Soil quality and health
This page explains why soil health is important, and links to resources and data.
Soil health is a soil’s ongoing capacity to function as a living ecosystem sustaining plant, animal, and human health. A healthy soil supports important ecosystem services such as nutrient cycling, carbon storage, water filtration and storage, food production and biodiversity. Healthy soils support New Zealand’s production of food and fibre, and natural ecosystems.
Threats to soil include
- loss through erosion
- impairment through nutrient mismanagement
- contamination
- damage to soil physical structure.
Loss of soil through erosion often leads to downstream effects on water quality in rivers and estuaries through sedimentation.
Poor soil health can also lead to wider environmental effects by leaching of nutrients and contaminants into groundwater, and emissions of greenhouse gases.