In recent years, the interest in subsoil has increased, since it can hold immense reservoirs of nutrients, organic matter and water. The project Soil³ - Sustainable Subsoil Management - aims to improve the overall nutrient and water use efficiency of plants through subsoil management in order to secure or increase crop yields. This paper assesses the sustainability of two subsoil management measures: a) the cultivation of deep-rooted pre-crops (biological approach) and b) stripwise mechanical subsoil loosening in combination with the incorporation of compost (Soil³ method). In a first step, experts were asked to rank the relevance of subsoil in the provision of various ecosystem services. In a second step, we assess the impact of subsoil management measures on the delivery of ecosystem services.

https://tools.bonares.de/doi/doc/30/

photo: Soil³