The National Soil Monitoring Program (NSMP) is led by CSIRO under the National Soil Action Plan 2023-28 and funded by the Natural Heritage Trust (NHT).
The national NRM sector is proudly delivering the field component of this unique Australia-wide project.
Explore resources contributed and created through this project
The National Soil Monitoring Program (NSMP) will see approximately 3,000 sites sampled across the country over two years.
Accurate geo-referencing of these sites and the capture of landuse information will result in a comprehensive catalogue of soil characteristics representing major Australian landscapes. This will assist future decision-making and investment prioritisation, and the development of new soils projects led by the regional NRM organisations.
Each jurisdiction is using slightly different approaches to implementing the NSMP, based on landscape scale challenges and existing expertise, but all used the National Heritage Trust Regional Delivery Panel tender process for contracting this work with CSIRO.
During 2025-26 the NRM sector partnered with State agencies on bilateral projects, including graduate programs to increase soil skills and awareness of regional NRMs’ work.
Through extensive training and fieldwork, the project will measurably increase the regional NRM sector’s capability in soils; tracked via benchmarking and post-project surveying.
In May 2026, NRM Regions Australia hosted a National Soil Action Plan workshop to consolidate the learnings of the NRM sector from the NSMP program. Themes from a national survey and consultations with all 53 regional NRM organisations were presented by the Australian Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.
Workshop insights highlighted the central role NRM organisations play in locally tailored soil planning and delivery, and how NRM regions collaborate to expand soil skills, extension services, data collection, and capability building, all contributing to the current National Soil Action Plan.
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