The Future of Brazilian Pedology: Pedometrics and Advanced Methods for Soil Survey

Abstract

Over the last few decades, Brazil has faced difficulties with the reduction of financial resources to update the inventory of its soils. The lack of support for this activity by state and federal governments and funding agencies has led to a weakening of institutions that traditionally carry out soil surveys and pedology research in Brazil. The dismantling or incorporation of soil survey institutes in other institutions of a broader scope, like in other countries, also took place in Brazil, with the extinction of the Radambrasil Project and the transformation of Embrapa’s National Soil Survey and Conservation Service into National Soil Research Center, with much larger attributions than those of its predecessor, and less focused on pedology. Also, traditional soil surveys are now considered expensive and time-consuming. However, newly available techniques and technological advances in digital soil mappingDigital soil mapping can be applied to conduct faster, less costly and more quantitative soil assessments, allowing for the continuity of soil surveys in Brazil. We present a summary of the problems and challenges facing soil surveying in Brazil, and some innovative pedometric solutions for this activity that is essential for the development of sustainable agriculture and environmental resources exploitation, as well as conservation issues under climate changeClimate change scenarios, under which tropical soilsTropical soils will be key elements for Carbon emissions’ mitigation.