Leading scientists call for action to increase global soil carbon, in advance of the annual climate summit of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Katowice, Poland (COP24) and World Soil Day (5 Dec).

The amount of carbon in soil is over twice the amount of carbon found in trees and other biomass.

But one-third of the world’s soils are already degraded, limiting agricultural production and adding almost 500 gigatons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, an amount equivalent to the carbon sequestered by 216 billion hectares of U.S. forest.

Modalities for climate action in agriculture will be addressed 3 December at the first workshop of the Koronivia Joint Work on Agriculture, a breakthrough initiative of the 2017 UNFCCC climate negotiations. 

In a commentary piece, Put More Carbon in Soils to Meet Paris Climate Pledges, published today by the journal Nature, climate change and agricultural scientists who serve on the science and technical committee of the organization 4 per 1000 describe a path for recuperating soil carbon stocks to mitigate climate change and boost soil fertility.