SER Europe Position on the European Soil Monitoring Directive
– Adriana Clivillé, CREAF
The Society for Ecological Restoration Europe (SERE) raises concerns about the adequacy of the proposal of the recent European Soil Monitoring and Resilience Directive, and the effectiveness of its goals, although it admits that it is a first step in the right direction to increase soil monitoring capacity. This position has been made public in a report co-authored by CREAF researcher Pilar Andrés Pastor and Pere Rovira Castellà, researcher at the Centre of Forest Science and Technology of Catalonia, with the review of two international specialists also involved in the document.
The importance of this EU directive lies in the fact that it is the embryo that should make it possible to move towards a European law on soil protection and restoration. The SER Europe report emphasizes that the directive does not take into account all the threats to European soils, and “is not ambitious enough to prevent further degradation”. It also states that “there is still a lack of effective legal instruments” to contain degeneration, as well as the loss of soil biodiversity.
As the director of SER Europe –Professor of Ecology and researcher at the University of Alicante Jordi Cortina-Segarra– explains, the positioning expresses that the proposed directive does not live up to expectations, especially after the failure of the 2006 Soil Framework Directive, which was withdrawn in 2014.
The Soil Monitoring and Resilience Directive addresses the health, sustainable management and remediation of contaminated land. From a legal and implementation point of view, it is to be submitted to the European Parliament, as is the European Nature Restoration Law, which is expected to be adopted in December 2023.
