Spatial and temporal assessment of soil degradation risk in Europe

Soil degradation threatens agricultural productivity and ecosystem resilience across Europe, yet spatially consistent assessments of its intensity and drivers remain limited. In this study, we used Soil Degradation Proxy (SDP), that integrates four key indicators of soil degradation, including erosion rate, soil pH, electrical conductivity, and organic carbon content, to quantify soil degradation risk. Using over 38,000 LUCAS topsoil observations and a machine learning model trained on climate, land cover, topographic, soil parent material properties, and spectral variables, we map annual SDP values between years 2000 to 2022 across Europe. Results show soil degradation risk is highest in southern Europe, especially in intensively managed and sparsely vegetated landscapes. Over the past two decades, approximately 7.1% of land area across the EU and the UK has experienced increasing degradation risk (most notably across Eastern Europe), with rainfed croplands emerging as the most affected land cover type. Land cover is the most influential driver, modulating effects of climatic variables such as precipitation and temperature on SDP. This data-driven framework provides a consistent and scalable approach for monitoring soil degradation risk and offers actionable insights to support targeted conservation and EU-wide policy implementation.

Subjects

Climate variability

Environmental policy

Land cover

Machine learning

Soil health indicator

Soil monitoring

DDC Class

630: Agriculture and Related Technologies

333.7: Natural Resources, Energy and Environment

Lizenz

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Publication version

publishedVersion

Name

s41598-025-33318-7.pdf

Size

3.59 MB

Format

Adobe PDF

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Spatial and temporal assessment of soil degradation risk in Europe