The second meeting of Sino- Europe Panel on Land and Soil sponsored by the Institute of Soil Science of Chinese Academy of Sciences was held in Nanjing on February 7, 2012. 

The meeting was attended by EU representatives from University of Reading, BOKU, University of Hamburg, Germany, Pannonian University, Hungary, JRC Environment and Sustainable Development Research Institute and European Land Use and Spatial Information Center in Spain. The Chinese representatives are from the Institute of Soil Science of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences and MWR Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, China Agricultural University, Southwest University, Guangzhou University, Shenyang Agricultural University and China University of Geosciences. Professor Shen Renfang, cochairman of the committee and director of the Institute of Soil Science addressed a welcoming speech. Focusing on food security, both parties clarified and discussed about a series of problems arising in the land and soil use changes in China and EU in recent years, e.g. reduced arable land caused by city expansion, groundwater depletion caused by intensive agricultural production and the influence of the high-intensive land use on soil and environment. Based on the above discussions, cooperative researches on Sino-EU land and soil scientific field were prioritized, and both sides were to carry out these cooperative researches within the relevant cooperation framework.

In response to the recommendations stipulated in the resources and environment cooperation memorandum signed by Chinese Academy of Sciences and the European Union, the Sino- Europe Panel on Land and Soil (SEPLS) was established in Ispra EU Joint Research Centre, Italy in June, 2010, which was composed of well-known experts from land and soil scientific fields in China and EU. The current cochairman of the panel of experts is Prof. Shen Renfang and Doctor Luca Montanarella from EU Joint Research Centre, while Prof. Li Xiubin works as the Secretary General. The establishment of the SEPLS makes the information exchange in relevant fields between China and EU more convenient, formal and rigorous and enables both parties to take concerted actions once the soil and land system is threatened by the natural and socio-economic systems.