It is an exciting time to be a soil scientist! We have seen the importance of soils rise up in the political and public consciousness. The 2023 EFRA (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) Committee inquiry into soil health, along with coverage in the national press and films such as ‘Kiss the ground’ and ‘Six inches of soil’ has raised public awareness of soils and in turn the importance of soil science as a discipline.
I am really excited to take up the role of President-Elect of the Society and to support Paul Hallett in his role as president over the next two years. I am a strong supporter of the need to raise the awareness of the importance of soils and promote soil science to a wider audience, and I hope to use my role with BSSS to further champion soil science education and outreach – both of which are central to the society’s mission and vision.
Photo Credit: Max Allcock – Horizon Collective
One of the ways in which the society supports soil science education is by providing educational materials and supporting members to engage in educational activities. The society has produced a fantastic range of education resources which are available to download from the website – if you haven’t already seen them, please do take a look. These are suitable for use in schools, at home, or by other groups like Brownies or Scouts.
Building on the downloadable soil resources, the society has also put together several soil ‘loan boxes’. These boxes include all the material needed to deliver a practical session on soil science to children. Since the first loan box was put together in 2023, the boxes have now been loaned out 15 times. Recently we took a loan box to a primary school in Cardiff to deliver a soil science session before the annual conference in Cardiff in December 2024, and it was fantastic to see how engaged and interested the children were. We might just have sparked an interest that could lead to a future soil scientist! Anyone can request a loan box to deliver a session, and we’d love to see more members using them during the next year.
Preparations are also underway for this years Open Farm Sunday on 8 June. This is a national event run by LEAF (Linking Environment and Farming) every June when farmers across the country open their gates to public to discover more about food and farming. It has been hugely successful, and since the first Open Farm Sunday in 2006, over 2000 farmers across Britain have opened their gates and welcomed over 3.25 million people onto farms for farming’s annual open day. The event is very relevant to the Society as the soil is a farmers most important asset, and we’ve been pleased to work with LEAF to support the event by pairing willing BSSS members with farmers who would like soil to be a prominent feature at their farm’s open day. This year I’ll be talking soils at RSPB’s Hope Farm on Open Farm Sunday. We’d love to see more members get involved – please contact the BSSS team via admin@soils.org.uk if you’d like to volunteer.
