Opportunities and Challenges for Sustainable Agricultural Soil Management in Switzerland

Abstract

Switzerland has a wide diversity of soil types that are subject to pressures of varying intensity and scale. Localised pressures such as compaction, sealing or heavy metal accumulation threaten both short- and long-term soil fertility and food production. Large-scale trends such as the intensive use of fertilisers or continued cultivation of organic soils can have effects on the ecosystem functioning of an entire region. Many of these pressures are concentrated on the Swiss plateau, which covers only about one third of the country and contains both the densest population and the most productive soils. We here review the main soil challenges of Switzerland and examine to which extent these challenges are addressed by different legal frameworks. Soil erosion, contamination as well as nutrient availability and use efficiency are all best described in the scientific literature and regulated by policies. In contrast, for several pressing soil challenges such as soil organic carbon loss, biodiversity loss or soil compaction only limited policy instruments are in place. We also report on the key findings of the 5-year EJP SOIL project that aimed to address several of these soil challenges in research projects of different scale. We discuss the key findings relevant for Switzerland, and outline their implications for various stakeholder groups, including researchers, policy makers, farmers, land managers and advisors. This not only enhances the value of the research outputs for stakeholders but also demonstrates how a research programme of this scale can directly benefit different national stakeholder groups.