E7: Healthy soils
Short Description
Healthy soils underpin the multiple functions of soils in food production, supporting wildlife, regulating water and regulating climate. More work is being done to define exactly what the indicator will include but it could include physical properties (such as a measure of soil structure), chemical properties (such as soil carbon, nutrients and pH), bare ground (soil) and a measure of soil biological activity. This indicator is not limited to agricultural soils. Further development of statistically and scientifically robust national monitoring programmes may be needed to provide data for this indicator.
Readiness and links to data
This indicator is not available for reporting in 2025 as further development work is required prior to inclusion in the Outcome Indicator Framework. The indicator will be published when sufficient data have been collected through the Natural Capital and Ecosystem Assessment (NCEA) programme. The indicator will use data currently being gathered on soil characteristics (physical, chemical and biological) and land use to show how different soils are contributing to different ecosystem services as a measure of soil health.
The final indicator will be drawn from a soil health indicator produced by the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC). A proof of concept (JNCC report 737) was published in 2023, and JNCC has recently published their soil indicator methods (JNCC report 763) which summarises the modelling methods that will be used to produce the indicator. An Annex has been published alongside, which presents a pre-experimental dataset indicative of the approach from Defra's NCEA programme.
National soil monitoring under the NCEA programme began in 2023. The delivery of an up-to-date and comprehensive soil health baseline through the England Ecosystem Survey (EES) and the National Forest Inventory+ (NFI+) is a priority of the programme. This is a 5-year survey which will have analysis-ready data from earlier years of the sampling being released from December 2025. The current phase of the programme has had capital investment to achieve 2 of the 5 years needed for a soil health baseline. The next phase of capital investment, needed to complete and publish the baseline in the 2028/2029 financial year, will be included in Defra's research and development spending review.
JNCC will finalise the indicator models based on feedback from expert panels and adapt them to utilise new data from the EES and the NFI+ (strategic surveys under the NCEA programme). The indicator will use data gathered through the NCEA to show how different soils are contributing to different ecosystem services as a measure of soil health and will contribute to a comprehensive and robust baseline for soil health by 2029. However, JNCC is planning to publish an initial, interim statistic, which can be improved on iteratively to enhance the indicator enabling the disaggregation of results by land use and soil type, for example.
Some data on aspects of soil health are already published in the Countryside Survey reports.