49
3 SOC Stocks in SSA
There is no consensus on the exact estimates of SOC stocks in SSA as a whole. This
can mainly be ascribed to a shortage of (reliable) soil information and methodological discrepancies. Nevertheless, the existing estimates can still offer insights into
the potential of SSA to mitigate climate change through sequestration of C and
reduction of CO 2 emissions. The digital SOC map (Fig. 4) developed by FAO and
ITPS (2018) indicates that shrub lands and barren and sparsely vegetated areas in
the Sahel region (i.e., Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad, Eritrea, and North Sudan) and
southern Africa (i.e., Namibia, Botswana, and parts of South Africa) (Fig. 5) contain
between 0 and 20 Mg Cha
−1
in their soils at 30 cm depth, which is the lowest in
Fig. 4 SOC stocks of SSA’s topsoil (0–0.3 m depth) in Mg C ha
−1 . The map was generated using
digital data of SOC stocks from FAO and ITPS (http://54.229.242.119/GSOCmap/). (Data source:
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations)
Land Use Changes and Sustainable Land Management Practices for Soil Carbon…
3 SOC Stocks in SSA
There is no consensus on the exact estimates of SOC stocks in SSA as a whole. This
can mainly be ascribed to a shortage of (reliable) soil information and methodological discrepancies. Nevertheless, the existing estimates can still offer insights into
the potential of SSA to mitigate climate change through sequestration of C and
reduction of CO 2 emissions. The digital SOC map (Fig. 4) developed by FAO and
ITPS (2018) indicates that shrub lands and barren and sparsely vegetated areas in
the Sahel region (i.e., Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad, Eritrea, and North Sudan) and
southern Africa (i.e., Namibia, Botswana, and parts of South Africa) (Fig. 5) contain
between 0 and 20 Mg Cha
−1
in their soils at 30 cm depth, which is the lowest in
Fig. 4 SOC stocks of SSA’s topsoil (0–0.3 m depth) in Mg C ha
−1 . The map was generated using
digital data of SOC stocks from FAO and ITPS (http://54.229.242.119/GSOCmap/). (Data source:
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations)
Land Use Changes and Sustainable Land Management Practices for Soil Carbon…