SUITMA 4 - Nanjing, China

The 4th International Conference on Urban Soils - Soils of Urban, Industrial, Traffic, Mining and Military Areas (US/SUITMA) was held in Nanjing, People Republic of China, during October 18 - 27, 2007, in the Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences. The Chair of the organizing committee was Prof. Gan-Lin Zhang.

More than 120 participants from 19 countries attended the conference. The presentations session consisted of three major groups of topics:

Part 1: Methodologies, including:

i) Soil survey, description, terminology standardization and sampling in urban areas;

ii) Laboratory methods for urban soils;

iii) Soil classification and mapping in urban areas;

Part 2: Impacts of urbanization on soil resources, including:

excursion to Tongling (Fot. W. Burghardt)

vi) Historical aspects of urban soil formation and characterization;

Part 3: Urban soils in relation to urban ecosystem, including:

i) Ecological impact of urbanization in regional and global scales;

ii) Urban soils and greenery plants;

iii) Urban soils in relation to water environment;

iv) Biogeochemical cycling of life-dependent materials in urban ecosystem;

v) Pollution status and control of urban soils;

vi) Remediation of contaminated SUITMA;

vii) Ecological assessment of urban soil quality;

Fot. W. Burghardt

viii) Ecology-based urban land use planning.

There were totally 43 oral and 85 poster presentations.

Pre- and post-conference tours were organized. The pre-conference tour was devoted to major urban soils (including sub-urban areas as well) in Nanjing. The 2-day post-conference tour was arranged in an ancient copper mining city – Tongling of Anhui Province where copper tailings and rehabilitation of mining areas were investigated.

Also the election of the new chair persons was conducted. Prof. Jean-Louis Morel from University of Lorraine, France was elected as Chair of SUITMA WG and Prof. Gan-Lin Zhang from Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences was elected as the Vice Chair.

More about SUITMA 5 here:

Burghardt, W. (2008) 4th International Conference on Urban Soils - Soils of Urban, Industrial, Traffic, Mining and Military Areas, Nanjing, China (US/SUITMA). St. Nortcliff, A.E. Hartemink (Editors): IUSS Bulletin 112, 2008: 36-38. ISSN: 0374-0447.

http://iuss.boku.ac.at/files/iuss_bulletin_112_hires.pdf