Soils play a key role for the functioning of terrestrial ecosystems. Thus, soils are essential for human society not only because they form the basis for the production of food. This has long been recognized, and during the last three decades the need to establish methods to evaluate the ability of soils to provide soil functions has moved toward the top of the agenda in soil science. Quantitative evaluation schemes are indispensable to adequately include soils into strategies to reach sustainable development targets. In this paper we build upon existing approaches and propose a concept to evaluate individual soil functions with respect to the soil's intrinsic potential in contrast to its actual state. This leads to a separation of indicator variables and allows for conclusions on the structure of appropriate models that are required to predict the dynamics of soil functions in response to external perturbation. This concept is demonstrated for the production function, carbon storage and water storage which are evaluated exemplarily for different plots of a long-term field experiment. It is discussed for nutrient cycling and habitat function, where evaluation schemes are still less obvious.

INSPIRE provides the framework for the establishment of a European Spatial Data Infrastructure. The cross-border use and applicability of data requires that specific standards and rules are fulfilled by data providers. Such rules are currently being developed as data specifications. Soil as a theme in the INSPIRE annex III is included in this process, and was selected as the target theme for the EU best practice network GS SOIL "Assessment and strategic development of INSPIRE compliant Geodata-Services for European soil data". The project contributes to the harmonization and provision of interoperable soil geodata in Europe. The main deliverable of the project is the web portal http://gssoil-portal.eu/, which provides information, data management tools and links to data sources. Examples are the soil specific multilingual thesaurus, a metadata editor and catalogue service, provision of WMS and prototype WFS.

Identifying the potential distribution of soil-biodiversity with its density and richness relationships, including constituent species, is a pre-requisite for the assessment, conservation and protection of soil biodiversity and the soil functions it drives. Although the role of earthworms in improving soil quality has long been established, to quantitatively and spatially assess how this soil-animal group’s distribution changes along environmental gradients and geographic space and the identification of the drivers of such change has not been fully investigated. This comprehensive study aimed at modelling and mapping earthworm spatial distribution and diversity patterns to determine their conservation needs and provide baseline reference data for Germany. The study compared multiple modelling algorithms to map earthworm community parameters and 12 species-specific distribution probabilities, calculate their geographic range sizes and determine responses to environmental predictor variables. Three general patterns of spatial distribution ranges were identified by the model predictions (large-range, mid-range, and restricted-range species) with the corresponding environmental contributions to the predictions. Modelled species responses to environmental predictors confirm observed environmental drivers of earthworm distribution in Germany. The range classes based both on distributional level and geographic space provide the necessary information for identifying conservation and decision-making priorities, especially for restricted-distribution species as well as those with clearly defined habitat preferences.

Soil classification systems give an idea which soils are similar regarding their morphology (often developed through pedogenesis) and therefore assigned to the same class, and which are dissimilar and therefore assigned to another class. The morphological criteria are often selected along pedogenetic lines of thinking. Soil functions however often depend on other physical and chemical properties not covered in the same consistent and balanced way, for example neither in World Reference Base for Soil Resources nor US Soil Taxonomy. By using the concept of substrate, a concise and hierarchical soil solid material classification that can be used in parallel to a morphological or morphogenetic soil classification is described. It includes parent material genesis (geogenesis), fine earth texture, coarse fragments, lime and lithic carbon content, and rock type and enables to characterize the soil horizon material—as a complement to the pedogenetic horizon designation—and the entire soil profile—as a complement to the (genetic) soil type. The system covers natural and anthropogenic substrates (as found, e.g., in urban areas, on landfills, etc.). Its hierarchical approach can be used in single profile descriptions, but also in soil mapping, for which it provides a framework for delineation and rule‐based aggregation of spatial soil units.

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