Requests for soil maps and reports on soil resources
Additions of materials for inclusion in our on-line World Soil Library, the ISRIC – World Soil Information Database, are always welcome!
Cartographic materials and country reports form an important part of ISRIC’s collections; geographic coverage is the whole world with special attention for developing countries. The subject emphasis is on soils, but related geographic information on climate, geology, geomorphology, vegetation, land use, and land suitability is also important.
The main purpose of our acquisition policy, as World Data Centre for Soils, is to make a safe depository for endangered documents on soil resources and, ultimately, to make the accrued information available for on-line consultation. Another key objective of maintaining and enlarging the collection is its use for compilation of the World Soils and Terrain Database (SOTER) and other WDC soil data.
ISRIC - World Soil Information is particularly interested to obtain world coverage of maps at reconnaissance and smaller scale (< 1:250 000) with the accompanying documentation; selection criteria are relevance of the materials for soil science, agricultural development, and environmental issues.
Prior to sending us any materials, please contact our Librarian for further details.
Background
Since its foundation in 1966, ISRIC - World Soil Information has built up a collection of over 19 000 reports, books and maps, various digital databases, and thousands of pictures in the fields of soils, land resources and management. For many years, these materials could be consulted only at our premises in Wageningen. Since 2005, over 4000 of our maps have been scanned as a foundation for the European Digital Archive of European Digital Archive of Soil Maps (EuDASM), an ongoing collaborative project with the Institute for Environment and Sustainability (IES), Joint Research Centre (JRC), of the European Commission.
Items from our map collection and library holdings can be consulted on-line through the ISRIC - World Soil Information Database. Features include: on-line access to over 3600 digital maps that can be down-loaded at high resolution and viewed on screen with a zoom facility; over 500 full-text reports in PDF format; country-specific searches based on Google maps, as well as basic and advanced searches; and a pull-down menu that gives links related to soil science.
The digitization of our holdings of grey literature and maps, which are often scarce or even unique, is a long-term activity. Text books previously held in the ISRIC library have been transferred to Wageningen UR Library, which offers a document delivery service, to make them more widely accessible and to make room for new acquisitions of country soil reports and maps.