Changes in anthropogenic influence on soils across Europe 1990–2018. (November 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Novák, Tibor József; Balla, Dániel; Kamp, Johannes
• Is Part Of: Applied geography. Volume 124(2020)
• Publication Date: 2020-11
• Subjects: Land cover change -- Rewilding -- Abandonment -- Urbanization -- Soil classification -- Anthropocene; Geography -- Periodicals; Human geography -- Periodicals; Human ecology -- Periodicals; 910
• DOI: 10.1016/j.apgeog.2020.102294
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0143-6228

Abstract

Abstract: Soils have been widely transformed and degraded by human activities. The area occupied by soils that remain unmodified is decreasing, while recent rural outmigration and land abandonment provide new opportunities for soil restauration across larger area.Little is known about the spatial distribution of both near-natural and anthropogenically influenced soils on large scales. We here present a new methodology to assess soil naturalness across Europe combining CORINE land cover and anthropogenic diagnostic features of the World Reference Base (WRB) for soils. Based on these features, we defined soil naturalness groups, ranging from dominantly natural to dominantly anthropogenic soils. This yielded a European soil naturalness map for the year 2018, covering 37 countries. Using the dataset resurveys, we spatially assessed changes in land cover in 1990–2018 and used these to estimate changes in soil naturalness. On average, 50.74% of the examined soil surface was classified as natural or near-natural, 41.66% of the surface was moderately, but recognizably transformed by human activities, while 4.43% of the soils were found to be strongly affected or created by human activities. Over the study period, increased anthropogenic influence on soils was stated for 42 745 km 2 (0.18% of the surface studied area), decreasing influence for 14 248 km 2 (0.06%). Hotspots of increasing anthropogenic influence were found in regions with rapid development, while hotspots of decreasing influence were often associated with land abandonment.Our approach allows recognizing areas of changes in soil naturalness, and can be used to inform soil protection initiatives on the European level. Highlights: Land cover classes combined with soil diagnostics allows an evaluation of the grade of human impacts on soils. Four grades of human impact on soils are distinguished and the extent of each was calculated for European countries. Changes in human impact on soil according the changes of land cover classes were calculated. Hot spots for increasing human impacts proved to be suburbs of capitals, harbors and industrial developing regions. Extent of decreasing human impacts exceeds the area of increasing human impacts in many of peripheral regions of Europe.