functional capacity.Many indicators have been developed in the past which focus on threats to soil quality (Kibblewhite et al., 2008)but this terminology has proven difficult to communicate with farmers and land-managers at the local scale(Schulte et al., 2014). Therefore LANDMARK will focus on indicators that provide the end-user with an assessmentof soil functional capacity. The selection of indicators will be performed on existing datasets, as several of theproject partners (partners: 3, 6, 7, 9, 10, 14, 17, 18, 19, 21, 23) have large scale databases on measurements ofsoil functions. New indicators will only be developed in cases where data is not available (this will form the basisof PhD research), for example the development of molecular methods to assess a specific functional capacity,such as nitrification genes. The indicators will be tested at 100 sites across Europe, based on a soil type x land-usematrix for the major climatic zones of Europe (based on Anonymous, 2011). Node 2 will be co-ordinated by DrRachel Creamer (Teagasc) and include input from all partners on the selection of indicators, collation and testingof indicators.

Node 3) An assessment of policy tools for optimising the supply of soil functions at EU scale. The coordinators ofthe LANDMARK consortium have developed the concept of Functional Land Management (Schulte et al., 2014):this is a framework for matching the supply of and demand for soil functions at large spatial scales. Examplesinclude land management to incentivise intensive food production on fertile soils (to meet global dietaryrequirements), nutrient provision/cycling (to support resource use efficiency), the demand for water purification(in order to meet the WFD requirements) and the demand for soil carbon sequestration (to contribute to EU GHG-reduction targets). LANDMARK will use European databases to define sets of proxy indicators for the five groupsof soil functions. These functions will be assessed across the same land-use x soil type matrix used in Nodes 1 and2. This policy-oriented Node 3 will be led by Dr Arwyn Jones (JRC) and will include input from Nodes 1 and 2.Specifically, this node will be conducted by the following partners (1, 2, 9, 10, 14, 20). This Node will have anintercontinental perspective, as it will work with Chinese Academy of Sciences (15) and the University of SaoPaulo (16) to facilitate shared learning on a diversity of incentivisation programmes/implementation schemes forsoil management.

1.2 Relation to the work programmeThe LANDMARK proposal addresses the Topic SFS-4-2014: Soil quality and function in the Call for ‘SustainabilityFood Security – Sustainable food production systems’ of H2020 Societal Challenge 2. The main challengeidentified by the Topic is the “need to understand the complex and fragile interplay in soil in order to develop on-farm soil management practices to increase agricultural productivity whilst avoiding degradation of this virtuallynon-renewable resource in environmentally sustainable ways”. This is explicitly addressed in LANDMARK: wehave closely aligned our project activities with the Call requirements, as outlined in Table 2:

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Table 2: Alignment of LANDMARK to SFS-4-2014

Text in call SFS-4-2014:Soil quality and function

How is this addressedin this LANDMARK proposal?

Agricultural soils provide the basis for crop andanimal production and in turn are impacted by thedifferent types of land use, water quality,management practices, choice of crops, cultivarsand genotypes. Effects include not only changes tochemical and physical soil properties but also tothe composition of the soil biological communityand plant-soil-microbial interactions

The approach of LANDMARK is based on the concept of five aggregated soilfunctions: primary productivity, water purification & regulation, carbonsequestration & regulation, habitat for biodiversity, and provision & cycling ofnutrients. All soils perform all functions simultaneously, but both the extent and therelative composition of this functionality depend on pedological, physical, chemicaland biological soil properties. These in turn differ between soil types, land use(arable grass, forestry) and soil management activities: tillage, seeding grasslands,crop rotations (e.g. inclusion of legumes), organic manure applications.

Understanding this complex and fragile interplay iscrucial for developing on-farm soil managementand conservation practices to increase agriculturalproductivity whilst avoiding degradation of thisvirtually non-renewable resource inenvironmentally sustainable ways.

Research on soil functions has heretofore been fragmented or focussed on singularfunctions. This has resulted in a multiplicity of scientific interpretations of soilfunctions, indicators of soil functionality and best management practices for soilhusbandry. A step-change in research is needed to develop an “Understanding thiscomplex and fragile interplay” across all spatial scales (from farm to continent).LANDMARK uniquely brings together the major scientific disciplines (soil science,agronomy, soil biology, chemistry and physics, soil system modellers, spatialmodellers) as well as extension services, chambers of agriculture, farmer unions.LANDMARK also brings together the most prominent international disciplinaryresearch networks on all aspects of soil functions (see Section 1.3)

Proposals should provide a comprehensive analysisof the various types of agricultural land use inEurope along with the effects of agricultural landuse and management on soil properties and soilfunctioning.

LANDMARK will harmonize and utilize existing large empirical datasets on soilfunctions (which will be presented in Section 3 of this application) to quantify soilfunctions in relation to soil properties, land use and soil husbandry. This will includethe development of a long-term online data warehouse (co-ordinated by INRA)which will facilitate remote updates from national data centres/JRC.LANDMARK will comprehensively assess the supply of soil functions, as well as thedemand for soil functions, at regional and EU level. It will subsequently providescenario analyses how the supply of soil functions can be optimised to meetdemand. This will include an appraisal of policy instruments (existing and potentialnew instruments) to incentivise the uptake of best soil husbandry practices,developed by LANDMARK.

They should further propose ways by which the'soil environmental footprint' of different croppingsystems and management interventions can beestablished.

The suite of soil management practices and indicators to be developed byLANDMARK will integrate both agronomic and environmental aspects ofsustainability. Therefore, indicators of the environmental footprint of specific landuse and soil management combinations are at the very heart of the LANDMARKoutputs and project outcomes. We will align this to existing related initiatives suchas Bio Intelligence Service (2012) and the FAO’s Livestock EnvironmentalAssessment and Performance (LEAP) partnership, in which Partner 1 is a SteeringCommittee member.

Proposals should test new approaches to on-farmmanagement that enhance key soil attributes forcrop productivity and yield stability taking intoaccount below and above ground aspects. Workshould take into account various types of crop andlivestock farming systems and pedo-climatic zonesacross the EU.

LANDMARK will develop a toolkit for soil husbandry aimed at optimising bothagronomic and environmental soil functions and will test this on participatingfarms for scientific credibility and robustness. The toolkit will be relevant forfarmers and will be specific for combinations of soil properties (soil type), land use,and pedo-climatic zone. This will be based upon the research conducted in Node 1and provide simple methods for checking the functional capacity of a soil. This willbe available as an online handbook or mobile app.

In line with the objectives of the EU strategy forinternational cooperation in research andinnovation and in particular with theimplementation of the EU-China dialogue,proposals are encouraged to include third countryparticipants, especially those established in China

The LANDMARK consortium includes three third country participants: Dr. GanlinZhang (State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of SoilScience, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, China) and Prof Victoria Ballester(University of Sao Paulo, Brazil). They will be key-actors in Node 3, for sharedlearning on policy instruments aimed at managing soil / land functions (“What hasworked well? What hasn’t worked?”). In addition, Prof Johan Six (ETH, Zurich,Switzerland will be a key-actor for the soil function ‘carbon sequestration andregulation’.

Proposals should fall under the concept of 'multi-actor approach' and allow for adequateinvolvement of the farming sector in proposedactivities.

LANDMARK brings together the major actors involved in soil husbandry, i.e.:farmers (supported by Copa-Cogeca, through communication portals, access tomeeting facilities and advice), extension services (partners 1, 10, 11, 12), appliedresearch institutes (partners 1,6,13, 14), academic institutions (partners 2, 5, 7, 8,9, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23) and policy makers (partners 3). In addition, EEA,DG ENV and DG AGRI have agreed if the project application is successful, but theirinternal rules do not allow them to commit at this stage.

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1.3 Concept and approach

1.3.1 ConceptSoil functions deliver soil-based ecosystem services for humankind.Soil functions which are present in agro-ecosystems are (Figure 2):

- Primary productivity (white box)- Water purification and regulation (blue box)- Carbon sequestration & regulation (black box)- Provision of functional & intrinsic biodiversity (green box)- Provision & cycling of nutrients (purple box)

(Haygarth & Ritz, 2009; Creamer & Holden, 2010; Bouma et al.,2012; Rutgers et al., 2012; Schulte et al.,2014)

All soils perform these functions simultaneously, but both theextent and the relative composition of this functionality depends upon pedological, physical, chemical andbiological soil properties. Analogous to the Genotype x Environment x Management (GxExM) approach commonlyapplied in the field of agronomy, soil functionality depends on land use (“G”), climate & geology (“E”) and soilmanagement (“M”). For example, the impact of land use on the relative composition of soil functions may beillustrated as follows (Schulte et al, 2014):

Trade-offs between soil functionsAnthropogenic interventions through land use and management affect all soil functions simultaneously. Thisresults in interactions between soil functions that can be either synergistic or antagonistic. For example, thedemand for the function ‘Primary productivity’ may (or may not – depending on local contexts) compete with thedemand for the function ‘Water purification & regulation’. In scenario A of Figure 4, the function ‘Primaryproductivity’ is increased at the expense of the function ‘Water purification & regulation’. This scenario couldarise from an indiscriminate increase in fertilizer, irrespective of crop requirements. In scenario B, the function‘water purification & regulation’ or ‘primary production’ is selectively enhanced instead, without impacting on theother functions, as a result of improved management such as more precise methods, timings and rates offertilizer applications. Scenario C representsan alternative situation, in which therelative composition of the suite of soilfunctions in a catchment area is altered ormanipulated through land use change, e.g.from grassland to deciduous forestry.

Threats to soil functions may arise wherethe functionality of one or more soilfunctions declines over time. Threatsinclude: soil sealing, compaction, erosion,loss of biodiversity, loss of organic matter,salinization, contamination, desertification(Creamer & Holden, 2010; Creamer et al.,2010).

Figure 2: Freestyle illustration of the suite ofsoil functions (Schulte et al., 2014).

Figure 3: Freestyle illustration of typical compositions of soil functions for a range of contrasting land usetypes (Schulte et al., 2014). For colour legend see Figure 2.

Figure 4: potential trade-offs between soil functions in response tomanagement and land use change. Legend as per Figure 2.

A)

B)

C)

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Soil management is aimed at:1. Optimising the desired multi-functionality of soils, and2. Sustaining the desired functionality of soils by mitigation of threats

Crucially, stakeholders have different perspectives on the definition of ‘optimising multi-functionality’, asillustrated by the outcomes of stakeholder workshops (e.g. Rutgers et al., 2012; Schulte et al., 2009). Thesestudies show that, in generalised terms:

- Farmer stakeholders view this optimisation from the perspective of income maximisation at local scale, incompliance with environmental legislation;

- Legislative stakeholders, and many researchers view this optimisation from the perspective of protectingnational natural resources (air, water, biodiversity) within the context of national agricultural policies;

- EU policy stakeholders view this optimisation from the perspective of meeting the requirements ofvarious EU Directives pertaining to soil functions, e.g. CAP (sustaining primary productivity), the WaterFramework Directive (water regulation and purification), the EU Climate Strategy (opportunities foroffsetting of greenhouse gas emissions through carbon-sequestration), the Habitats Directive (protectionof biodiversity) and the Nitrates and Sewage Sludge Directives (recycling of nutrients).

1.3.2 Overall Approach and MethodologyOptimising the functionality of soils therefore requires coherent action at three spatial scales:

- Local: development of improved practices for soil husbandry and adoption of these best practices byfarmers, within given agricultural systems, soil type and climate conditions

- Regional: monitoring of soil functionality using appropriate and implementable sets of indicators, in orderto track changes in soil functionality over time and to assess the supply of soil functions.

- European: appraisal of supportive policy instruments (incl. CAP) and harmonisation of nationalmonitoring schemes

The workflow diagram (Figure 5) visualises the design of LANDMARK. The three Nodes represent straight lines ofsight from the LANDMARK objectives to the project outcomes. Work packages (WPs) represent distinct workactivities: most of these are cross-cutting, i.e. applicable to multiple nodes and therefore multiple spatial scales.

WP1 (Leader: University of Ulster) will bring together and critically review the existing knowledge and expertise onsoil functions, soil management, soil monitoring and soil-related policies through a scientific literature review andstakeholder workshops. In this WP, we will draft optimised suites of soil functions, as prioritised by the variousstakeholder groups. This WP will deliver an initial list of on-farm tools for assessing and managing soil functions(Node 1), as well as a list of potential regional indicators of soil functions (Node 2). Individual tasks will be led bypartners 3, 5, 14 and 22 with significant input into soil functional requirements by agricultural extension services:1, 10, 11, 12 and policy makers: 3, EEA, DGs. Outputs will include a LANDMARK glossary and review papers.

WP2 (Leader: Szent Istvan University) will bring together and harmonize the extensive datasets on soil functionsthat the LANDMARK consortium has access to. These include data from large-scale trials (Figure 1: blue circles),national and EU datasets (Figure 1: green circles) and international networks (Table 3). For Node 1 we will selectrepresentative agricultural land use systems (building on the SEAMLESS project: http://www.seamless-ip.org).These land-use systems will be categorised into six major types: field crops, permanent crops, pasture andgrasslands, industrial crops, horticulture and mixed farms. Within these production systems, the following soilmanagement practices and cropping systems will be assessed:

- Catch crops/legumes/crop residues: improve carbon levels, fertility profiles (Partners: 2, 13, 17)- Crop rotation including grass rotations (Partners: 1, 5, 6)- Manure and fertiliser input (Partners: 1, 2, 13, 14)- Tillage intensity (reduced/minimum/conventional systems) (Partners: 9, 18, 7, 14)- Moisture regime (rainfed vs irrigated) (Partners: 18, 22)- Grass systems (grazing intensity/feed production) (Partners: 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 14, 18)

For Node 2 we will focus on arable, grass and forestry land-uses. For Node 3, WP2 will collate EU soil datasets(e.g. European Soil Information System, LUCAS, SPADE, BioSoil, EIONET) (partner 3). WP 2 tasks will be led bypartners: 3, 7, 13, 14. Outputs will include a public long-term data-warehouse with associated metadata,constructed by INRA which has extensive experience in developing such data storage facilities.

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Figure 5: LANDMARK project workflow.

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Table 3: Soil research networks that LANDMARK partners are proactive in and can draw onNetwork Synopsis Partners involved

Sino-EU Panel onLand and Soil (SEPLS)

A scientific body with a goal to provide decision makers in Europe and China with aclear scientific view on the current state of land and soil resources and potentialenvironmental and socio-economic consequences of their future utilization patterns.

3, 15

ECOFINDERS Assessment of soil biodiversity across EU (FP7) 1, 6, 3, 5

European Soil BureauNetwork

Soil data provision and advice to European Commission 1, 7, 14

GS-Soil Portal for European INSPIRE compliant soils data (E-content) 1, 7, 13

FACCE-JPI EU Joint Programming Initiative on Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change 14, 1, 2, 18

EIONET Data provision to European Environment Agency 1, 3

CATCH-C FP7 Best soil management practices (FP7) 13, 5

EC Food SecurityForesight exercise

Foresight study on Sustainable Food Security (JRC, Seville) 1, 2

ENVASSO Developed indicators of threats to soil functions (FP6) 23, 1, 13, 7, 14, 6

SoilServiceConflicting demands of land use, soil biodiversity and the sustainable deliveryof ecosystem goods and services in Europe (FP7)

5

SoilTrEC Soil Transformations in European Catchments (FP7) 13, 5

SmartSOILSustainable farm Management Aimed at Reducing Threats (FP7)to SOILs under climate change

2

CRES Centre for Regional Change in the Earth System (http://klimaleksikon.dk/opslag/cres) 2

AgMIP The Agricultural Modeling Intercomparison and Improvement Project 2

IPCCCoordinating lead author for assessment report 5 in chapter 7: Food productionsystems and food security (www.ipcc.ch/pdf/press-releases/ipcc-wg2-ar5-authors.pdf)

2

e_SOTER Regional pilot platform as EU contribution to a Global Soil Observing System 7, 3

GlobalSoilMap Global consortium producing digital soil maps 14, 15, 3

IntergovernmentalTechnical Panel onSoils

Scientific and technical advice and guidance on global soil issues to the Global SoilPartnership

14, 3, 7

WP3 (Leader: WUR + RIVM) will develop a comprehensive scientific framework with all partners for understandingand quantifying soil functions in relation to soil properties, land use, climatic zone and soil management, based onthe harmonized datasets collated in WP2. This WP will deliver on the scientific ambition of the project (describedin detail in Section 1.4) by developing A) a conceptual framework for understanding soil functions and B) amathematical framework for quantifying soil functions. This WP therefore includes the input of specialists in bothconceptual modelling (partner: Prof Peter de Ruiter (5)) and data discovery methodologies (partner: SasoDzeroski, Department of Knowledge Technologies (20)). Based on these frameworks, WP3 will select coherentsets of indicators for the five aggregate soil functions. These will include empirical indicators for on-farmassessment and management interactions (Node 1), indicators for soil monitoring schemes (Node 2) and proxy-indicators for use at large spatial scales (Node 3). Within this WP, individual tasks will be led by partners 5, 8, 17,20, 22 and 23, with input from all LANDMARK partners (1,2,3,7,9,10,11,12,13,14,18,19,21).

WP4 (Leader: University of Antwerp) will apply the concept of Functional Land Management at EU level. Thismeans that this WP will:

a) Quantify the demands for the five aggregate soil functions in an EU context (based on WP1)b) Assess the capacity of soils to deliver five soil functions in an EU context, using the proxy-indicators

developed in WP3 and EU datasets collated in WPs 2+3.c) Conduct scenario analyses with a view to arriving at optimum suites of soil functions at EU level, as

determined by all stakeholders (WP1)

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These assessments will rely on proxy-indicators of soil functions: these are indicators that can be derived fromexisting high-level datasets available to the LANDMARK consortium. For example: the denitrification capacity ofspecific soil type x land use x management combinations, as a partial proxy-indicator of the function waterpurification & regulation. LANDMARK will link these proxy-indicators to empirical indicators through either 1:1 or1:many relationships. Within this WP, individual tasks will be led by partners 1, 3 and 14, all of whom have criticalmass and expertise in spatial analysis. Outputs will include indicative scenario maps of the actual and potentialsupply of soil functions across the EU.

WP5 (led by the three Node Leaders) will apply the knowledge, data and expertise generated by WPs 1-4, todeliver on the project outcomes: 1) a toolkit for soil management; 2) a blueprint for a EU soil monitoring scheme3) an assessment of policy instruments. This means that WP5 will:

1) For Node 1: Use the outputs of WP1, 2, 3 to develop a user-friendly toolkit which includes: a) simple toolsfor the on-farm assessment of soil functionality and b) context-specific recommendations for optimisingthe functionality of individual farms. This toolkit will be developed as an online handbook or mobile appand evaluated through the EIP Operational Groups via the Chambers of Agriculture (partners 1,10,11,12).

2) For Node 2: Test and validate the indicators developed in WPs 1, 2 and 3 for monitoring of soil functionsat a regional scale, following the criteria by Turbé et al. (2010). Sites will be selected by implementing aspatial analysis of European datasets from the JRC and EEA, which will provide a wide spectrum of mainsoil characteristics, such as pH, texture and organic C content and land management strategies (crops androtation, livestock farming systems, forestry management types). Indicators will be deployed across allsites and discrimination analyses will be undertaken to ascertain the key indicators for soil functionalityacross the range of land-use/management types. In addition, meta-data measurements will be collectedto assess ease of application, cost-effectiveness (lab and field) and interpretability.

3) For Node 3: Conduct ex-post and ex-ante assessments of policy instruments (past, present and potentialinstruments) for their effectiveness in optimising the suite of soil functions. Examples include theGreening of the CAP, the current review of the Areas of Natural Constraints, and national agri-environmental schemes funded under Pillar 2. This WP will also include ‘outsiders assessments’ ofeffectiveness by placing the appraisal in the wider context of, and comparison with, non-EU policyinstruments as facilitated by partners 15 (China) and 16 (Brazil). This task will be led by partner 1, who hasinternationally recognised experience in translational research on the science-policy interface.

WP6 (led by the LANDMARK Secretariat) will be responsible for the management of LANDMARK. Tasks includecommunication (both internal and external), self-monitoring and evaluation, interactions with the LANDMARKStakeholder Steering Committee and the European Commission. Financial and contractual arrangements andinternal auditing will be managed by CIRCA Ltd.

1.3.3 Technology Readiness LevelFigure 6 illustrates the position of LANDMARK on the innovation trajectory from idea to implementation:

For Nodes 1 and 2, LANDMARK brings together the existing research (WP1, 2) with a view to developing acomprehensive understanding (WP3) that will be validated on participating farms (WP5). For Node 3, LANDMARKwill build on the ‘proof of concept’ on Functional Land Management (WP1, 2), conduct research (WP4) with aview to developing a comprehensive understanding (WP5).

Figure 6: Positioning of LANDMARK on the innovation trajectory from idea to implementation

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1.3.4 Multi-actor approachLANDMARK will align closely to the concept of the European Innovation Partnership (EIP): through theparticipating extension services, LANDMARK will engage and/or initiate Operational Groups (OG) in at least fourMember States (France, Germany, Austria, Ireland). These OGs will have a proactive role in WP 1 (review ofexisting knowledge, including knowledge from practitioners) and WP 5 (design of soil management toolkit,monitoring scheme and policy framework). Employing the methodology by Rutgers et al. (2012) LANDMARK willorganise regional workshops where all stakeholder groups (farmer representative groups, national legislativebodies and European policy makers) will weigh the required functional aspects of the soil system, in order todefine the optimum suite of soil functions and select the most appropriate corresponding indicator sets.

Table 4: Explicit roles of LANDMARK project partners (names in brackets have confirmed participation pending funding)

Actor type Involvement from: Type of involvement WP

Academia 9 European Universities Academic excellence throughout all WPs, with expertise in soilpedology, biology, chemistry, physics, nutrient cycling,agronomy, biostatistical modelling, spatial modelling

All

University of Copenhagen - Node Leader 1: Toolkit for soil management All WPsNode 1

Appliedresearchinstitutes

Teagasc - LANDMARK Coordinator: project management- Node Leader 2: Monitoring scheme of soil functions- Catchment data on soil nutrient management and water

quality/ National Soil Survey

All WPsNode 2

National Institute for PublicHealth and the Environment

- National spatial datasets on Biological Indicators of SoilQuality

- Environmental assessment: quantifying the relationshipsbetween environmental attributes and soil functions

1, 2, 3

INRA - National soil spatial datasets on soil properties and soilfunctions and French nation-wide research programme“Bioindicateurs”

1, 2, 4

Austrian Agency for Healthand Food Safety

- Large agricultural experimental facilities and datasets onagronomic trials and soil functions

1 , 2, 3

Extensionservices

French Chambers ofAgriculture

- Facilitation / establishment of Operational Groups on soilmanagement (aligned to European Innovation Platform)

- Facilitating 1:many consultations and communicationbetween LANDMARK partners and farmers, for input intoWP1 and WP5

- Coordinating on-farm experiments and testing various soilmanagement toolkits with operational groups

- Members of LANDMARK Steering Committee

1, 5

Austrian Chambers ofAgriculture

German Chambers ofAgriculture – lower Saxony

Ireland: Teagasc AdvisoryServices

Practitioners:farmers andlandmanagers

Participating farmers andland managers;EIP Operational Groups

- Direct input into WP1- Participation in on-farm evaluation of Outcome 1 (toolkit for

soil management) and Outcome 2 (soil monitoring)

(1, 5)

Policy makers European Commission -Joint Research Centre

Node Leader 3: Developing a Policy Framework for ‘FunctionalLand Management’

Node 3(all WPs)

(European EnvironmentAgency)

- (Direct input into review of policy demands)- (Provision of links to additional existing European datasets)- (Members of LANDMARK Steering Committee)

(1, 2, 4)

(DG Agriculture, DGEnvironment)

- (Direct input into review of policy demands & instruments)- (Members of LANDMARK Steering Committee

(1, 5)

SME CIRCA Ltd. - Financial and contractual management 6

In addition, COPA-COGECA (www.copa-cogeca.eu) has agreed to support LANDMARK through:- Provision of facilities to host farm-stakeholder workshops / meetings at the office facilities in Brussels- Facilitating consultation of national representatives through members of the Working Party on the

Environment- Participatation as members of the LANDMARK Steering Committee

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1.3.5 Gender considerationsSex and/or gender analysis are not applicable to the proposed research itself. However, it is worth noting thattraditionally the scientific disciplines relating to soil science have been male dominated. The gender compositionof the members of the LANDMARK consortium, as well as the gender composition of the proposed stakeholderrepresentatives, represents a manifest break from this tradition.

1.4 AmbitionLANDMARK brings together a multi-disciplinary team to address the issue of managing and measuring soilfunctions for a range of land uses across three spatial scales. This multi-disciplinary approach will facilitateunderstanding of the role of soil functions across a range of stakeholder requirements (land management,indicator measurement and policy framework) and knowledge bases (agronomy, soil chemistry, physics, ecology,biology, pedology, biostatistical and spatial modelling).

As outlined in Section 1.2, the (multi)functionality of soils depends on the interaction between:- Soil properties as defined by pedo-climatic variables- Land use- Management practices

LANDMARK will build upon existing FP6/FP7 projects which have evaluated some of the two-way interactionsbetween these three factors. Examples include: best management practices in relation to soil properties (Catch-C:www.catch-c.eu ), soil functions in relation to land use (SoilTrEC: www.soiltrec.eu ) (Table 3). To date, there is nogeneric scientific framework to assess soil functions that account for all three factors.

A major impediment to such a meta-analysis is the diversity of soils (and soil properties) across Europe. Thisdiversity has been described by pedological classification methods (e.g. World Reference Base, LANDMARKpartner 7), but heretofore it has been difficult to correlate these pedological classifications to the soil propertiesthat govern individual soil functions.

LANDMARK will address this by linking the understanding of soil functions to the diagnostic assessment of soil.The adoption of diagnostic (feature) classes brings together the pedological assessment of soils withmeasurement of basic soil properties (e.g. soil organic carbon, texture, pH). The field pedological description willbe simplified to a set of key diagnostic criteria that reflect the major criteria affecting soil management practices,for example: depth, permeability (gleying), presence of groundwater (watertable), calcareous nature. Thesediagnostic classes reduce the level of disciplinary expert pedological knowledge required in describing some ofthe major processes in soils. A similar approach has been adopted in the ongoing development of criteria for thenew delineation of Areas of Natural Constraints (Van Orshoven et al., 2013), to which LANDMARK consortiummembers 1, 3 and 23 have proactively contributed. In addition, this method has been adopted in Ireland and iscurrently being used as a tool for understanding and quantifying soil functions in grassland soils.

The outputs of LANDMARK will include a robust scientific framework that quantifies how each of the five majorsoil functions depends on combinations of diagnostic criteria, land use and soil management practices. We willuse advanced knowledge discovery methodologies such as decision trees and rules for predicting structuredoutputs (Kocev et al., 2013) to elucidate these relationships at pan-European level, using existing datasets.

Therefore, LANDMARK will uniquely provide the scientific knowledge base on sustainable soil management,harmonised at the three spatial scales: from farmers’ fields, to regional level and up to and including EU policylevel. This integration will facilitate coherent multi-stakeholder action. Put simply, it will ensure that policies canbe translated into effective and practicable on-farm soil management strategies, and likewise, it will ensure thatfarm practices contribute meaningfully to multiple EU objectives pertaining to agriculture and the environment.

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2. Impact

2.1 Expected impactsWe use the Research Impact Pathway (RIP) methodology to illustrate the expected impacts of LANDMARK. TheRIP is a project design tool that identifies the exact research programme required to address the problem areaidentified in the call, as well as the pathway through which the research programme will lead to positive impactsfor stakeholders (Figure 7). Specifically, it describes: a) the problem area to be addressed; b) the direct causes ofthe problem area; c) the underlying knowledge related causes; d) the research & development outputs thataddress these knowledge gaps; e) the outcomes from the research & development and f) the project impact.

Figure 7: Research Impact Pathway of LANDMARK

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In Figure 5 (Section 1.3.2) we have already detailed the pathway through which WPs will deliver project outputs,and how these outputs will lead to project outcomes. In Figure 8 below, we describe in further detail how theseLANDMARK outcomes (the second-last step in the RIP) relate to expected project impacts, as set out in the call(last step in the RIP):

Note: for Outcome 1, we will focus on soil management practices in order to maintain the coherence and focus ofthe LANDMARK proposal. We note that “Assessing soil-improving cropping systems” will be the topic of aseparate Horizon 2020 call in 2015. Therefore, with respect to Expected impact 3, a more accurate commitmentwill be: “increases in soil functionality to enhance crop productivity and resilience in farming systems (relying onfertilizer and / or legumes) through improved practices for soil husbandry including land use options.”

The outcomes of LANDMARK will have distinct impacts for each of the three different stakeholder groups (asidentified in Section 1.3.1):

- Farmer stakeholders (who view the optimisation of soil functions from the perspective of incomemaximisation at local scale, in compliance with environmental legislation): LANDMARK will deliver a menuof cost-effective options for soil management. These context-specific solutions, co-developed and testedby LANDMARK farmer participants, will empower farmers and farm advisory services to manage soils forincome maximisation with the confidence that these practices are sustainable and compliant withenvironmental legislation (e.g.: “greening measures” within Pillar 1 of the new CAP);

- Legislative stakeholders (who view the optimisation of soil functions from the perspective of protectingnational natural resources (air, water, biodiversity) within the context of national agricultural policies):LANDMARK will deliver a coherent set of indicators of soil functions and soil functionality. Theseindicators will empower legislative stakeholders to:

o Make informed decisions about land management at national scale, as the indicators will allowfor the supply of and demand for soil functions to be quantified;

o Track changes in soil functions over time through harmonized soil monitoring schemes.- EU policy stakeholders (who view the optimisation of soil functions from the perspective of meeting the

requirements of various EU Directives): LANDMARK will deliver a policy framework for sustainable landmanagement, based on a participatory assessment of existing and potential policy instruments. This willempower policy stakeholders to:

o Augment coherence between policies pertaining to the sustainable management of land (e.g.CAP, EU climate policy, environmental directives);

Figure 8: Illustration of how LANDMARK outcomes relate to expected impacts, specified in call SFS-4-2014

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o Following the withdrawal of the proposal Soil Framework Directive: develop new specific andeffective policies on land management, aimed at optimising the sustainable use of Europe’s richsoil heritage resource.

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LANDMARK: Creamer, R.E., Holden, N., 2010. Guest Editorial. Special issue: Soil Quality. Soil Use andManagement 26, 197.

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LANDMARK: Gardi, C. et al., 2002. Soil quality indicators and biodiversity in northern Italian permanentgrasslands. European Journal of Soil Biology 38, 103-110.

LANDMARK: Ghaley, B.B. et al., 2013. Quantification and valuation of ecosystem services in diverse productionsystems for informed decision-making. Journal of Environmental Science and Policy: DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ensci.2013.08.004

LANDMARK: Haygarth, P.M., Ritz, K., 2009. The future of soils and land use in the UK: Soil systems for theprovision of land-based ecosystem services, Land Use Policy 26, 187-197.

LANDMARK: Kibblewhite, M.G. et al. (eds), 2008. Environmental Assessment of Soil for Monitoring Volume VI:Soil Monitoring System for Europe. EUR 23490 EN/6, Office for the Official Publications of the EuropeanCommunities Luxembourg, 72pp.

LANDMARK: Kocev, D. et al., 2013. Tree ensembles for predicting structured outputs. Pattern Recognition 46,817-833.

LANDMARK: Porter, J.R., Christensen, S., 2013. Deconstructing crop processes and models via identities. Plant Celland Environment 36, 1919-1925.

LANDMARK: Rutgers, M. et al., 2012. A method to assess ecosystem services developed from soil attributes withstakeholders and data of four arable farms Science of the Total Environment 415, 39–48.

LANDMARK: Schulte, R.P.O. et al., 2009. Lough Melvin: a participatory approach to developing cost-effectivemeasures to prevent phosphorus enrichment of a unique habitat. Tearmann – the Irish Journal of agri-environmental research 7, 211-228.

LANDMARK: Schulte, R.P.O. et al., 2014. Functional soil management: a framework for assessing the supply ofand demand for soil-based ecosystem services for the sustainable intensification of agriculture and other landuse. Environmental Science and Policy 38, 45-58.

LANDMARK: Tóth, G. et al., 2007. Soil Quality and Sustainability Evaluation - An integrated approach to supportsoil-related policies of the European Union, EUR 22721 EN. 40 pp. Office for Official Publications of theEuropean Communities, Luxembourg. ISBN 978-92-79-05250-7.

Turbé, A. et al.,2010. Soil biodiversity: functions, threats and tools for policy makers. Bio Intelligence Service, IRD,and NIOO, Report for European Commission (DG Environment).

LANDMARK: Van Orshoven et al. (eds.), 2012. Updated common bio-physical criteria to define natural constraintsfor agriculture in Europe: Definition and scientific justification for the common biophysical criteria. EuropeanCommission, Joint Research Centre, EUR 25203 EN – 2012.