Soil carbon in Africa

In September 2020, the FAO published a guide on the state of soils in Africa. It is entitled Carbone des sols en Afrique, impacts des usages des sols et des pratiques agricoles. We decided to tell you about it because it is one of the essential tools in our project, which aims to study methods of soil carbon sequestration. This article presents various studies taking stock of African soils in all their specificities and provides information on the carbon storage capacities according to the various types of soils and their uses on a particular continent.

This article makes an alarming assessment of the current situation. Throughout the world, soils are constantly being degraded as a result of their uses, even though they are an indispensable resource for food production, water filtration, preservation of biodiversity and carbon storage.

As essential reservoirs of carbon, soils play a major role in the fight against global warming and the increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. They are also at the center of several United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDOs), more particularly SDO 2 "Zero Hunger", 13 "Fight against Climate Change", 15 "Land Life", 12 "Responsible Consumption and Production" and 1 "No Poverty".

On Earth, the majority of carbon is located in soils, 1,500 to 2,400 Giga tons are located in the first few meters of soil, compared to 830 Gt in the atmosphere and 450 to 650 Gt in plant biomass (Ciais et al., 2013). The "agriculture, forestry and other land uses" (AFOLU) sector defined by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), is thus recognized as having a major role in CO2 reduction and sequestration strategies (Smith et al., 2014).

The objective of the initiative "4 for 1000, soils for food security and climate", launched by France at COP 21 (Paris, 2015), seeks to promote the crucial role of agricultural soils in food security but also the fight against climate change through carbon sequestration.

This article shows us that tropical soils have a particular role, through their properties and the speed of their evolution and also through the many changes in their uses. Soil management has a major role in carbon sequestration. However, studies on this phenomenon remain rare and still poorly understood. It is therefore necessary to work on this subject in order to meet the various environmental objectives developed at various international gatherings such as the COP 21 in 2015 in Paris.

If you are interested in this article and want to know more, we invite you to consult the complete book produced by the FAO.

Enjoy reading! http://www.fao.org/3/cb0403fr/CB0403FR.pdf