Between June 15-19, University of Sydney research fellows Drs. Brendan Malone and Uta Stockmann visited the National Taiwan University (NTU), Taipei, to provide training and expertise in advanced methods of digital soil mapping. The hands-on and practical course was presented to local researchers, graduate students, and Taiwanese Government scientists, totaling 25 participants. The visit to Taiwan was the first face-to-face arrangement of the International Program Development Fund (IPDF) collaborative project between NTU and Sydney University: “Securing soils for posterity. An international research and training collaboration focusing on the assessment and improvement of global soil carbon sequestration”.
With increases to the global human population and consequent degrading forcing to the environment, the world is experiencing an era where food security and environmental resilience are at stake. Subsequently, these issues are of great importance socially and at all levels of governance. Through the many functions that soils furnish humankind with, there is and will be an increased effort to maintain and improve the condition of the global soil resource for future generations.
It is widely reported that soil carbon and monitoring the fluxes thereof are vital to securing soils for posterity. Working directly with the National Taiwan University (NTU), this project aims to gain a deeper knowledge of soil carbon sequestration, and assess whether stocks of soil carbon are increasing – more locally within Taiwan, but also globally. This is a unique opportunity because NTU maintains a vast soil information database, which according to NTU distinguished Professor Zueng-Sang Chen contains over 130 000 soil profile descriptions with associated soil property data. This is an exceptional amount of data relative to other national soil surveys databases throughout the world, and subsequently will be invaluable to ongoing investigations and furthering knowledge about the dynamics of soil carbon across landscapes in general.
The training workshop introduced participants to the latest methods in soil data analytics and digital soil mapping. NTU were wonderful hosts, and ensured both Brendan and Uta did not leave Taiwan without experiencing their beautiful and busy culture during their one week stay in a very warm Taipei. A delegation led by Prof. Zueng-Sang Chen from NTU is expected to visit the University of Sydney in October for strategic project discussions and presentation of primary results and soil mapping efforts to date.
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