Enhancement of sustainable land soil resource management in agriculture - E2SOILAGRI

NIBIO has long-term experience working on soil research issues. During many years, the department of soil survey at NIBIO has gained extensive experience not only in collecting data, but also making data easily accessible for different users. Moreover, Norwegian methodologies used in soil survey are very similar to the ones that are planned to be introduced in Latvia. Consequently, the national adaptations of international soil classifications used over the years in Norway would provide Latvia with valuable experience needed to set up our methodologies and system of soil survey.

Project manager at NIBIO is Siri Svendgård-Stokke, Head of the Agricultural Soil Survey Department.

• We are happy to be a partner in this important project. The main objective for NIBIO is to have an advisory role for the project promoter and our Latvian partners, but the project will also be useful for us.
• The Norwegian Program for Soil Survey is an information system consisting of four steps: Data capture, Data management, Data processing and Dissemination. The information system requires an effective and reliable data capture, a secure data management, adequate data processing and a thorough dissemination. Probably, this way of organizing a National Soil Survey Program will be useful for the Latvian partners.
• International knowledge-sharing, specifically on dissemination, could provide us with new ideas regarding new products based on the results from the Norwegian Soil Survey

Project results: 

November, December 2021:

NIBIO conducted a series of interviews with important stakeholders and partners in Latvia in order to summarize information about the current Latvian Soil Information System. NIBIO concludes that although the system is fragmented, it has a large amount of soil data. NIBIO understands E2SOILAGRI as a project supporting the consolidation of the Soil Information System through standardization, updating and management of the existing data. This will be a very valuable project in making the soil data in Latvia more relevant and useful for a sustainable soil resource management in agriculture.

Due to covid-19 restrictions, the meetings were held by using Teams/Zoom. The inception report summarizes the main findings of these interviews

(https://hdl.handle.net/11250/2978145)

February 18th. 2022: 

Project Steering Committee Meeting 18.02.2022. On the agenda: Planned activities in 2022, project application and partnership agreement amendments (by the project manager), and Presentations from partners about current progress and planned activities (University of Latvia, State Plant Protection Service, Silava and NIBIO)

April, 2022:

A three-day study trip to Hustadvika in Norway was held for eight Latvian project participants. The goal was to give participants a thorough introduction to in field data capture and an introduction to the Norwegian Soil Survey Information System. The Latvian participants represented The Ministry of Agriculture, University of Latvia, State Plant Protection Service and Latvia University of Life Sciences and Technologies. NIBIO was represented by the Department of Geomatics and the Department of Agricultural Soil Survey.

A report describing the Norwegian Soil Information System was published prior to the visit (https://hdl.handle.net/11250/2992191)

October, 2022:

NIBIO project participants spent a week in Latvia to perform necessary information gathering on the status of the project for the Latvian partners. The study visit included both interviews and field visits.

December, 2022

A mid-term report from the study visit in October was published. The report summarizes the main findings of the study trip and remarks from the review team on the different tasks of E2SOILAGRI ( https://hdl.handle.net/11250/3036996)

November, 2023:

NIBIO project participants spent four days in Latvia to perform necessary information gathering on the project implementation results for each Latvian partner.

December, 2023:

A final project implementation review report from the study visit in November was published. The report summarizes the main findings of the study trip and remarks from the review team on the different tasks of E2SOILAGRI

Planned activities: 

Perform project final implementation review. To help project steering group follow up and evaluate project implementation progress it is expected to develop two stage project implementation reviews. Final project implementation review (PIR) will assess project implementation results according to the planned results listed in the Terms of Reference. In the same time project implementation according to recommendations provided in the mid-term PIR will be assessed.

Final PIR will be carried out in following stages:

• Review of written project progress reports
• 4 day in country mission to perform stakeholder and project implementation partner interviews
• Perform initial finding discussion with representatives from project steering group at the end of in country mission
• Prepare and deliver written final PIR report