From Dirt to Decision-Making: Governance and Soil Health Must Go Hand in Hand

In October, the world convened in Des Moines for the 2025 Borlaug Dialogue under the theme “SOILutions for Security”, we are reminded that soil is far more than just what lies beneath our feet—it is the living foundation of resilient food systems, climate adaptation, biodiversity, nutrition and global stability. Yet many of the technical and agronomic advances in soil health risk falling short unless matched by strong governance frameworks.

As the CGIAR Multifunctional Landscapes (MFL) Science Program emphasizes, technical innovations alone will not realize the promise of soil-health at scale unless they are embedded in strong governance frameworks: institutional arrangements, stakeholder engagement, equity and inclusion, policy coherence, finance-models, measurement systems, incentives and accountability frameworks. Drawing in key messages from the Dialogue, this blog reflects on why governance is a critical pillar for soil-health approaches within MFL’s soil-health agenda.

Soil health is systemic and cross-sectoral, so governance must coordinate across silos

At the Dialogue, organizers emphasized how soil connects food, nutrition, water, energy, biodiversity, and climate, and soil health is not simply an agronomic issue. In such a web of interlocking domains, weak governance may lead to uncoordinated and fragmented efforts with unintended effect, gaps in investments, incoherent policies, and so on. Research confirms this: a paper on the “Multistakeholder Engagement to Scale Soil Health Globally: The Coalition of Action 4 Soil Health” argues that multistakeholder engagement and governance coherence are pivotal for scaling soil-health globally. Thus, governance that can bring together ministries, farmers, private sector actors, civil society, finance and research is a precondition for meaningful soil-health change. Without governance that aligns across sectors, we risk soil-health efforts being patched, partial or unstained.

Local context matters — governance frameworks must enable adaptation, local agency and equity

Emphasizing governance means commitment to inclusive, participatory, locally-grounded decision-making, along with embedded mechanisms for accountability, transparency and capacity-building, enabling soil health to be owned by the people working and stewarding the land.

One of the recurring themes at the Dialogue was that solutions cannot be one-size-fits-all. Soil health depends on climate, soil type, farmer capacity, land tenure, supply chains and markets. Governance must therefore allow for decentralized decision-making: enabling local actors (farmers, communities) to innovate and adapt practices, access resources, and participate meaningfully, rather than just being recipients of top-down prescriptions. At the Dialogue, speakers emphasized the role of farmer organizations, cooperatives and local institutions in driving soil-regenerative practices. Good governance frameworks embed mechanisms for participation, at local levels.

Incentives, finance and measurement need governance guardrails

Technical interventions for soil health are increasingly available. But to scale them reliably, we need governance mechanisms that manage incentives, finance, monitoring and verification, and risk-sharing. Governance is indispensable for aligning incentives, unlocking finance and establishing credible measurement systems to take soil health from demonstration to scale. At the Dialogue opening, for instance, the message was clear: we are “not even close” to meeting future food needs, and bold coordinated investment is required. But investment alone isn’t enough. Governance must ensure that fiscal incentives (subsidies, credits), private-sector participation, and public finance are equitable and aligned with soil-health goals — not inadvertently rewarding degradation or short-term yield maximization at the expense of soil vitality or reinforcing existing inequalities.

Moreover, as the literature shows, measurement, monitoring, reporting and verification (MMRV) of soil health outcomes are weak in many places. Without governance frameworks that mandate, standardize and reward credible measurements, we risk green-washing or non-durable gains.

Soil health is generational, and restoration takes time. This temporal dimension makes long-term sustainability-oriented governance critical, exactly what soil-health transitions demand. The Dialogue emphasizes that cross-sector collaboration and shared purpose are required. This requires governance mechanisms that create the conditions for long-term institutional mandates and budgetary commitments. Further, governance is needed to manage risk. Farmers adopting longer-term soil health practices face upfront costs and delayed returns. Public policy, insurance and finance need to step in — and governance determines whether they do so equitably.

Concluding thoughts

The 2025 Borlaug Dialogue reminds us: soil is the foundation of food security, climate resilience and ecosystem health. In the words of the Dialogue, we are called to act “with the same urgency, creativity and collaboration that defined Dr. Borlaug’s legacy.” The CGIAR MFL Science Program is front-and-center in making that vision real. But the science and innovation agenda alone will not be enough. Governance is the scaffold that allows soil-health practices to be adopted, scaled, sustained and equitable. For CGIAR and its partners, this means treating governance with the same priority as agronomy, markets, and regenerative and restorative practices. The soil under our feet—and the landscapes above it—will only deliver when we build the governance around them that can sustain them.

Author : Wei Zhang, IFPRI