This full-day event brought together projects from across the Mission Soil initiatives to explore key concepts and practical approaches for strengthening soil data and knowledge management in Europe.
Advancing Soil Data and Knowledge Management
SoilWise contributed actively throughout the workshop, sharing insights and facilitating discussions on soil knowledge management, vocabularies and glossaries, metadata templates, and FAIR strategies and guidelines. Participants had the opportunity to engage in interactive breakout sessions, putting these concepts into practice and exchanging experiences with peers from across Europe.
Workshop Highlights
The day began with an opening session featuring remarks from REA, DG AGRI, JRC, and the SoilWise team, introducing the workshop objectives and structure. Key plenary presentations included:
- Soil Knowledge Management – Rob Lokers (WUR)
- Vocabularies & Glossaries – Fenny van Egmond (ISRIC)
- Metadata Templates – Tomáš Řezník (Masaryk University)
- FAIR Strategies & Guidances – Céline Blitz-Frayret (CIRAD)
Breakout sessions allowed participants to have more dedicated and practical discussions on these topics, fostering collaboration and hands-on learning. Participants rotated across all four breakouts. Topics were explored in both morning and afternoon sessions, ensuring that participants could apply concepts to real-world soil data challenges.
Collaborating for FAIR Soil Data in Europe
Through its active participation in the Mission Soil Data Cluster, SoilWise continues to work closely with Mission Soil partners to advance the FAIR principles for soil data—ensuring that soil information is Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable across Europe. The workshop reinforced the importance of shared vocabularies, robust metadata practices, and structured knowledge management for achieving this goal.
The SoilWise team looks forward to further collaborations with Mission Soil partners and contributing to Europe’s growing ecosystem of FAIR soil data.
