Policy Frameworks - Soil Carbon: Science, Management and Policy for Multiple Benefits - page 345

COP 19. Together with the supplement to the
2003 IPCC Good Practice Guidance, trans-
lating the decisions made by the UNFCCC,
it will provide a new formal reference for
future SOC accounting, if adopted at UNFCCC
COP 19.

launched in September 2011, should fur-
ther support the work of the FAO in this
sense in order to develop a platform for pro-
moting soil biodiversity into environmental
policy and sustainable land management
for the protection and enhancement of eco-
system services.

CBD

UNCCD

Many areas of the world host a richer bio-
diversity below ground than above ground
in terms of abundance, numbers of species
and functions of organisms. The dynamic
equilibrium of SOC under unchanged land
use is driven by the active soil biodiversity
pool. For this reason, any disturbance of
SOC levels immediately affects soil biota. In
tropical latitudes, Midgley et al . (2010)
demonstrated that high C levels corresponded
to a high biodiversity system. However, no
clear global relationship between soil bio-
diversity and C sequestration has yet been
established. Given that many soil organisms
remain unknown or unclassified, there is a
possibility that a large unknown part of the
soil biodiversity has already been irrevers-
ibly lost worldwide due to rapid SOC deple-
tion. Soil biota perform a wide variety of
processes and functions, including organic
matter decomposition, nutrient cycling, soil
structure formation, pest regulation and bio-
remediation of contaminants. In turn, various
ecosystem services such as food production,
climate regulation and water provision bene-
fit from a rich soil biodiversity pool (Dominati
et al ., 2010; Pulleman et al ., 2012). It is
therefore fundamental to complete the full
assessment of global soil biodiversity re-
sources as well as to implement an effective
strategy for protecting endangered soil
species. The CBD, as a contribution to the
achievement of the Millennium Development
goals, has already recognized the import-
ance of an Agricultural biological diversity 1
in the Fifth Meeting of the Conference of the
Parties held in Kenya, Nairobi (COP5 Deci-
sion V/5) and has established in the Eighth
Meeting held in Brazil, Curitiba the Inter-
national Initiative for the Conservation and
Sustainable Use of Soil Biodiversity 2 (COP8
Decision VIII/23), coordinated by the FAO.
The Global Soil Biodiversity Initiative, 3

The UNCCD was originally negotiated, in
1994, to address land degradation in dry-
lands (arid, semi-arid and dry subhumid areas),
especially in sub-Saharan Africa, one of the
most vulnerable ecosystems (FAO, 2004).
Only in recent years has the Convention been
realigning its strategy towards addressing
land degradation in other parts of the world
too ( 10- Year Strategy of the UNCCD, 2008-
2018 ). The transition from a regional to-
wards a global focus was well reflected by
the ratification of nearly all countries in the
world, all aiming to reverse global land
degradation trends. The SOC pool tends to
decrease exponentially with temperature.
Consequently, SOC content in drylands
(usually smaller than 1%) is recognized as a
parameter that reflects degradation and deser-
tification trends (Lal, 2000, 2002). However,
despite the relevance of SOC in monitoring
and assessing desertification, only little at-
tention has been given to this parameter in
recent policy assessments. Including SOC
as a relevant indicator within the regular
reporting system of the UNCCD would cer-
tainly raise the attention to soils in the
Convention negotiation process, and also
allow for developing synergies with the CBD
and UNFCCC. The potential for such syner-
gies has already been well recognized within
the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (Texi-
er, 2005).

Global Soil Partnership of the FAO

With their lengthy negotiation processes,
binding multilateral environmental agree-
ments have shown their limits during the
past 20 years. In the Rio+20 Sustainable De-
velopment Conference , 4 a new approach to
sustainability and environmental issues has