Open Soil Atlas

What was this project about?

This pilot created an open-source co-learning centre for the local community of Berlin. It consisted of a website presenting guidelines in a textual and infographic form to educate the public and raise awareness about soil quality and fertility and the correlation between healthy soil and healthy communities. The online material was combined with a series of free workshops, where citizens had been taught how to make observations, test the soil, interpret results and draw conclusions. We uploaded soil quality data and GPS locations to a digital entry form. Citizens’ observations have generated a high-resolution soil quality map. 

Our findings provided policymakers and urban ecology initiatives with indicators as to which areas were best suited for agricultural purposes and which required remediation activities. 

The entire research and data collection process was intended to be replicated and expanded worldwide, in order to engage different communities and spread the analysis to new and different sites all over the world. The project builds on the Feld Food Forest project and is promoted by its community.