The Africa Soil Information Service (AfSIS) is developing a practical, timely, and cost-effective soil health surveillance service to map soil conditions, set a baseline for monitoring changes, and provide options for improved soil and land management. Because knowledge about the condition and trend of African soils is highly fragmented and dated, there is an urgent need for accurate, up-to-date, and spatially referenced soil information to support agriculture in Africa.

At present no standards, definitions or criteria exist for the assembly, mapping and interpretation of soil legacy data sets, case definitions, soil health and degradation, diagnostic tests, and sampling designs for assessing and monitoring soil condition. It is thus difficult to derive spatially and temporally consistent evaluations of the occurrence of soil degradation, or to provide evidence-based management recommendations for maintaining and improving soil health.