University of Münster, Münster, Germany.
University of Alicante, Alicante, Spain.
Commun Biol. 2024 Nov 26;7(1):1577. doi: 10.1038/s42003-024-07275-2.
Soils are the backbone of terrestrial ecosystems, underpinning their biodiversity and functioning. They are also key to agricultural production and ecosystem development. Although focus on effective and profitable food production has led to severely degraded soils, the tools and standards for restoration strategies in agricultural soils are still largely underdeveloped. In this review, we summarize recent developments in ecological restoration practice for soils, evaluate whether these are in line with ecological theory, identify where they could be improved, and contextualize these to agricultural soil restoration. We identify restoration actions and success indicators that may best foster sustainable use of agricultural soils while also increasing their multifunctionality, that is their ability to simultaneously supply multiple ecosystem services including provisioning food and feed. Lastly, we explore actions available to improve soil health and focus on tool and indicator implementation. Calls for reductions in provisioning services, such as yield production, commonly used in ecological restoration practices conflict most directly with wider soil-ecosystem-service-focused restoration actions, including supporting and regulating services. Comprehensive restoration actions harnessing the interdependence of multiple soil properties, including contribution to vegetative yield, appear to be most efficient in agricultural settings with a central role of soil biodiversity in ecosystem service provisioning.
土壤是陆地生态系统的支柱，支撑着它们的生物多样性和功能。它们也是农业生产和生态系统发展的关键。尽管关注有效和盈利的粮食生产导致土壤严重退化，但农业土壤恢复策略的工具和标准仍在很大程度上尚未开发。在这篇综述中，我们总结了土壤生态恢复实践的最新进展，评估了这些进展是否符合生态理论，确定了可以改进的地方，并将这些进展与农业土壤恢复联系起来。我们确定了可能最有利于可持续利用农业土壤同时提高其多功能性的恢复措施，即它们同时提供多种生态系统服务的能力，包括提供食物和饲料。最后，我们探讨了改善土壤健康的可用措施，并侧重于工具和指标的实施。减少生态恢复实践中常用的供应服务，如产量生产，与更广泛的以土壤-生态系统服务为重点的恢复行动最直接冲突，包括支持和调节服务。在农业环境中，利用多种土壤特性的相互依存关系，包括对植被产量的贡献，似乎是最有效的，土壤生物多样性在生态系统服务提供中起着核心作用。
