Eo 4 Soil 2026

2nd EO 4 Soil Symposium

ESA SYMPOSIUM ON EARTH OBSERVATION

FOR SOIL PROTECTION AND RESTORATION

04 06 November 2026 | ESA-ESRIN | Frascati (Rome), Italy

Background

Earth Observation for Soil Monitoring

The European Space Agency (ESA) is committed to advancing the monitoring of soils, which support plant growth, regulate exchanges of gases with the atmosphere, store water and nutrients, host an immense diversity of organisms, and are essential to ecosystem functioning and the production of food, fibre and timber.

In March 2024, ESA organised the first Symposium on Earth Observation for Soil Protection and Restoration, underscoring the growing role of Earth Observation (EO) in supporting soil protection, sustainable management and restoration.

In parallel, the EU Soil Monitoring Law (Soil Monitoring Directive) was finalised at European level and entered into force on 16 December 2025, explicitly recognising the value of Copernicus data for achieving its objectives. The EO science community is now called to develop concrete approaches that show how EO can support monitoring of the soil health indicators defined in the legislation. Satellite-based monitoring and mapping of soil organic carbon and other key soil properties will be a critical building block for robust and cost‑effective Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) systems for carbon capture and removal.

Workshop Objectives

Soils are increasingly recognised from multiple perspectives - including biochemical, ecological, technological, analytical, social, policy, and economic viewpoints. The EU Soil Strategy for 2030 establishes a framework and concrete actions to protect and restore soils while ensuring their sustainable use. It sets the vision of achieving healthy soils across Europe by 2050, with key milestones to be reached by 2030.

In parallel, the European Space Agency has long been committed to supporting soil monitoring and restoration through advanced Earth Observation technologies, particularly via the Copernicus Programme.

The ESA Symposium on Earth Observation for Soil Protection and Restoration aims to:

Assess how EO can support soil protection, restoration and sustainable use as defined in European and international policies, including Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) frameworks.
Demonstrate the capabilities of satellite remote sensing, alone and in synergy with in situ, airborne and modelling data, for monitoring, validation, reporting and verification of key soil properties (e.g. organic carbon, nutrients, minerals, moisture, salinity), as well as soil–vegetation interactions.
Evaluate the potential of operational EO-based soil monitoring systems for improved estimation, mapping and long-term tracking of soil condition and function.
Identify future requirements for EO-enabled soil information services, including methodological advances, data integration, operational sustainability and potential business models.
Explore downstream applications that support national and European agencies in assessing soil health and land degradation, and in reporting against indicators such as SDG 15.3.1.
Foster broad scientific and stakeholder participation through parallel sessions aligned with the European soil science and policy framework, highlighting the suitability and limits of EO methods for soil protection and restoration.

ESA aims to maximise the impact of this symposium by building on the growing momentum around soil protection driven by the EU Soil Strategy for 2030, the increasing integration of science and policy, numerous EU-funded soil research initiatives, and the expanding opportunities offered by new satellite missions for soil monitoring.

Draft Programme

DAY 1: WEDNESDAY, 4 NOVEMBER 2026, BIG HALL

Time	Min	Title Speaker
P1 - From Evidence to Action: Policy, Standards & Trusted Soil Intelligence
09:00	15	Welcome from ESA
09:15	30	Keynote: Earth Observation for Soil and Policy needs Arwyn Jones, JRC & Rainer Baritz, EEA
09:45	10	Imperviousness Change in Europe between 2006 and 2024: Update and Future Outlook for the EEA Land & Soil Indicator Ludvig Forslund, EEA
09:55	10	From Imperviousness Mapping to Soil Sealing Monitoring: Earth Observation Support for the EU Soil Monitoring Law Eva Poglitsch, GeoVille Information Systems and Data Processing GmbH
10:05	10	An integrated methodological approach for assessing Soil Organic Carbon dynamics in a robust, transparent, and cost-effective manner Marta Gómez Giménez, GMV
10:15	10	Toward CRCF compliant peatland MRV: an EO-driven and process-based model to support carbon accounting Georg Kodl, Assimilia
10:25	10	Scaling up carbon farming: are process-based models using earth observation data more cost-effective than soil sampling? Lisa Vanderheyden, UCLOUVAIN
10:35	10	EO-based Solutions for Soil Carbon Monitoring in Support of Carbon Markets: Integrating Satellite Data and In-situ Observations in Agroforestry Systems Josephine Francine Portugal, Planetek Italia S.r.l.
10:45	10	Integration towards a EU-Wide Standardised MRV 2.0 Methodological Framework for Soil Carbon and Greenhouse Gases Balance. Maria Fantappiè, Crea
10:55	10	Towards Privacy-Preserving Soil Intelligence for EO-Driven MRV Systems Giannis Gallios, University Of Florida
11:05	10	From Remote Sensing to Spatial Planning Decisions: Downscaling Soil Organic Carbon Data for Environmental Assessment in the Built Environment Francesco Axel Pio Romio, University of Ferrara
11:15	10	Moderated discussion
11:25	25	Coffee Break
S3 - Sensing Soil Dynamics: Water, Structure & Management from Multi-Sensor EO
11:50	10	Joint Retrieval of Soil Moisture, Vegetation Water Content, and Surface Roughness Using C- and L-Band SAR Synergy Francesco Mattia, Italian National Council of Research (IREA)
12:00	10	Harmonised Earth Observation Soil Moisture for Detecting Rapid Soil-Water Stress across Europe Vaibhav Kumar, Research Institute For Geohydrological Protection
12:10	10	Multi-Source Soil Data Harmonisation to Support Regional Monitoring of Soil Organic Matter Fabio Castaldi, National Research Council Of Italy (CNR)
12:20	10	Multi-source assessment of soil moisture observations at different scales: Italian National Agrometeorological Network (RAN), SMAP products and Sentinel-2 OPTRAM approach Faezeh Karimian, Council For Agricultural Research And Economics (CREA) - Research Centre For Agriculture And Environment
12:30	10	Multi-scale hyperspectral remote sensing of northern peatland soil moisture Susanna Karlqvist, Aalto University
12:40	10	Integrating Earth Observation and Soil Data for Global Mapping of Peat Depth and Organic Soils Mustafa Serkan Isik, OpenGeoHub Foundation
12:50	10	ANALYZING THE PRIMARY DRIVERS OF SOIL SPECTRAL VARIANCE IN TIME SERIES (Sentinel-2 and Landsat 8) Paul Karlshöfer, German Aerospace Center
13:00	10	Contrasting Optical and SAR-Based Earth Observation for Soil and Water Monitoring in Rainfed and Irrigated Smallholder Rice Systems, Southeast Asia Kim Fooyontphanich, Livelihoods Funds
13:10	10	Near Real-Time Agricultural Water Management—Part2: Estimating Crop Water Demands via Coupling Dual-Crop Stress FAO-56, Sentinel-1/2 Data, and modified SMAR Model Farid Faridani, Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA) - Research centre for Agriculture and Environment
13:20	10	Near Real-Time Agricultural Water Management—Part3: Detecting and quantifying Irrigations via Soil Water Discrepancies Driven by Satellite vs. Reanalysis data Farid Faridani, Council for Agricultural Research and Economics (CREA) - Research centre for Agriculture and Environment
13:30	10	Moderated discussion
13:40	80	Lunch
S2 - AI and Digital Soil Mapping: From Data to Predictive Soil Intelligence
15:00	10	Interpreting AlphaEarth Foundation Embeddings for Soil Organic Carbon Across European Soil Datasets Fabio Castaldi, National Research Council Of Italy (CNR)
15:10	10	PARACUDA-NG: An Open-Source Machine Learning Tool for analyzing spectral data and developing prediction models Sharad Kumar Gupta, Tel Aviv University
15:20	10	A Multi-View Hypergraph Convolutional Network for Joint SOC and Clay Prediction from Sentinel-2 Imagery Christos Chadoulos, Laboratory Of Remote Sensing, Spectroscopy, And Gis, Department Of Agriculture, Aristotle University Of Thessaloniki
15:30	10	Earth Observation and Machine Learning Framework for National Digital Soil Mapping Alberto Gutiérrez García, Agro Technological Institute Of Castilla Y León
15:40	10	Mapping and Prediction of Soil Salinity Using Sentinel-2 Imagery and Machine Learning Models in the Semi-Arid Region (Morocco) Abdessamad HILALI, INRA
15:50	20	Coffee Break
S2 — AI and Digital Soil Mapping: From Data to Predictive Soil Intelligence
16:10	10	Soil Salinity Mapping Using Machine Learning and Remote Sensing in the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia Elsayed Salama, National Centre for Vegetation Cover Development and Combatting Desertification, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
16:20	10	Modeling long-term changes (2000–2025) in soil organic carbon and soil pH at 30 m resolution using Landsat ARD Tom Hengl, Opengeohub Foundation
16:30	10	Climate change effects on depth-dependent soil organic carbon under cover cropping Jie Xue, Laboratoire de Géologie, Ecole Normale Supérieure, CNRS UMR 8538, Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace, PSL Research Universit
16:40	10	From in situ to remote sensing: a framework for quantifying boundary-condition sensitivity in soil organic carbon models across European sites Yue ZHOU, École Normale Supérieure
16:50	10	Towards Operational Tier-3 MRV: Integrating Novel Earth Observation, Spectroscopy and AI Approaches for Robust Soil Carbon Monitoring Dimitra Palantza, Aristotle University Of Thessaloniki
17:00	20	Combined moderated discussion
17:20		Science-to-Applications panel discussion
18:05		Poster session & icebreaker

DAY 2: THURSDAY, 5 NOVEMBER 2026, BIG HALL

Time	Min	Title Speaker
S1 — Seeing Soil in New Dimensions: Imaging Spectroscopy & Spectral Libraries
09:00	30	Keynote: From Spectral Detail to Temporal Coverage: Fusing Hyperspectral and Multispectral EO for Soil Monitoring Paul Karlshoefer & Kevin Kuehl, DLR
09:30	10	Toward a Global IEEE Standard for Soil Spectral Measurements in Laboratory and Field Conditions: progress and status Eyal Ben Dor, Tel Aviv University
09:40	10	Inter-Laboratory Harmonisation of Soil Spectral Libraries for Transferable Soil Property Predictionndicator Kostas Karyotis, Aristotle University Of Thessaloniki
09:50	10	Development in the LWIR spectral range for reference soil spectral libraries and estimation of soil properties Sabine Chabrillat, GFZ Helmholtz Center Geosciences / LUH Leibniz University Hannover
10:00	10	Development of a mixed soil-water-vegetation spectral library based on Radiative-transfer modelling for the improvement of soil property retrievals Asmaa Abdelbaki, GFZ
10:10	10	Microaggregate Distribution of Arid and Semiarid Soils as Predicted by Reflectance Spectroscopy in the VIS–NIR–SWIR Region Jonti Evan Shepherd, Tel Aviv University (Remote Sensing Laboratory)
10:20	10	Soil health mapping in a dryland ecosystem using prisma and enmap hyperspectral imagery Saham Mirzaei, CNR-IMAA
10:30	10	Regional multi-temporal soil health mapping over cropland with EnMAP: SOC, texture and SOC/clay indicators for the Brandenburg region in Germany Robert Milewski, GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences
10:40	10	Synergetic CHIME–LSTM soil-health assessment using hyperspectral optical and thermal Earth Observation. Robert Milewski, GFZ Helmholtz Centre for Geosciences
10:50	10	Spectro-temporal compositing for advanced and regional-scale soil analysis using EMIT Uta Heiden, DLR Oberpfaffenhofen
11:00	10	EnMAP and upcoming hyperspectral satellites for global soil mapping and monitoring from space: Potential and challenges Sabine Chabrillat, GFZ Helmholtz Center Geosciences / LUH Leibniz University Hannover
11:10	10	Moderated discussion
11:20	30	Coffee Break
S4 — Trustworthy EO Soil Products: Validation, Uncertainty & Scaling
11:50	10	One map does not fit all: characterisation of European soil properties maps Laura Poggio, ISRIC - World Soil Information
12:00	10	Validation of AgroSoil, an innovative soil moisture spatial product, against in-situ measurement across Europe following the QA4SM validation guideline. Théo Côme, GAF Geospatial GmbH
12:10	10	Integrating digital soil mapping products into harmonized soil databases for higher-resolution crop suitability assessment Shahla Asgharinia, FAO
12:20	10	Enhancements to the WORLDSOILS Soil Organic Carbon Monitoring System Julia Yagüe, GMV Aerospace
12:30	10	Assessing Existing Earth Observation Products for Improved Estimation of Cropland Soil Organic Carbon Stock Changes Juan Camilo Garcia Peña, Universite Catholique de Louvain
12:40	10	Limits and opportunities of multispectral data for estimating soil organic carbon (SOC) content in croplands. Dries De Bièvre, UC Louvain
12:50	10	Mitigating Confounding Effects in Satellite Soil Property Retrieval: A Multi-Site Assessment Using PRISMA and EnMAP Data Saham Mirzaei, CNR-IMAA
13:00	10	Propagating input uncertainty through process-based SOC modelling for grassland at landscape scale Marmar Sabetizadeh, Earth and Life Institute, Université catholique de Louvain,Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium.
13:10	10	Integrating eddy covariance and Sentinel-2 observations to scale carbon monitoring across croplands and boreal forests Lucas Diaz, Finnish Meteorological Institute
13:20	10	Towards scalable soil erosion assessments: lessons from RUSLE-based applications Melissa Latella, Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC Foundation)
13:30	10	Moderated discussion
13:40	90	Lunch
A1 — Carbon Farming & MRV: Turning EO Evidence into Climate Action
15:10	10	Soil Organic Carbon Content Monitoring using Multi- and Hyperspectral Remotely-Sensed Information – A Case Study in Zambia Silke Migdall, Vista GmbH
15:20	10	Combining EO and Soil Sampling for Land Management Recommendations: SOC Modelling for Land Restoration in Kenya and Uganda Hannah Kemper, World Food Programme
15:30	10	Constraining agroforestry heterogeneity for SOC assessment in Mediterranean dehesas Laura Hernandez Mateo, ICIFOR-INIA, CSIC
15:40	10	Earth Observation-Supported Soil Protection and Rehabilitation in Drylands using Biological Soil Crusts Jessica Friedrichs, Blue Horizon Sarl
15:50	10	Prediction of soil organic and inorganic carbon fractions in organic cropland using laboratory and field Vis-NIR/MIR spectroscopy with spatial analysis Claudio Colombo, Università Del Molise
16:00	40	Coffee Break
16:40	10	Spatial Patterns of Soil Organic Carbon stock Change in Italy (2000–2022) Mohamed Elarbi Brick,
16:50	10	Uncertainty in modelling of carbon stocks in European forest topsoil Laura Poggio, ISRIC - World Soil Information
17:00	10	Uncertainty propagation in process-based soil carbon models for MRV applications Bertrand Guenet, Cnrs
17:10	10	From Monitoring to Causal Evaluation: Using Earth Observation to Assess the Effectiveness of Soil-Protection Policies Dimitrios Skuras, University of Patras
17:20	20	Combined moderated discussion
17:40	10	Day 2 wrap-up

DAY 3: FRIDAY, 6 NOVEMBER 2026, BIG HALL

Time	Min	Title Speaker
A2 — Operational Soil Intelligence: Agriculture, Degradation & Decision Support
09:00	10	An EO-Based Decision Support System for Degraded Land Mapping and Sustainable Land Suitability Assessment Josephine Francine Portugal, Planetek Italia S.r.l.
09:10	10	ArcGIS GEO for Pastures Sustainable Monitoring and Erosion Processes Kakha Nadiradze, Association For Farmers Rights Defense, Afrd
09:20	10	Hydro-Geomorphic Assessment of Soil Erosion and Sediment Yield using Integrated RUSLE–SDR Modelling on Cloud-Based Platform in the Western Himalaya Sunil Kumar, Central University Of Punjab, Bathinda
09:30	10	Reconstructing Landsat monthly bands (1997-2025) using iterative gap-filling: applications in monitoring land degradation and soil erosion Tom Hengl, Opengeohub Foundation
09:40	10	ESA CCI Soil Moisture Product Helps Monitor Mediterranean plant survival in reforested areas of Northeastern Portugal Zulimar Hernandez, Sustec
09:50	10	Digital soil mapping using EnMAP imagery: a case study from Kopaida basin, Greece Spyridon E. Detsikas,
10:00	10	Integrating Sentinel-2 Based Tillage Information and Pedoenvironmental Covariates to optimize Field-Scale Soil Organic Carbon mapping Gohar Ghazarya, Leibniz Centre For Agricultural Landscape Research
10:10	10	AI and Multi-Source Data for Soil Salinization Mapping in the Gobaad Zone, Djibouti Said Okieh Kamil, Centre d'études et de recherche de Djibouti
10:20	10	Mapping residual soil nitrate in a diversified cropping system using multi-source sensing data and stacked ensemble learning for decision support Md Tawhid Hossain, Leibniz-zentrum Für Agrarlandschaftsforschung (zalf)
10:30	10	Energy-Efficient Crop Classification at Scale Using AgrUNet: A Multi-GPU Deep Learning Approach Within the MESEO Project Andrea Miola, University of Ferrara
10:40	20	Moderated discussion
11:00	30	Coffee Break
11:30	45	Closing plenary and synthesis
12:10	15	Closing remarks and departure

Poster List

1	Strengthening soil monitoring law in Africa to reduce chemical and hazardous waste pollution from environmental crime. Nancy Marangu
2	Strengthening Trust in MRV Systems and Carbon Farming Schemes Through Multi-Actor Dialogue Claudia Colonnello
3	Insights for Mediterranean Rainfed Cropping and Agroforestry Systems under the EU Carbon Removals and Carbon Farming Regulation Laura Hernandez Mateo
4	A multi-actor approach to support carbon farming adoption: stakeholder engagement, capacity building, and policy recommendations in MRV4SOC Chiara Locuratolo
5	Practice-based indicators derived from remote sensing phenology to identify Lighthouse farm benchmarks across Europe Eric Smit
6	Assessing Living Lab Readiness in Soil Carbon Demonstration Sites: Evidence from MRV4SOC Anastasia Gkartzoni
7	Operational soil-disturbance monitoring from multi-sensor Earth Observation: quantifying dating bias and cross-region transfer for CAP and the Soil Monitoring Law Michele Croci
8	Defining Essential Land Degradation and Desertification Variables for monitoring and assessment Mona Bonnier
9	The Open Geospatial Carbon Registry: designing for trust in EO-based certification under the CRCF Julia Wagemman
10	Leveraging subsidy declarations and Sentinel-2 time series to agricultural practice detection in olive groves: a framework for MRV systems Karina Marques
11	A novel indirect method for monitoring clay soil shrink-swell deformation integrating InSAR and ground measurements. Valerio Vivaldi
12	Near Real-Time Agricultural Water Management— Part1: Enhanced Retrieval of Vegetation Index and Surface Soil Moisture Synergizing Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 data Farid Faridani
13	A transparent rule-based algorithm for tillage detection from Sentinel-1 time series Dries De Bièvre
14	Integrating Earth Observation and Erosion Modelling for Torrent-Control Planning in Mountainous Watersheds Stefanos Stefanidis
15	Single-site, multi-site calibration and machine learning spatialization of carbon flux parameters in the ORCHIDEE land surface model Souleymane Diop
16	Testing the Boundaries of Ex-Situ Environmental Data for RothC Modelling: Climate Reanalysis Limits and Satellite Opportunities Asa Gholizadeh
17	Towards EO-supported landscape-scale MRV of cropland soil organic carbon stock dynamics at the German MRV4SOC DemoSite Demmin Robert Milewski
18	The probability of occurrence map of Terra Rossa soils in Italy obtained from a hybrid machine learning and geostatistical approach Roberto Barbetti
19	Remote sensing–based prediction of soil salinity hotspots in the Alqueva Irrigation District, Portugal Hanaa Darouich
20	Multi-property Digital Soil Mapping for predicting Soil Aggregate Stability in semi-arid agricultural lands Yassine Bouslihim
21	From Space to ESA ESRIN: EO, IoT and AI to Evaluate the ESRIN Soil and ecosystem conditions Valeria Pia Vevoto
22	Adaptive digital soil mapping of peatlands in a complex landscape Collin van Rooij
23	Beyond Static Covariates: Rethinking Uncertainty in Digital Soil Mapping Odunayo David Adeniyi
24	Integrating national soil survey and long-term experiment data to optimise soil organic carbon modelling for farm-level carbon accounting in Denmark Franca Giannini-Kurina
25	Assessing the Sensitivity of Bare Soil Fraction Estimation to Spatial Resolution: A UAV and Sentinel-2 case study in Greek Vineyard Spyridon E. Detsikas
26	UAV based validation of fractional vegetation cover derived from hyperspectral imagery Kevin Kühl
27	Spectral multitemporal Sentinel-2 Dataset: Espatial projection of Principal Component Quadrant Scores Arthur Aparecido Janoni Lima
28	Reducing Surface Soil Moisture Effects in Bare Soil Reflectance Composites Using a Satellite-Derived Soil Moisture Product Eleni Sofikiti
29	Mapping soil organic carbon and other key soil properties using a hyperspectral spaceborne multi-sensor time series Kathrin Ward
30	Finding the optimal spectral scale with Gaussian pyramid preprocessing for heavy-metal estimation from proximal soil sensing Mohammadmehdi Saberioon
31	Analyzing the Global Landscape of Soil SpectralLibraries: A State-of-the-Art Inventory Spyridon E. Detsikas
32	Challenges, uncertainties and opportunities to implement RothC by using remote sensing in past-polluted areas as the Guadiamar Green Corridor Javier Bravo Garcia
33	Building the MRV4SOC Knowledge Hub: A FAIR-Aligned EO Data Repository for European Soil Monitoring Dimitra Palantza
34	Robust EO-based above-ground biomass estimates enable scalable modelling assessments of Soil Organic Carbon dynamics Marta Gómez Giménez
35	Sentinel-2 Based Detection of Nitrogen Fertilizer Applications for Soil Management and Environmental Monitoring Sara Romagnoli
36	A Reproducible Satellite–Field Data Integration Workflow for Regional SoilOrganic Matter Estimation in Arable Land Vladimir Ćirić
37	GEOCHEMICAL INDICES AND PROBABILISTIC HEALTH RISK ASSESSMENT FOR PTES IN URBAN PARKS: SUPPORTING ENVIRONMENTAL POLICIES IN CALDAS, ANTIOQUIA, COLOMBIA Juan David Correa Estrada
38	Fine resolution assessment of Land Productivity Dynamics using a Landsat-MODIS NDVI time series in Asterousia, Crete Fatima-ezzahrae Imam
39	Fit for Purpose? Mask Sensitivity and Temporal Uncertainty in Linking Parcel-Level Soil Analyses to Sentinel-2 across the Menemen Plain, Türkiye Tahsin Ünal
40	From Earth Observation to Carbon Farming: Quantifying Soil Carbon Sequestration in Cropland within a Monitoring, Reporting and Verification Framework Yue ZHOU
41	Towards Tier 3 Soil GHG Accounting in Cultivated Peatlands: Necessity, Opportunities and Key Obstacles Junbin Zhao
42	Soil sampling and modelling at ICOS sites – the case of NO-Hur and MRV4SOC Holger Lange
43	Comparing GEST approach and Eddy Covarience Data for GHG Emissions from Peatlands Iryna Raiskaya
44	From long-term field experiments to landscape-scale SOC assessment: parameterizing RothC for Mediterranean rainfed croplands Benjamin Sanchez Gimeno
45	Can minimum and no-tillage act as a carbon farming in maize cultivations Central-Northern Italy, and can be monitored through MRV? Maria Fantappiè
46	From field to landscape: Integrating Earth Observation data into RothC modeling of grassland soil organic carbon dynamics Marmar Sabetizadeh
47	Evaluation of poplar plantation in arable farms as a carbon farming practice in the Northern Italy plain Stefano Monaco
48	Optimizing soil sampling efficiency: Multi-scale stratification from fields to landscapes Luca Bernardini
49	Integrating soil sampling, proximal sensing and remote sensing for digital soil mapping and variable-rate phosphorus management Vojtech Lukas
50	Assessment of Soil Carbon Stocks in Urban Green Parks of Coimbra (Portugal) using NDVI and Randon Forest Zulimar Hernandez
51	Assessment of Soil Carbon Stocks in Urban Green Parks using NDVI and Random Forest: The case study of Coimbra (Portugal) Zulimar Hernandez
52	Earth Observation-Based Assessment of the Soil Erosion Regulation Ecosystem Service in a Mediterranean Fir Forest Stefanos Stefanidis
53	Assessing intercropping period management quality using Copernicus HRL Cropping Patterns data: Multi-annual parcel-based analysis of cover crops in Wallonia, Belgium Louis Descarpentries
54	Soil Health Biological Monitoring in Italy: experiences and lessons learned Carlo Jacomini
55	Integrating Sentinel-2 NDVI Data to Map Tillage Plots and Estimate Soil Erosion Rates in Olive Groves of Northeastern Portugal Zulimar Hernandez
56	Assessing Soil Water Deficit using Copernicus Data in a Semi-Arid Basin (Côa River, Portugal) Regis Cassino Junior
57	Soil Geochemical Survey as the Foundation of EO-Based Soil Monitoring for Armenia's Food-Climate Convergence Gevorg Tepanosyan
58	Engineering Climate-Resilient Forest Restoration: A Hydrogel–Microbial–Biostimulant Approach for Timber Sapling Establishment Samwel Debbarma
59	Explainable FTIR-Based Machine Learning for Characterizing Soil–Water–Nutrient Interactions in Semi-Arid Olive Orchards Lahcen Hssaini
60	Towards an integrated framework for the restoration and monitoring of polymetallic mining soils: insights from the Gafsa phosphate basin, Tunisia Rania Zaghdoudi

Thematic Sessions

1) Policy, strategic vision, certification and user uptake

EU Soil policy and Earth Observation: research, industry, and technology
LULUCF, CRCF
Soil Monitoring law
National realisation strategies
Soil carbon certification to the light of edge technologies and soil business models

2) Scientific / technical advancements

Monitoring soil parameters: Earth Observation as a trustworthy technique
Uncertainty assessment
Soil Organic Carbon Monitoring: data sources, prediction algorithms, handling of uncertainties
Soil data and methodologies: AI, geo-statistics, spectroscopy, machine learning, radiative transfer modelling, and other
Platforms, soil data harmonisation, soil data distribution
Novel techniques for soil parameter mapping
Potential of current and future spaceborne systems for soil monitoring

3) Applications and use cases

Towards a Copernicus soil monitoring service portfolio
Show-casing potential soil carbon removals in various LULC types, in the short and long terms
Scientific application and used cases at different scales
Soil surveys - common efforts to gather and harmonise lab/field data for model calibration

Deadlines

Milestone	Date
Symposium Public Announcement	10 April 2026
Call for oral presentations and poster abstracts	10 April 2026
Abstract submission deadline	extended to 13 August 2026
Notification of oral presentations and posters selection by ESA	18 September 2026
Draft programme	30 September 2026
Opening of registration	3 August 2026
Registration closure	11 October 2026
Final information and programme	15 October 2026
Welcome email by ESA	28 October 2026
EO for soil protection and restoration symposium	4-6 November 2026

Abstract Submission

The abstract submission is now closed.

Note: Abstract length should be at least 200 words and maximum 400 words (one A4 page, single space normally contains 400-500 words).

Information about the co-authors (name, last name, affiliation, contact email) and the presenter is required.

The official language of the Workshop is English.

Participants are expected to finance their own travel and accommodation expenses.

Guidelines for authors

Oral presentations:

Presenters are expected to stick to their allocated presentation based on the final Programme to allow for adequate time for the Q&A slot afterwards.

Bring your presentation on a USB stick in PPT or PDF format, name it LastnameSessionname.type (e.g., PresenterSession3.ppt).

At the beginning of the day, when your presentation is scheduled, please approach the technical personnel at the bottom of the meeting room, provide your presentation and carry out a short technical check if necessary.

Presenters are kindly requested to be present in the meeting room at least 10 minutes prior to the start of the session and to make their presence known to the chair of the session.

Presenters are welcomed to use the PPT template for oral presentations, available here.

Poster presentations:

Presenters at the poster sessions shall bring their own printed posters. It will not be possible to print posters onsite. Posters should be mounted on 4 November.

Presenters are welcome to use the template for poster presentations, available here.

The maximum poster size is A0, Portrait orientation. The poster boards will be 2m high and 1m wide. Poster numbers (according to the conference programme) will be noted on the poster panels.

Authors are strongly encouraged to produce a “proper” full-size poster rather than using multiple smaller (e.g. A4) sheets.

Formal poster sessions are held on Wednesday after the end of the presentations, but coffee breaks could also be opportunities to present the posters.

Registration

Attendance to the Symposium is only in-person. Online broadcast is not foreseen.

Registration is now open. Please register HERE by 11 October 2026.

Please note that on the Registration Portal you are only required to pay in advance, via credit card only, the lunch vouchers.

Scientific and Organising Committee

Organising Committee	Program Committee	Scientific Committee
Anke Schickling, ESA Lorenza Versace, Olly Services	Anke Schickling, ESA Arwyn Jones, JRC Katja Berger, GFZ Laura Poggio, ISRIC Livia Peiser, FAO María Julia Yagüe Ballester, GMV Panos Panagos, JRC Rainer Baritz, EEA Uta Heiden, DLR	Alexandra Stoleriu, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University Amalia Castro Gomez, Serco Andreas Brink, JRC Andreea Julea, EEA Anke Schickling, ESA Arwyn Jones, JRC Asa Gholizadeh, CZU Calogero Schillaci, JRC Carsten Montzka, FZJ Daniel Žížala, CZU Daniela Smiraglia, ISPRA Eyal Ben Dor, TAU Fabio Castaldi, CNR Franca Giannini Kurina, Aarhus Agroecology Department Giulia Conchedda, FAO Jonti Shepherd, Tau Katja Berger, GFZ Katrin Ward, University of Delft Kostas Karyotis, AUTH Laura Poggio, ISRIC Marco Contin, University of Udine María Julia Yagüe Ballester, GMV Marmar Sabetizadeh, UCLouvain Nikolaos Tsakiridis, AUTh Nikos Tziolas, UFL Pasquale Borrelli, University of Basel Paul Karlshoefer, DLR Piero Manna, National Research Council Raffaele Casa, Università della Tuscia Rainer Barnitz, EEA Robert Milewski, GFZ Sabine Chabrillat, GFZ Sabine Grunwald, University of Florida Saskia Foerster, UBA Stefano Pignatti Morano Di Custoza, National Research Council Thomas Schmidt, Ciemat Tomislav Hengl, OpenGeoHub Foundation Uta Heiden, DLR Vladimir Ciric, University of Novi Sad Yijian Zeng, University of Twente Yusuf Yigini, FAO Nada Mzid, University of Naples Federico II

Logistics

ESA-ESRIN

Largo Galileo Galilei, 1
00044 Frascati (RM)
Italy

COURTESY TRANSPORT:

During the Workshop, a free shuttle bus service will be offered from Frascati to ESA-ESRIN and from ESA-ESRIN to Frascati centre.

The pick-up and drop-off point will be at Piazza Guglielmo Marconi.

The timetable will be communicated closer to the event.

ACCOMODATION:

Please find below a list of suggested hotels in the centre of Frascati. Rooms can be booked upon availability by contacting the hotels directly:

Hotel Name	Contact email	Phone number	Walking distance from Frascati P.zza Marconi
Hotel Bellavista Frascati	info@hbellavista.it it	+39 06 5416304	2 minutes
Hotel Cacciani	hotel@cacciani.it	+39 06 942 03 78	3 minutes
Hotel Flora	info@hotel-flora.it	+39 06 9416110	4 minutes
Hotel Colonna	hotelcolonna@hotelcolonna.it	+39 06 9401 8088	4 minutes
Hotel Villa Mercede	info@villamercede.com	+39 06 9929 1979	15 minutes (we suggest to request the shuttle service at the Hotel Reception or to book a taxi)
Grand Hotel Villa Tuscolana	info@villatuscolana.com	+39 06 942 900	23 minutes (we suggest to book a taxi)
Park Hotel Villa Grazioli	info@villa-grazioli.it congressi@villa-grazioli.it	+39 06 945400	26 minutes (we suggest to book a taxi)
Domus Park Hotel	info@domusparkhotel	+39 06 200 0100	29 minutes (we suggest to book a taxi)

Contacts

For information regarding the submissions, author instructions, scientific committee related inquiries please contact events.organisation@esa.int.

Should you need a VISA Invitation Letter, please contact events.organisation@esa.int.

Contacts

ESA–ESRIN, Largo Galileo Galilei 1, Frascati, RM, Italy
events.organisation@esa.int