International Black Soil Society

The 2nd workshop of IGCP 665 (2nd International Symposium on Global Black soil Critical Zone Geo-ecological Survey) was successfully held in Harbin from 8th to 12th, December, 2018. More than 80 scientists from 7 countries attended the workshop.

Prof. Cheng Qiuming, President of the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) attended this workshop and highly affirmed the achievements of the IGCP 665 research and the black soil critical zone research. He also invited the International Black Soil Society which was proposed by the whole research team to apply to become a member under the IUGS structure.

Prof. Peng Suping, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, President of the International Black Soil Society (IBSS), was also invited to attend the meeting and gave a brilliant speech on the significance and future development of geo-ecological survey in the black soil critical zone.

Prof. Li Zhizhong, Director-General of Shenyang Geological Survey, China Geological Survey stressed that black soil is the most precious soil resource in the world. There are only four black soil regions in the world. They are all important food producing areas in their countries and have an important impact on global climate change. In the future, we should carry out the geo-ecological survey of the global black soil critical zone through IGCP 665 project, strengthen cooperation to achieve a new breakthrough in black land investigation and research.

Prof. Wang Daming, Vice President and Secretary-General of IBSS, the team leader of IGCP 665 project reported and summarized the major progresses since the project was approved. Focusing on the black soil critical zone research, especially on the IGCP 665 project, the scientists shared the progress of IGCP 665 project during 2018, discussed scientific problems as well as the research plans for the next following years.

The achievements of the IGCP 665 project include:

1. Organized China Geological Survey project

We continue the integrated geological survey in Northeast China in 2018. The budget was 500 million USD, the same amount as the IGCP project proposal. We have finished 44 960 square kilometers of 1:250,000 geochemical survey, 100,000 square kilometers of satellite remote sensing survey and 1500 square kilometers of aerial hyperspectral survey.

2. Applied China-Czech inter-government project

We have applied the China-Czech Regular Scientific and Technological Meeting Exchange Project, named "Orbiting Satellite Soil Mapping and Monitoring" in 2018. The main content of cooperation is that the two sides jointly carry out research work on soil quality information inversion, mapping and monitoring based on orbital satellite data. The proposal is under review now.

3. Established International Black Soil Society (IBSS)

The research team of the IGCP 665 from more than 30 institutes of more than 10 countries has proposed an International Black Soil Society together. It has been registered already and will provide a collaboration platform for all the scientists interested in black soil critical zone research.

4. Signed initiative and LoIs

The IBSS has made an initiative on global black soil critical zone geo-ecological survey (Shenyang Declaration), and the whole research teams have signed this initiative. LoIs have also been signed by the whole IGCP 665 research team.

5. IGCP665/IBSS website

The IGCP 665 website has been registered with the link as http://www.blacksoils.org/news_en/index.html. The website is also used as the home page of IBSS.

6. Collaborated with other international organizations

Prof. Wang Daming, team leader of the IGCP 665 was invited to the 1st international symposium on black soils (the 1st workshop of International Network of Black Soil) organized by UNESCO and the Heilongjiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences of China.

7. Collected background data and mapped atlas

We collected background research datasets from different research teams, e.g. Geochemical and Mineralogical Surveys by USGS, Multi-purpose Geochemical Surveys by SGS, GEMAS by EuroGeoSurvey, Land Remote Sensing Program by USGS, World Soil Spectrum Lib by CSIRO and Space-Air-Ground RS Survey by SGS.

A basic atlas has been mapped based on these background data. The Atlas is divided into three scales: global scale (46°N black soil area), regional scale, local scale. The maps include soil types, land use changes, surface vegetation cover, carbon emissions regional scale temperature, primary productivity, and precipitation etc.

8. Served social economic development in Northeast China

By using the results of land quality geological survey, we have planned and built a natural green selenium-enriched rice demonstration base in Changfa Town, and successfully built the reputation of “Longjiang Selenium First Village”.

We have also constructed a demonstration farmland for selenium-enriched rice planting in Dongliao County, and a traceability management system for the geo-ecological environment of specialty agricultural products. The origin of agricultural products can be obtained through a QR code on the product packages, through which consumers can inquire about agricultural soil types, soil organic matter, nutrients, beneficial elements and other information services.

Our research team has also discussed the next steps in detail. The IGCP 665 project (as well as BASGES research) plan will be divided into 8 directions of 3 kinds. The first kind is about survey techniques including 4 directions, the second one is about critical zone modeling including 3 directions, and the last one is about cooperation platform construction including 1 direction. They are as follows.

1.1 Multi-scale RS survey and monitoring of global black soil critical zone

1.2 Spectral survey of global black soil critical zone

1.3 Multi-scale geochemical survey of global black soil critical zone

1.4 Northeast China black soil CZO construction and comparative study

2.1 Comprehensive modeling of global black soil critical zone

2.2 Carbon cycle research of global black soil critical zone

2.3 Microbial research of global black soil critical zone

3.1 Construction of sharing platform of datasets, models and research news etc.