- EXTENT OF COVERAGE
AFRICA Asia Australia and Oceania Americas Europe Eastern Africa
1. Burundi
2. Comoros
3. Djibouti
4. Eritrea
5. Ethiopia
6. Kenya
7. Madagascar
8. Malawi
9. Mauritius
10. Mozambique
11. Réunion
12. Rwanda
13. Seychelles
14. Somalia
15. Uganda
16. United Republic of Tanzania
17. Zambia
18. Zimbabwe
Middle Africa
19. Angola
20. Cameroon
21. Central African Republic
22. Chad
23. Congo
24. Democratic Republic of the Congo
25. Equatorial Guinea
26. Gabon
27. São Tomé and Príncipe
Northern Africa
28. Algeria
29. Egypt
30. Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
31. Morocco
32. Sudan
33. Tunisia
34. Western Sahara
Southern Africa
35. Botswana
36. Lesotho
37. Namibia
38. South Africa
39. Swaziland
Western Africa
40. Benin
41. Burkina Faso
42. Cape Verde
43. Côte d'Ivoire
44. Gambia, The
45. Ghana
46. Guinea
47. Guinea-Bissau
48. Liberia
49. Mali
50. Mauritania
51. Niger
52. Nigeria
53. Saint Helena
54. Senegal
55. Sierra Leone
56. Togo
Eastern Asia
1. China
2. China, Hong Kong SAR
3. China, Macau SAR
4. China Tibet
5. Japan
6. Korea (North)
7. Korea (South)
8. Mongolia
9. Taiwan
Northern Asia
10. Russian Federation
South-Central Asia
11. Afghanistan
12. Bangladesh
13. Bhutan
14. India
15. Iran
16. Kazakhstan
17. Kyrgyzstan
18. Maldives
19. Nepal
20. Pakistan
21. Sri Lanka
22. Tajikistan
23. Turkmenistan
24. Uzbekistan
South-East Asia
25. Brunei Darussalam
26. Cambodia
27. Indonesia
28. Laos
29. Malaysia
30. Myanmar (Burma)
31. Philippines
32. Singapore
33. Thailand
34. Timor-Leste
35. Viet Nam
Western Asia and Middle East
36. Armenia
37. Azerbaijan
38. Bahrain
39. Cyprus
40. Georgia
41. Iraq
42. Israel
43. Jordan
44. Kuwait
45. Lebanon
46. Oman
47. Palestine
48. Qatar
49. Saudi Arabia
50. Syria
51. Turkey
52. United Arab Emirates
53. Yemen
Australia/New Zealand
Australia
New Zealand
Melanesia, the islands in the southwestern part of Oceania
1. Fiji
2. New Caledonia
3. Papua New Guinea
4. Solomon Islands
5. Vanuatu
Micronesia, the islands in the northwestern part of Oceania
6. Guam
7. Kiribati
8. Marshall Islands
9. Micronesia (Federated States of)
10. Nauru
11. Northern Mariana Islands
12. Palau
Polynesia, the islands in the eastern part of Oceania
13. American Samoa
14. Cook Islands
15. French Polynesia (Tahiti)
16. Niue
17. Pitcairn
18. Samoa
19. Tonga
20. Tuvalu
Caribbean
1. Anguilla
2. Antigua and Barbuda
3. Aruba
4. Bahamas
5. Barbados
6. Bermuda
7. British Virgin Islands
8. Cayman Islands
9. Cuba
10. Dominica
11. Dominican Republic
12. Grenada
13. Guadeloupe
14. Haiti
15. Jamaica
16. Martinique
17. Netherlands Antilles
18. Puerto Rico
19. Saint Kitts and Nevis
20. Saint Lucia
21. Trinidad and Tobago
22. U.S. Virgin Islands
Central America
23. Belize
24. Costa Rica
25. El Salvador
26. Guatemala
27. Honduras
28. Nicaragua
29. Panama
South America
30. Argentina
31. Bolivia
32. Brazil
33. Chile
34. Colombia
35. Ecuador
36. French Guiana
37. Guyana
38. Paraguay
39. Peru
40. Suriname
41. Uruguay
42. Venezuela
North America
30. Canada
31. Mexico
32. United States
Eastern Europe
Belarus
Bulgaria
* Czech Republic
* Hungary
Moldova
* Poland
Romania
Russian Federation
* Slovakia
Ukraine
Northern Europe
* Denmark
* Estonia
(*) Faroe Islands
* Finland
* Greenland
+ Iceland
* Ireland
* Latvia
* Lithuania
+ Norway
* Sweden
* United Kingdom
Southern Europe
Albania
Andorra
Bosnia and Herzegowina
Croatia (Hrvatska)
* Cyprus
Gibraltar
* Greece
Holy See (Vatican City State)
* Italy
Macedonia
* Malta
* Portugal
San Marino
Serbia and Montenegro (former Yugoslavia)
* Slovenia
* Spain
Turkey
Western Europe
* Austria
* Belgium
* France
* Germany
+ Liechtenstein
* Luxembourg
Monaco
* Netherlands
+ Switzerland
* Member States of the European Union (EU)
+ Member States of European Free Trade Association (EFTA)
FUTURE PERSPECTIVE
- - Complete the archive in order to achieve global
coverage
- - Georeference on-line the digital maps
- - Raster to vector conversion for GIS applications
- - Integration in the European Soil Information System
References
International Council for Science 2004. ICSU Report of the CSPR Assessment Panel on Scientific Data and Information. Paris
Organizations & Institutes interested in contributing and expanding this European archive on the soil maps of the WORLD - EuDASM are requested to contact the responsible persons below:
Further comments, suggestions and Inputs are invited.
Contacts details
Dr. Luca Montanarella
European Commission- JRC, European Soil Bureau, Institute of Environment and Sustainability, ITALY
Email: luca.montanarella@jrc.it
Dr. Senthil-Kumar Selvaradjou
European Commission- JRC, European Soil Bureau, Institute of Environment and Sustainability, ITALY
Email: senthil.selvaradjou@jrc.it
- - Complete the archive in order to achieve global
coverage
‘Data and information are essential
building blocks of science. Many types of data, including extant historical
data which have newly appreciated scientific importance for the analysis
of changes over time, are not being used for research because they are
not available in digital formats’ (International Council for Science,
2004).
Maps made in the past remain the backbone for present
and future studies. Soil maps are resources for researchers in many fields
apart from soil science; they are the source of databases, related to
and dependent on soils, used to monitor land degradation and improvement,
changes in land use and water resources, and to predict climatic and other
environmental changes.
Less and less new, fundamental soil data are being produced
these days; the older data and information are being pumped around more
and more. Therefore it is vital to preserve the older data (in this case
maps) as they are building blocks of most current soil information. The
user of present-day, derived information should have easy access to the
source material, if only to assess the reliability of the derived material.
But, in many countries, soil maps are being lost because
of lack of proper attention to storage and retrieval, often compounded
by a loss of institutions that have been responsible for the acquisition
and maintenance of soil and land resources data. This problem is acute
in developing and transitional countries where valuable data, currently
only available on paper, must be digitized before they are lost forever.
In Africa, though not only in Africa, this type of information
is rapidly being lost; much is already lost. The digitization of the African
maps will enable the African countries to recover and re-use their soil
information.
Translation of soil information from paper maps and reports
into digital format is a prerequisite of the next step - the development
of a digital information system on soil and terrain that may be drawn
upon for manifold applications.
BACKGROUND
For some 40 years, ISRIC – World Soil Information
has been providing significant support to the international science community
by collecting and archiving regional-, national- and global-scale maps
of soils and land resources.
Despite effective procedures for storage and maintenance,
most organizations involved in archiving struggle to arrest the deterioration
of paper maps and the quality of information they contain. Deterioration
occurs for various reasons that include handling, transport, exposure
to light, moisture and atmospheric pollution.
Realizing the need to conserve the information on existing
maps, which underpin the fast-developing thematic mapping strategies to
support soil protection, the Institute of Environment and Sustainability
(IES) in the European Commission (Italy) and ISRIC – World Soil Information
initiated the European Digital Archive of Soil Maps (EuDASM). The immediate
objective is to transfer soil information into digital format, with the
maximum resolution possible, to preserve the information of paper maps
that are vulnerable to deterioration.
Beyond data rescue, the archive is expected to develop
into a common platform for storing soil maps from around the world and
making the information readily accessible. Organisations that maintain
soil map archives in paper form, and wishing to conserve this information
by transferring it into digital form, are invited to join the EuDASM programme.
The initiative for this programme was taken by Dr Luca
Montanarella of the European Joint Research Centre and Dr Otto Spaargaren
of ISRIC – World Soil Information in October 2004. The first level
success for this initiative was figured out by completion of the around
2000 soil maps pertaining to the African continent. Through this digitization
programme the map quality and precision of information were preserved
against further loss assuming to be required for future use by land resources
specialists.
OVERVIEW OF EUDASM