Global gaps in soil biodiversity data

Soil biodiversity represents a major terrestrial biodiversity pool, supports key ecosystem services and is under pressure from human activities. Yet soil biodiversity has been neglected from many global biodiversity assessments and policies. This omission is undoubtedly related to the paucity of comprehensive information on soil biodiversity, particularly on larger spatial scales. Information on belowground species distributions, population trends, endemism and threats to belowground diversity is important for conservation prioritization, but is practically non-existent. As a consequence, much of our understanding of global macroecological patterns in biodiversity, as well as mapping of global biodiversity hotspots, has been based on aboveground taxa (such as plants) and has not considered the functionally vital, but less visible, biodiversity found in soil.JRC.D.3-Land Resource