SOIL CONSERVATION AND CARBON SEQUESTRATION

Guest Editorial

The collection of papers in this special issue of Climatic Change were selectedfrom those presented at Soil Carbon Sequestration sessions at the 11th and 12thInternational Soil Conservation Organization (ISCO) Conferences, Buenos Aires,2000, and Beijing, 2002. ISCO is an international organization dedicated to thepromotion of soil conservation.

Improved soil conservation through erosion control and other means, normallyresults in increased organic matter content in the soil. These multiple benefits havetraditionally been promoted in soil conservation literature as a means to enhancecrop yields, increase farm income, and reduce transport of sediments and pol-lutants to surface waters. However, with increased focus on climate change andthe development of the Kyoto Protocol and other international treaties which mayemerge, soil conservation through carbon (C) sequestration also reduces the netCO2 emission by systematically removing CO2 from the atmosphere, thereby mit-igating climate change. This adds an important new dimension to the issues of soilconservation, namely, the economic benefits gained from creating and trading Ccredits on the international C market. This is a classic ‘win-win’ situation, beinga cost-effective and natural process of mitigating climate change with no adverseecological impacts compared to oceanic and geologic sequestration strategies.

The papers in this special issue examine various themes surrounding the issuesof C sequestration. They begin with an overview of the Kyoto Protocol and sup-porting accords, describing the opportunities and responsibilities for countries thatchoose to participate in these activities. This is followed by two papers describ-ing the potentials for C sequestration in China and India, which currently are notrequired to report on their greenhouse gas mitigation measures, but who collec-tively have major impacts on global climates because of their large populationsand increasing industrialization. The three papers from Canada and Iceland illus-trate country studies on calculating greenhouse gas balance, and the implicationsof ‘net-net’ accounting for agricultural areas. Finally, the last two papers discusscriteria for creating project specific C credits, as well as some legal implicationssurrounding the issues of C sequestration.

This collection of papers is not the final word on C sequestration, but rathera work in progress. The focus is on linking C sequestration with soil conserva-tion, and mobilizing activities to capture the economic and environmental benefitsaccrued thereof. Other issues such as creating, verifying and trading C credits arehardly touched, and may be a priority for a future issue. Much work is ongoing, but

Climatic Change 65: 253–254, 2004.

254 GUEST EDITORIAL

much still remains to be resolved, on the issue of C sequestration, soil conservation,and climate change.

Recently, doubts have been raised on whether sufficient countries will ratifyKyoto to bring it into effect. In our opinion, this is not critical. Kyoto is more thanan international agreement; it is a collective expression that human actions are nowso extensive that they can impact on systems as broad as the global climate. Kyotois less than perfect, but if this version does not survive, subsequent events willcertainly take up the challenge, and bring about improved versions that will be tothe benefit of everyone.

The conferences from which these papers were selected, and the publicationof this special issue were supported by the Environment Bureau, Agriculture andAgriFood Canada. This support is gratefully acknowledged.

JULIAN DUMANSKIRATTAN LAL