I servizi ecosistemici del suolo – un progetto di ricerca per limitare il consumo di suolo a scala locale

There is a common believe that land take is consuming a non-renewable resource, with social and economic impacts at various scales (EC, 2012). The debate is now focusing on possible strategies to limit and deal with the impacts. These include evaluation of ecosystem services (MEA, 2005) as one of the most interesting scientific challenges in the coming years. We discuss the evaluation of ecosystem services provided by unsealed soil, providing the reference framework of a research conducted by ISPRA in the frame- work of the LIFE project SAM4CP (Soil Administration Model for Community Profit) focusing on seven major ecosystem services, with reference to the overall objective of the research is to understand how the benefits produced by the soil may vary due to changes in land use.