FAO and its partners in the Global Soil Partnership (GSP) are designing SoilSTAT, a system for monitoring, forecasting and reporting periodically on the status of global soil resources. The name of the system mirrors the FAOSTAT family of global status databases and monitoring.

SoilSTAT is part of the Global Soil Information System. It will be built under GSP Pillar 4 as part of spatial data infrastructure for the exchange of web-based soil data services. The basic data elements of Pillar 4 include soil profiles, soil polygon maps and soil grids; SoilSTAT will be based on indicators describing the current condition of, and trends in, soil quality. According to the Status of the World’s Soil Resources report, indicators will address soil threats such as erosion, compaction, salinization and the loss of soil organic matter. SoilSTAT will therefore be an important mediator in the harmonized reporting of national soil information for the Sustainable Development Goals.

It is envisaged that SoilSTAT will build on baseline inventories and soil monitoring systems established by countries. It is expected to evolve as the common denominator for national systems in a global effort to share harmonized information on indicators of soil health.