SONATA

Monitoring of nature infrastructure - Skill acquisition for Nature-based Solutions

SONATA Summer School

From Soil to Landscape: Integrating Biodiversity, Spatial Science and Policy for Sustainable Land Use

SONATA Summer School – From Soil to Landscape was held at the BioSense Institute 1-5 June 2026, and brought together soil science, biodiversity, spatial modeling, and policy to support sustainable land-use decisions. Using Vojvodina as a living laboratory, participants combined soil and microbiome data, habitat mapping, GIS tools, and stakeholder insights to co-create Nature-Based Solutions and spatial guidelines. The programme covered key topics related to soil health, soil organic carbon, soil biodiversity, stakeholder engagement, policy, as well as the use of spatial tools and modelling for sustainable land management and NbS planning.

Over five days, participants attended three days of lectures, one day of practical training, and a final day dedicated to presenting and discussing the results of their work. Lectures were delivered by experts from the SONATA consortium, including BIOS, NINA, and VITO, alongside invited speakers from universities, research institutes, and industry across Europe. Participants also took part in two interactive stakeholder workshops led by NINA and BIOS, focusing on stakeholder role-play and the development of stakeholder-oriented questions related to soil management, biodiversity, and Nature-Based Solutions.

The practical day was organized in two parallel tracks. The Soil Mapping & Modelling track was led by Dr. Branko Brkljač, Dr. Kristina Kalkan, and Miljana Marković, while the Soil Microbiome & Bioinformatics track was led by Dr. Sanja Brdar, Andrea Simeon, and Ivana Pejović.

The practical sessions brought together Master’s and PhD students, as well as young researchers from Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Poland, France, the United Kingdom, Denmark, and Russia, creating a diverse and international learning environment.

As a result of the practical work, participants successfully identified priority areas for Nature-Based Solution implementation, modelled potential impacts on soil organic carbon, analyzed soil microbiome diversity, and explored management practices that could enhance soil biodiversity. Furthermore, they investigated how differences in microbial diversity can inform the design of targeted Nature-Based Solutions and support evidence-based land management decisions.

The Summer School provided a valuable platform for interdisciplinary learning, collaboration, and knowledge exchange among the next generation of researchers working towards sustainable soil and ecosystem management.

Learning Objectives and Expected Outcomes

After completing the Summer School, participants will be able to:

Understand links between soil health, biodiversity, and landscape processes across scales.
Apply soil sampling, eDNA/microbiome analysis, and spatial data in landscape assessments.
Use GIS and spatial modeling tools to support land-use and soil-related decisions.
Integrate social research and stakeholder perspectives into scientific workflows.
Translate scientific evidence into policy-relevant outputs, including spatial guidelines and Nature-based Solutions.
Critically assess the role of soil organic carbon, biodiversity, and drought resilience in climate mitigation and land management.

Participants will:

Gain hands-on experience with multidisciplinary datasets and tools (soil,
biodiversity, spatial, socio-economic).
Develop integrated group outputs, linking soil health and biodiversity with
landscape-scale planning.
Produce conceptual or prototype spatial guidelines (e.g. buffer zones,
restoration areas, SOC-oriented scenarios).
Strengthen skills in co-creation and science–policy interaction, relevant for
EU Soil Mission and Green Deal initiatives.
Build networks across disciplines and sectors, including academia, policy,
and finance.

Date and Location

1st – 5th June, BioSense Institute, Novi Sad, Serbia

Format

Lectures, hands-on practicals, group work, excursions, co-creation workshops, and round tables with scientists, policymakers, and financial actors. All activities will be held in English.

Invited Speakers

Dr. Thomas Blaschke

Thomas Blaschke received his MSc and PhD degrees from the University of Salzburg, both in Geography and Geographic Information Science. He is a Full Professor for Geoinformatics and Head of the Department of Geoinformatics – Z_GIS, University of Salzburg. His research interests include methodological issues of the integration of GIS, Earth observation and image processing also with aspects of participation and human-environment interaction. Prior positions comprise several lecturer, senior lecturer and professor positions in Germany, Austria, and the UK. He became full professor for Geography & GIS in 2001 at the University of Tübingen, Germany and returned to Salzburg in 2003.

His academic achievements include >450 publications with an H-index of 99. In 2015 he was elected as a corresponding member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. He is active in spin-off activities and has been serving on various advisory boards incl. ESA, the European Copernicus programme, ISPRS International Policy Advisory Committee and the International Research Center of Big Data for Sustainable Development Goals.

Dr. Christian Folberth

Christian Folberth is Senior Research Scholar in the Agriculture, Forestry and Ecosystem Services Group at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Austria. He has a background in environmental sciences and since his PhD at ETH Zurich specializes in agricultural modelling using process-based and data-driven approaches. He has been PI of or partner in various research projects spanning climate change impacts and adaptation, supply chain risks, food system resilience, land use change, sustainable intensification, and agro-environmental assessment based on process-based modelling, machine-learning, and transdisciplinary knowledge co-creation. Present research projects include ANFOS – Advanced ensemble projections for indirect impacts of nuclear conflict in global food systems (Future of Life Institute, USA), MACROS – Machine-learning crop meta-models for climate adaptation (Austrian Science Fund, AUT), and SAbERES – Land-use planning and financial innovation to increase Mexico’s resilience to climate change (International Climate Initiative, DEU)

Prof. Dr. Ir. Jetse J. Stoorvogel

Prof. Dr. Ir. Jetse J. Stoorvogel is a Dutch scientist known for his interdisciplinary research in integrated environmental modelling. He holds a full professorship in Integrated Environmental Modelling at the Open Universiteit (the Netherlands) where he is also department head of the Department of Environmental Sciences, a position he has held since April 2022 . Additionally, he serves as an associate professor at Wageningen University (the Netherlands), focusing on the feedbacks between soils and land use. He specializes in land use dynamics, soil–land use interactions, and integrated environmental modelling. His research focuses on how agricultural systems, environmental change, and policy decisions influence land-use patterns across landscapes. At Wageningen University & Research and the Open Universiteit, he has contributed to the development of spatial and scenario-based models that analyze sustainable land management, soil degradation, agricultural intensification, and climate-related land-use transitions. His work combines GIS, environmental modelling, and systems analysis to support evidence-based decision-making for sustainable land and ecosystem management.

Stoorvogel’s work integrates scientific modelling with practical applications, aiming to inform policy and promote sustainable agricultural systems both locally and globally.

Dr. Thalea Stuckenberg

Thalea Stuckenberg is a German soil ecologist specializing in the intricate relationships between below- and aboveground ecosystems. She currently holds a postdoctoral research position within the EU-funded Horizon Europe project ProPollSoil at the Philipps-University of Marburg, working in the Animal Ecology group under Prof. Dr. Anne-Christine Mupepele. Her current research focuses on the impact of land management and abiotic and biotic soil characteristics on soil-dependent pollinators.

She completed her PhD at the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, where her doctoral research investigated soil biology and the functioning of temperate forest ecosystems. She earned both her Bachelor of Science in Biology and her Master of Science in Ecology from the University of Bremen. Throughout her career, she has managed diverse ecological projects, ranging from monitoring insect biodiversity in technical ponds to studying soil biodiversity and biological processes in soil ecosystems in temperate forests in Germany and temperate rainforests in Chile.

This project is funded by the European Union under Horizon Europe (Project SONATA GA 101159546)