Soil Carbon Sequestration Impacts on Global Climate Change and Food Security
Abstract
The carbon sink capacity of the world's agricultural and degraded soils is 50 to 66% of the historic carbon loss of 42 to 78 gigatons of carbon. The rate of soil organic carbon sequestration with adoption of recommended technologies depends on soil texture and structure, rainfall, temperature, farming system, and soil management. Strategies to increase the soil carbon pool include soil restoration and woodland regeneration, no-till farming, cover crops, nutrient management, manuring and sludge application, improved grazing, water conservation and harvesting, efficient irrigation, agroforestry practices, and growing energy crops on spare lands. An increase of 1 ton of soil carbon pool of degraded cropland soils may increase crop yield by 20 to 40 kilograms per hectare (kg/ha) for wheat, 10 to 20 kg/ha for maize, and 0.5 to 1 kg/ha for cowpeas. As well as enhancing food security, carbon sequestration has the potential to offset fossilfuel emissions by 0.4 to 1.2 gigatons of carbon per year, or 5 to 15% of the global fossil-fuel emissions.
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Perennials could contribute to reducing soil erosion and have the potentiality to contribute to food security improvement.
“Aside from increasing SOC stocks, perennials could also contribute to reducing soil erosion (Glover, Culman, et al., 2010), and with the potentiality to contribute to food security improvement (Lal, 2004).”
From Changes in soil organic carbon under perennial crops (2020) · cites this paper as Lal, 2004
Changes in SOC will significantly affect efforts to mitigate GHG emissions and impact a host of other ecosystem services.
“Changes in SOC will significantly affect efforts to mitigate GHG emissions (Ney & Schnoor, 2002;Adler et al., 2007) and impact a host of other ecosystem services (Lal, 2004).”
From Changes in soil organic carbon under biofuel crops (2009) · cites this paper as Lal, 2004
Globally, agricultural soils have lost 42-78 Pg C relative to their pre-agricultural state.
“Globally, it has been estimated that agricultural soils have lost 42–78 Pg C relative to their pre-agricultural state [1].”
From Impacts of Rotational Grazing on Soil Carbon in Native Grass-Based Pastures in Southern Australia (2015) · cites this paper as [1]
The study does not assume any gains in soil organic carbon content in the AW scenarios between 1961 and 2005.
“Although management practices, such as conservation tillage, can increase soil organic carbon content in both extensive and intensive systems ([15](#r15), [16](#r16)), we do not assume any such gains in the AW scenarios between 1961 and 2005.”
From Greenhouse gas mitigation by agricultural intensification (2010) · cites this paper as [15]
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References 36 · Cited by 8,376
- Authors
- Lal, R.
- Affiliations
- The Ohio State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Lal, R.
- ORCID
- Lal, R.
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2004-06-11
- Volume
- 304
- Issue
- 5677
- Pages
- 1623-1627
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W2144189317
- Cited by
- 8,376
- References
- 36
- Citations by year
- 2026: 717 · 2025: 783 · 2024: 731 · 2023: 591 · 2022: 601 · 2021: 642 · 2020: 531 · 2019: 512 · 2018: 436 · 2017: 389 · 2016: 360 · 2015: 318 · 2014: 320 · 2013: 319 · 2012: 259
- FWCI
- 113.60
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil erosion and sediment transport
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Management and Crop Yield
- Keywords
- soil carbon sequestration, soil organic carbon, climate change mitigation, food security, degraded soils, soil restoration, no-tillage, cover crops, agroforestry, crop yield, carbon offsetting, fossil fuel emissions
- MeSH terms
- Agriculture, Atmosphere, Carbon, Carbon Dioxide, Climate, Food, Food Supply, Humans, Poverty, Soil, Ecosystem, Biomass, Crops, Agricultural, Malnutrition
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