Aligning Soil Monitoring, Methods and Metrics across the 4 Nations

The primary aim of the project was to investigate opportunities for ‘Aligning soil monitoring, methods and metrics across the 4 Nations’ of the United Kingdom. There are many positives to harmonising, sharing and consolidating soil data across the 4 Nations including:

• Advancing scientific understanding of soil systems and soil health, which contributes to more informed, evidence-based decision making
• Potential to improve efficiency with agreed metrics and common guidance provided
• Opportunity for improved transparency and robustness in the collection, use, and interpretation of soil data across sectors
• Fostering long-term commitments to collaboration and innovation into soil health and associated environmental co-benefits

However, data are often collected using different methods for specific purposes, held across different institutions, local authorities and/or countries, and not always in an easy to read/interpret format.

Project components

A core component of the project was a workshop held in June 2025. Representatives from each of the 4 Nations who are either responsible or contribute to soil monitoring were present. Prior to the workshop there was engagement with other stakeholders to gain insight into potential barriers, expectations from a 4 Nations approach, and the importance of soil monitoring alignment to policy. These conversations contributed to forming the topics for discussion at the workshop in June 2025. Workshop activities included the ranking of soil indicators for physical, chemical and biological measures. To aid interpretation of this report, a glossary has been provided at the end of this document.

Key findings on the 4 Nations alignment of metrics/indicator

No current dataset from any of the 4 Nations contained all of the indicators ranked at the workshop considered most important for soil monitoring. Regarding soil chemistry indicators, 6 existing datasets contained all of the top 4 ranked soil chemical indicators. In contrast, there were no existing databases identified that contained all of the biological indicators ranked as important. Similarly, there were no existing single database that had the full breadth of ranked soil physical, biological and chemical health indicators.

With special thanks to all contributors: Kenneth Loades, Nikki Baggaley, Suzanne Higgins, Roy Nielson, Jack Hannam, Sarah Buckingham, Elena Vanguelova, Jacqueline Potts, Ernest Afriyie, Allan Lilly and Fiona Seaton.

Read the full report here.