Guest lecture for the course ‘Applied Pedology (Laboratorio di Pedologia Applicata)’ as part of the Degree in Planning and Management of Forest, Territory, Landscape and Environmnt (PROGESA); Guest Speaker: Brandon Heung, Associate Professor at Dalhousie University, Truro, Canada.
Modelling and monitoring the state and dynamics of the soils and their properties are of critical importance in addressing the fiendish environmental challenges of our time. Yet, the existing spatial information needed to inform sustainable soil management practices is often limited or outdated. Over the past decade in Canada, digital soil mapping (DSM) techniques have become an emerging area of research within the soil science community. This subdiscipline of soil science leverages the advances in remote sensing and GIS to map soil variability using computationally-based approaches. Although this area of research is still emerging in Canada, I will argue that we are currently in a soil mapping renaissance, where our community has been producing map products that are more accurate and precise than what was previously available. This presentation will provide a theoretical overview of DSM; explore the novel applications of DSM techniques across Canada; and identifies the major challenges and opportunities that the Canadian soil mapping community must face.