Under the theme “Healthy Soils for Healthy Cities”, the “World Soil Day 2025” event was held at the headquarters of the Professional Council for Agricultural Engineering (CPIA), organized by INTA, Fertilizar, CPIA and the Argentine Association of Soil Sciences (AACS), with the aim of raising awareness of the importance of soil management and its impact on production, the environment and urban life.
During the meeting, Fertilizar Executive Director María Fernanda González San Juan emphasized that soil is not only the heritage of rural areas, but also supports life in urban environments as it regulates temperature, filters water, stores carbon and maintains biodiversity. In this regard, he recalled that, according to the FAO, 95% of food comes from the soil and a third is degraded, reflecting the scale of the challenge. Regarding the national reality, he emphasized that in Argentina the soil is the basis of agricultural production, explaining that “the future and hope do not lie far away or above, but rather down in the soil, which is in every sense our livelihood, because all our food sources depend on it.”
For his part, INTA President Nicolás Bronzovich praised the coordination between the different participating institutions as an example of how science can generate assets for an economy that wants to be competitive, dynamic and open. Reviewing the organization’s 69-year history, he highlighted INTA’s historic contribution to the study of soils in Argentina and the importance that this resource has had and continues to have for the country’s economy.
In this regard, Bronzovich pointed out that technology in current agricultural and food production has a growing importance in the productivity changes of the systems, emphasizing that these result from investments driven by incentives, clear rules, information and knowledge. Finally, he emphasized that the country is part of the national identity and that technology represents the future, defining INTA as a bridge between the two.
In turn, the director of INTA’s Natural Resources Research Center (CIRN), Pablo Mercuri, explained that soils require greater commitment from agronomists. He noted that there are still numbers that reflect the complexity of soil management on farms and the concern about depletion and replacement of nutrients to maintain their health. In addition, he warned campaign after campaign about the impact of high climate variability on the condition of the soil and on the availability of water, and emphasized the need to increase field work to maintain production and environmental protection.
In this sense, Mercuri emphasized the need for smart intensification and questioned whether the current soil samples per campaign are sufficient. He also emphasized that climate fluctuations in the country’s main production region exacerbate degradation processes, although they can bring opportunities such as early sowing of grasses and proper stubble management, which help improve the structure and fertility of the soil.
He also pointed out the importance of providing the producer with quick answers with concrete recommendations and emphasized the generation of primary information, such as maps of soils, wetlands, carbon and extensive crops. In this sense, he explained: “We have created a new generation of maps that consolidates information for decision-making.”
The day also included the axes “Tools 4.0 for soil use and conservation” and “A world under our feet” with presentations by specialists from INTA, the Faculty of Agronomy of the University of Buenos Aires (FAUBA), FAO, Fertilizar and Clarión.
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