911342 Soils and food security (in Eng.)

Vorlesung und Übung
Vortragende/r (Mitwirkende/r)
Sanden, Taru
Institut für Bodenforschung (IBF)
Angeboten im Semester
Wintersemester 2017/18
Unterrichts-/ Lehrsprachen


Soil is the essential basic for the entire food production, and the loss of soil fertility can lead to the collapse of civilisation. This course will focus on the use of the limited resource soil in past and future, and how soil use and management can affect soil fertility. The course is structured into the topics:
- Food Security and Climate Change
- Soil and Land Use
- Use of Natural Resources and Civilization
- Soil Organic Matter
- Soil Carbon Modelling
- Modelling Workhop
The impact of changes in climatic conditions and land use management on soil carbon stocks will be simulated with a soil model, and its potential feedback reactions to climate change discussed.


Students will get to know the concept of food security and how soils relate to this. They will learn which soil factors can limit production rates, how a global population uses the resource soil, and how we can estimate the potential of soils to provide food through changes in climate.