“I am working in the field of Soils within the European Commission for nearly 30 years. So, usually, any soil project or proposal related to the EU I’ll get involved somehow. This is a pretty natural process.

In the case of CIRCASA, this project is very relevant to the European Commission, the JRC was asked to contribute to WP3, the work package that is working on facilitation the establishment of an International Research Consortium (IRC) and a Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) for Soil Organic Carbon Sequestration.

 The aim for the CIRCASA project is to coordination about all the research that is done regarding organic carbon sequestration in agricultural soils. A very important topic, as shown at the session in Bonn in June 2019 of the Koronivia process within UNFCCC, where CIRCASA colleagues participated presenting the side-event “Enhancing NDCs ambition thorough Soil Organic Carbon Sequestration” 

Establishing the International Research Consortium

"What I also see is that there are many other activities in other fora and initiatives around soil organic carbon and climate change. For WP3, the main task is to establish an International Research Consortium, thereby providing a platform for developing synergies and avoiding unwarranted duplications of efforts.

What is good about CIRCASA is that there is much potential, the partnership is very strong and international. Hence, this can be a very promising project and a powerful tool with the Open Collaborative Platform for research, and identifying links and gaps in research. We originally intended the role for CIRCASA to play in structuring the debate around the relevance of agricultural soil organic carbon management for climate change mitigation and adaptation."

Urgency

"I see that there are hurdles to overcome and there is an urgency, as we are halfway the CIRCASA project and I see many parallel activities taking place. We need to collaborate and get together for CIRCASA to have the IRC established, a working open collaborative platform well embedded and linked with the other initiatives at the end of this project. Climate change and soil organic carbon sequestration in agriculture are raising topics at this moment. I see a lot of attention and interest around, such as at recent conferences.

We need to get motivated for CIRCASA to play the important role in coordinating this effort in research. Where I cannot stress it enough, everybody is welcome to join, contribute, and above all collaborate."

Luca Montanarella.