IAgrE SocEnv Fellow Lecture: Reconciling human timescales and infrastructure with soil time and space

This online lecture explores how soil systems operate across very different scales of space and time, from micro to landscape levels and from seasonal change to processes that unfold over millennia. It considers the mismatch between the slow formation and recovery of soils and the much faster pace of human exploitation, alongside the wider environmental changes that affect soil resources.

The session also looks at the current and future economic implications of soil degradation and the need for stronger soil protection policy and regulation. It is framed as a call to action for better community-based soil education and practitioner-led soil management.

The lecture is presented as part of the lead-up to World Soil Day and features Mark Kibblewhite HonFSE CEnv FIAgrE, Emeritus Professor at Cranfield University, as speaker.