Ireland's State of the Environment Report 2024

155 Chapter 6: Soil Key chapter messages 1. Ireland’s soils play important roles in storing carbon, in regulating both water flow and water quality and in growing food and raw materials. Soils are under threat from excess nutrients, compaction, soil sealing and loss of soil biodiversity, in Ireland and across the EU. Soil health must be prioritised to ensure food security, protect the soil biome, and safeguard the important environmental services that soil provides. 2. The protection of soils lacked a legal and policy framework until recently and the publication of the EU Soil Strategy in 2021 and the proposed soil monitoring law in 2023 are significant. Ireland faces challenges in achieving the objectives of the EU Soil Strategy and in implementing the proposed soil monitoring law. However, getting this right would significantly advance the protection of Ireland’s soil health. 3. To support the proposed soil monitoring law and soil health assessment, Ireland should advance soil mapping and modelling, through a cross-public sector approach, which would rapidly improve our knowledge of soil health at a national level.