Assuming a positive outcome of the parliamentary procedure for laws and, thus, the transformation of the official cadastre for buildings and land into a soil cadastre (urban, extra-urban and cadastre for the conservation of natural or semi-natural soil diversity) would start a new era for pedology. Finally, after many decades of activity to expand soil culture in Italy, almost all Italian families would be in contact with a soil specialist. Land use and redefined plots would be handled with greater care and responsibility. Experts in agricultural and forestry and biodiversity conservation would have a new impetus in their activity. Furthermore, economists will also have to address new issues. The aim of this work was to analyse how to meet the needs of a future Cadastre with respect to soil information both from a descriptive (Cadastral Certificate) and a cartographic point of view and to outline a practical guideline for future technicians who will be in charge of maintaining and updating the soil information system. To this end, we used the area of Caccamo (Sicily) and its soilscape as an example to put this concept into practice. On the one hand, this contribution aims at stimulating the start of a scientific-technical debate and, on the other hand, to give practical indications for the solution of the problem.

We report the dissipation behavior of pyrazosulfuron-ethyl under direct sunlight using iron-doped titanium dioxide nanoparticles (FeTiO2) as a catalyst. The test was carried out by reinforcement three varying aqueous pH solutions with pH~4.0,7.0 and 9.0 to make the homogeneous concentrations of T0 – untreated control, T1 – pyrazosulfuron-ethyl 70% WG @ 1 mg/L of pH water and T2 – pyrazosulfuron-ethyl 70% WG @ 2 mg/L of pH water. The fortified test samples were exposed to sunlight. The sampling occasions were 0, 1, 5, 10, 24, 48, 72 and 96th hours for all three different aqueous solutions having pH ~ 4.0 (acidic water), 7.0 (neutral water) and 9.0 (basic water). The acquired samples were quantified using validated high-pressure liquid chromatography with UV detection technique. The pyrazosulfuron-ethyl half-life (DT50) was calculated from the dissipation results by regression equation. The FeTiO2 nanoparticles were determined to be a wonderful decontaminating catalyst for pyrazosulfuron-ethyl in various water samples.

AbstractCadastres are always related to land: they are a creation of man as effect of his relationship with land.The different conditions of the Cadastre in 14 EU Member States, including the former EU Candidate States (that nowadays are also EU members), are shown in this paper.Half of EU countries store cadastral and registration data in the same database.Basically two original models of cadastral system exist in the EU, related with systems of land registration :1) in the Central European model (beyond the area of the Germanic “Grundbuch”) Cadastre emerges as a graphic basis (map) of land registration (Land Registry), so that physical changes must be reflected in the Cadastre and legal changes in the Land Registry, by maintaining a perfect parallelism;2) in the Latin model the Cadastre emerges only as a taxation instrument, useful for collecting land taxes.The Land Cadastre in the EU is almost always parcel-based and contains an urban Cadastre (of buildings) only in a few countries.Moreover, the European Land Information Service (EULIS) is shown as result of a project carried out by nine partners of eight EU Member States.The knowledge of the cadastral models in EU Member States is a fundamental condition for the harmonisation of Soil Cadastre at EU level as an inventory for environmental, social, economic, legal and taxation purposes.

In this paper, according to the data of 40 stations in Iran during 1967-2014, the trend of climate changes and its severity are evaluated. A consistent correlation is highlighted for trends of De Martonne index as indicator of climate change and temperature rise in some stations. Based on the results of the temperature analysis, 70% of the country has become warmer, 3% has become colder and 27% has faced without significant changes. The precipitation in the 30.5% of the country has been decreased and 69.5% of the country didn’t show any significant changes. About the climate changes derived from climate index: 38.6 % of the area of the country has become drier and 61.4% of the area didn’t show any significant changes. A hazard classification for climate change was used showing 21% of the country under without or no change class, 22% under moderate class, 37.2% under severe class and 19.5% under very severe class. These results correspond to more desertification, frequency and intensity of droughts and observing lost lakes during the last decades in the study area.

The Resolve research project set up a multidisciplinary research work to evaluate the effects of possible errors in soil management during pre-planting and vineyard cultivation, leading to severe soil erosion. Different soil functionalities were considered, namely provision of grape yield and quality, water and nutrient supply, carbon sequestration, organic matter recycling, and soil biodiversity. The project involved 19 experimental organically farmed vineyards situated in Italy, France, Spain and Slovenia (wine grape), and in Turkey (table grape). The aim of the project was to understand the causes of soil malfunctioning and work out a proper strategy to restore soil fertility.

In Sicily it is witnessing an environmental degradation that can be conducted to the human activity and the already known process of desertification. The present study had as object the c/da Piana del Signore in plain of Gela being an area characterized by an extreme aridity and salinity. Through consultation and study of the various researches realized on the area, the various environmental and territorial characteristics outlined, highlighting the issues and possible improvements. The objective was to outline the damages caused by man proposing possible routes for a correct requalification of the area in order to enhance a landscape of great agronomic and naturalistic interest. In fact to enhance that area it is necessary to restore it and, in this case, it is to undertake an activity of depollution, given that today in the area are deposited waste of any natura therefore highly polluting.

Huge quantities of treated wastewater (TMWW) and biosolids (sludge) are produced every day all over the world, which exert a strong pressure on the environment. An important question that is raised is “what to do with them?”.An effort is put by the scientific community to eliminate the concept of “waste” and to replace it with the concept of “recycling of resources”, by means of effective management, which does not concern only the users, but all the other groups involved in the problem, such as facility administrators, operations, politicians, scientific community and the general population. Sludge concentration data showed that there exist 516 chemicals in biosolids which create a serious health risk. It is pointed out that this risk will be greatly exacerbated by chemical toxins present in the sludge which can predispose skin to infection by pathogens. Consequently, the need for science-based policies are necessary to effectively protect public health. The risk assessment due to sludge, is difficult to evaluate of due to the large number of unknown interactions involved. People living near the sludge application sites may suffer from such abnormalities as: eye, nose, and throat irritation, gastrointestinal abnormalities, as nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, including cough, difficulty in breathing, sinus congestion, skin infection and sores. Many problems seem to be related to biosolid and wastewater application in agriculture, which should be solved. A universal one, acknowledged as an “international health crisis” is the resistance of pathogens to antibiotics and to the evolution of multidrug resistance of bacteria”. Certain anthropogenically created environments have been identified as major sources of multidrug resistance bacteria such as in water treatment plants, concentrated animal feeding operations etc. All these, and many other health problems, render the safety of sludge and biosolid and wastewater agricultural reuse, for the time being questionable even though the application is done according to official guidelines. It is therefore necessary that more research work be conducted on the short and long term application effects of sludge on human health, and on the environment so as to successfully address these problems Also,the existing guidelines must be reconsidered on the basis of the research findings to be attained. It is only then that the application of these inputs to land could be as safe as possible.

Concern about environmental pollution has grown in the last few decades, amongst both specialists in the field and society at large. This concern is reflected in thenumerous studies that have been published on this topic in recent years. Soil pollution has been somewhat neglected as a topic of study, relative to air and waterpollution, which are considered harmful to human life. However, soil pollution is a particularly serious problem because of the impact on soil functioning and on theecosystem as a whole. Although natural processes such as volcanic activity and weathering of the parent material contribute to soil pollution, anthropogenicactivities represent the main cause of soil pollution. Apart from some accidental events, most pollution is generated by human activities such as industrialprocesses, transportation, construction, uncontrolled discharges, waste generation and agriculture. Agricultural land is particularly sensitive to pollution, partly because certain agricultural practices (soil preparation and tillage, soil fertilization, grazing, etc.) may affect basic soil properties, and partly because the soils usuallydisplay poor resilience. However, pollutants often reach already degraded agricultural soils and their impact will therefore be added to existing effects. Thepollutants most frequently encountered in the agricultural sector include heavy metals, petroleum derived products, persistent organic pollutants, pesticides and fertilizers. Soil enzymes such as oxidoreductases and hydrolases have been widelyused to investigate the impact of different pollutants on agricultural soils. However, the study findings are often inconclusive, because the impact of a given pollutanton the activity of different soil enzymes is influenced by various factors. In this report, we analyze the findings of different studies concerning pollution of agricultural soils.

Subaqueous soils have to be studied with proper methodologies, according to a pedological approach and considering the key role of animal bioturbation. Morphological and chemical characteristics of submerged soils found in the MPA of Torre del Cerrano, Adriatic sea (Italy), have been studied in this way, and we conclude that submarine soils of the MPA are important examples of pedogenesis promoted by animals. Soils from the highly protected marine area hosted a major biodiversity than those from the sub- and non-protected areas, while no striking differences in terms of soil physical and chemical characteristics among protected, sub-protected and non-protected areas occurred.

The flooding regime of saltmarshes strongly affects organic matter mineralisation, representing a unique situation where oxygen diffusion is either impeded by submersion or favoured by retreating water in regular cycles within the same day. Decomposition of Limonium vulgare Mill. residues in saltmarsh soils was evaluated measuring CO2 and CH4 emissions. Four different saltmarshes from the Grado Lagoon (Northern Adriatic Sea) were investigated. Soils were characterised by a similar vegetation ( Sarcocornietea class) and similar high coverage of L. vulgare (70-75%) but differed in redox potential, texture and organic carbon content. Hydromorphic conditions were reproduced in mesocosms, and soils were 20 incubated under fully aerobic, fully anaerobic and transient (6 hours cycles) tidal states. Partially decomposed litter (leaves) of L. vulgare was added and 22 decomposition processes were monitored through CO2 and CH4 emissions. Larger CO2 emissions were measured under aerobic conditions, in particular in soil samples with coarse texture. Fully anoxic and tidal regimes showed a similar behaviour. On the contrary, CH4 emissions were less dependent upon flooding, showing only slightly larger values under completely submerged conditions. Larger CH4 emissions have been obtained in fine textured soils. Soil organic matter content also influenced gas emissions: larger values corresponded to higher emissions of both CO2 and CH4.