History, current state and prospects of development of economic assessment of soils in Russia (review)

Abstract

A detailed review of existing methods of economic assessment of soils in Russia is carried out. It is shown that the
foundations of such an assessment were laid and voiced by V.V. Dokuchaev — in public lectures at meetings of the
Imperial Free Economic Society. Of the domestic soil assessment systems, the most perfect and holistic is the one
created by a group of employees of the V.V. Dokuchaev Soil Institute under the leadership of I.I. Karmanov. The main elements of this system are the soil-ecological index (a bonus score refl ecting the level of soil fertility taking into account specifi c climatic conditions and terrain) and the tariff category of the soil type of the assessed site. Modern methods of assessment, including monetization of ecosystem services of soils in determining the amount of damage from land degradation and assessing the value of soils based on the concepts of «zero soil», are analyzed. It is shown that the most promising approaches to the economic assessment of soils are — the assessment of the cost of individual soil properties, the cost of soil modifi ers used to improve soil quality, the cost of soils, soils and soil mixtures used for the purposes of reclamation, landscaping and landscaping, the assessment of the cost of ecosystem services of soils for lands of various economic use. Examples of approbation of some methods of economic assessment of soils for the territory of the Educational and Experimental Soil-ecological Center of Lomonosov Moscow State University «Chashnikovo» are considered.