Global Compost Advocates Celebrate World Soil Day 2025, Promoting "Healthy Soils for Healthy Cities"

Soil took center stage on December 5, as soil and compost advocates around the world rallied to celebrate World Soil Day 2025. Led by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, this year’s theme, “Healthy Soils for Healthy Cities,” highlights the vital role soil plays in creating greener, more resilient, and livable cities, improving public health, and fighting climate change. 
 
Soils are essential for life on earth, intimately involved in nutrient cycling, greenhouse gas regulation, and water cycles—making them baseline infrastructure for sustainability, both in our cities as well as rural communities. They serve as the planet’s largest terrestrial carbon pool and provide a home for approximately 59% of global biodiversity, facts that underscore their role as the living foundation of ecosystems. They also provide the source for at least 95% of the world’s food, and yet, the FAO estimates that at least a third of the world’s soil resources are already degraded, with soil erosion threatening to reduce global crop production by up to 10% by 2050. This makes soil restoration a key priority for food security and climate resilience.
 
“Organics recycling as a key soil restoration practice is increasingly being recognized as an important means to regenerate soil vitality, close nutrient loops, and support climate-resilient communities,” said Diane Hazard, executive director of the Compost Research and Education Foundation. “It is something that everyone can and should be able to do—whether through home composting, community programs, or city-wide composting initiatives,” added Linda Norris-Waldt, executive director of the US Composting Council. “Every fruit or vegetable peel, fallen leaf, and other organic residual returned to our soils is an investment in healthier cities and a healthier planet. Sending these valuable resources to landfills or incinerators defeats this purpose—wasting nutrients, generating greenhouse gases, and undermining the resilience of our communities.”

Compost is one of the most effective tools we have to help generate healthy soils, whether those be rural, agricultural soils or urban landscape soils. From creating soils that are erosion and drought resistant; making cities resistant to extreme weather; and aiding tree and plant growth to help create urban tree canopies that cool cities down, compost plays an indispensable role in climate-resilient cities. At the USCC, we work to provide information on best practices for generating healthy soils and running programs—such as our Seal of Testing Assurance (STA) program—that put them into action. We also work to connect STA-Certified compost producers with those who are focusing on improving and strengthening urban soils, from landscape architects to urban farmers.

Endorsed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, World Soil Day became an official international day in 2014. Every year, the FAO hosts a map of World Soil Day events happening across the globe. This year was no exception, with hundreds of events occurring across every continent of the globe. You can learn more about World Soil Day by clicking here.