Minutes General Assembly 2025

Protocol ISMC General Assembly 2024

Date: 10^th of October 2025; 4:00 PM-5:30 PM

Virtual Zoom Videoconference

Agenda

1. Opening, volunteer for protocol and approval of the Agenda (Coordination)
2. Report of the activities 2024-2025 (Chairs)
3. Report of the finances 2024 (Coordination)
4. Approval of the finances 2024 (Coordination, simple vote)
5. Outlook activities 2025 (Chairs)
6. Information for the Election of treasurer and ISMC coordinator in December 2025
7. Working Group Reports (WG leads)
8. Any other business
9. Closing remarks (Chairs)

Attendees:

Yijian Zeng (Co-Chair), Attila Nemes (Co-Chair), Lutz Weihermüller (Treasurer and Coordinator), Vanderborght, Jan, Tiago Ramos, Hailong He, Nunzio Romano, Quirijn de Jong van Lier, Jingyi Huang, Rahmati Mehdi, Lehmann Peter, Sarem Norouzi, Efstathios Diamantopoulos, Yonggen Zhang, Tobias Klöffel, Tom Hengl, Köstel Johannes, Todd-Brown Kathe, Nendel Claas, Anne Verhoef, Jannis Groh

Topic 1: Opening, volunteer for protocol and approval of the agenda

Yijian Zeng, Attila Nemes and Lutz Weihermüller chaired the general assembly (GA). Lutz Weihermüller and Yijian Zeng agreed to take the minutes. Members agree on the agenda and no new agenda points were requested. The total GA was recorded and all participants agreed to the recording. Recording will be only used for internal purpose.

Thank you to Martine van der Ploeg (as former co-chair) and Attila Nemes / Yijian Zeng for their work as ISMC co-chairs. Special thanks to Martine for her work over the last years and the ongoing support. Yijian Zeng and Attila Nemes thanked Lutz for coordinating all ISMC activities.

Topic 2: Report of the activities 2024-2025

Lutz, Yijian, and Attila reported on the ISMC activities in 2024 to 2025:

ISMC Workshop Wageningen University 24th and 25th of March 2025

The ISMC chairs and coordination invited for an ISMC workshop at Wageningen University for 24th and 25th of March 2025. In total 18 people attended either onsite or online for discussion but also to join in the presentations given on running EU projects. Major points discussed were the ISMC activities since its foundation and future plans. Additionally, the integration of the EU SOILPROM project was one discussion point and we decided to open up a new working group on Soil Pollution Modelling. Call for this working

group will be open soon. We also had 4 presentations from running EU projects (SOILPROM, FARMWISE, OPTAIN, WUNDER), which have been recorded and are now available at our ISMC YouTube Channel. The full minutes of the workshop can be found at the ISMC homepage via this link.

ISMC/ GEWEX Water Initiative (SoilWat) Workshop at Reading 14-16.07.2025

The joint International Soil Modelling Consortium (ISMC) and GEWEX Soil Water Initiative (SoilWat) organized a 3 days workshop at Reading UK to bring together two research communities to improve the representation of soil and subsurface processes in land surface models, for enhanced weather forecasts and climate predictions. The subsurface modeling community, broadly represented by ISMC, and the land surface modeling community, represented by GEWEX, e.g. via its GLASS (Global Land Atmosphere Systems Studies) panel, worked together to identify the most pressing challenges related to this effort and ways forward.

The ISMC – GEWEX SoilWat meeting 2025 serves as a continuation of the first SoilWat Workshop held in Leipzig, Germany, in June 2016. The 2025 workshop aimed to assess achievements and identify research gaps since the last meeting.

The main objective were to write a paper that will outline a roadmap, identifying the next frontiers and challenges in this field, and how collaboration can address these. This is especially important since significant developments have been taken place within the climate and soil modeling communities in recent years, in particular those relating to Machine Learning, Digital Twins, and high-resolution Earth System modeling. The minute of the meeting can be found here.

Support of the International Symposium on Organic Farming and Production (ISOP) November 2025 in Can Tho Vietnam

ISMC supported the International Symposium on Organic Farming and Production (ISOP) by collecting registration fees from international participants and used the ISMC channels (newsletter and homepage) for advertising.

Special Issue in SOIL on Advances in dynamic soil modelling across scales open for submission

This special issue (SI) invites papers that study soil dynamics using numerical and statistical models. The SI was initiated by Marijn van der Meij from the 2/3D modelling group of the German Soil Science Society together with ISMC. Submission deadline is open until mid-2026. ISMC members act as co-editors for the SI.

2^nd International Summer school Advanced Soil Physics: Soil-Plant-Water Flow

From September 8^th to September 12^th the 2^nd summer school “Modeling Water Fluxes in the Soil–Plant System” took place in Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium), supported by ISMC. Thirty-five international students attended the intensive one-week program to deepen their understanding of water flow in the soil-rhizosphere-plant system, including the influence of plant physiology, as well as rhizosphere and soil hydraulics. After a beer tasting icebreaking event on Sunday evening, eight lecturers from the soil physics and biological science communities (from UCLouvain and FZ Jülich, and KULeuven) came over to teach various topics, including soil physics fundamentals to 3-D soil-plant functional and structural models. The program combined theoretical lectures, hands-on modelling sessions, group projects, and practical exercises using advanced numerical tools such as GRANAR, MECHA, and CPlantBox. The participants also visited laboratories for automated phenotyping and of soil and plant hydraulics. In addition, our invited speaker shared inspiring perspectives and cutting-edge research: Tom De Swaef (ILVO, Belgium) answered the question ‘What do a grass leaf, a tomato fruit and a tree stem have in common?’ using the latest development in turgor-driven plant growth modelling, and Simone Fatichi (National University of Singapore) presented the ‘Frontiers in mechanistic ecohydrological modelling.

Thanks to Mona Giraud, Andrea Schnepf, and Mathieu Javaux for organizing the summer school.

Travel grant awarded to Diego Armando Fernandez Ibarra

Diego Armando Fernandez Ibarra holds a degree in Animal Science from the National University of the Centre of Peru (UNCP) in Junín. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree at the Soil Physics Laboratory of the Centre for Nuclear Energy in Agriculture (CENA), University of São Paulo (USP), Brazil. His academic journey includes volunteer work and internships with research groups and the National Institute of Agricultural Innovation (INIA) in Peru, where he gained hands-on experience in field planning and operations in high altitude Andean ecosystems, along with skills in remote sensing and multispectral image analysis. In 2019, he participated in a student exchange program at USP, contributing to fieldwork and activities at the Soil Physics Laboratory of the Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture. His current research focuses on the hydrological characterization of soils and the calibration of agro-hydrological models, particularly in the context of the Andean ecosystem in Peru.

SWIG Online Database

The SWIG (Soil Water Infiltration Global (SWIG) Database) as an interactive map platform where researchers can view, select, and download infiltration measurements from around the world was launched. In the SWIG v2 Interactive Map 𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗮 can be uploaded and existing data downloaded here. Many thanks to Mehdi Rahmati for this initiative.

ISMC YouTube Channel

ISMC launched its YouTube Channel, where videos from ISMC related presentations (Meetings, summer schools, awards) will be uploaded. The Channel can be also used by members to upload any relevant videos.

Regular ISMC Newsletter

The monthly newsletter was and will be send out. Especially, the featured papers is well received in the community and many applications come in. Therefore, we currently feature 2 papers per issue. In near future also the working groups should present their work in the newsletter. Currently more than 1100 interested people have subscribed to the newsletter.

Topic 3: Report of the finances 2023-2024

Lutz Weihermüller showed a compiled overview of budgets and explained the development of paid members and membership fees. Memberships seem be stable, whereby currently ISMC has about 380 number of which most are those becoming members by attending the summer school or ISMC conference. Those members do not pay membership fees to ISMC in the first year as the membership fee was used for the events directly. Largest expense in 2024 was van Genuchten and the publication expenses provided to support the publication of the Pedotransfer function roadmap paper out of the PTF and Land Surface working group. Costs for the conference covered smaller items and the travel support for one young scientist. Revenues showed a large plus of ~€7600 from the last ISMC Conference in Tianjin. Again many thanks to the local organizers, especially Yonggen Zhang for the organization.

Topic 4: Approval of the finances 2024

A tabular overview of the book-keeping and the annual accounts of the fiscal years 2023 have been sent to the auditors (Kathe Todd-Brown and Yonggen Zhang) and approved. The treasurer was relieved for the fiscal years 2023 by the members.

The finances have been checked by Kathe Todd-Brown and Yonggen Zhang (elected budget auditors) and approved by signature. Attila Nemes and Yijian Zeng asked the members to release the treasurer. The Treasurer was released by all members (no abstention).

Topic 5: Outlook activities 2025-2026

• EGU 2026 Session in preparation with Mahyar Naseri (Measurement and Modeling of Soil Processes Across Scales)
• EGU 2026 Session proposal with Tobias Weber (Advances in Critical Zone Understanding through Integration of Novel Measurement Techniques and Modelling Approaches)
• EGU Session proposed by Mehdi Rhamati (Next-Generation Soil Physics: Integrating Remote Sensing, Artificial Intelligence, and Process-Based Modeling)
• ISMC Conference Brazil (September 2026)
  Quirijn provided a short overview of the planning status. Venue is booked and will be in Rio. Some excursion is already in detailed planning and keynotes have been identified. Beginning of next year the homepage will be launched with detailed information and abstract submission will be also opened early 2026.
• IUSS Conference Nanjing China. Session Title: Modelling soil processes from pedon to global scale (Yonggen Zhang, Wenhao Shi and ISMC Team) 
• IUSS Conference Nanjing China. Session Title: Water Flow and Solute Transport in the Soil-Plant System (Daniela Reineke, and Tobias Weber)
• COST Action on Land-Surface parametrization (Tobias Weber)
• Soilwat NERC proposal (Anne Verhoef)
• Side event at AGU? & EGU?
• Summer Schools?

A summer school in Naples is planned by Paolo and Nunzio, for which ISMC can support. In 2026 there will be already a webinar in the light of the summer school.

ISMC Lecturer Award

The chairs proposed the installation of an ISMC Award. Yijian Zeng provided some information to the members:

The Lecturer Award honours a scientist who advances the representation of soil processes in Earth system science, strengthens multidisciplinary applications, and fosters an inclusive, collaborative ISMC community. The awardee delivers the lecture as an ISMC Conference keynote and engages early-career researchers through a mentoring or tutorial event, with materials shared openly via ISMC channels.

What the awardee does

Keynote: Deliver the Lecture at the ISMC Conference.

Community engagement: Host one interactive ECR session (e.g., clinic, roundtable, or tutorial) within 12 months.

Knowledge sharing: Provide slides/materials for open access via ISMC channels.

Selection emphasis

Scientific impact: Clear advances in representing soil processes (theory, data, or modelling) with demonstrated uptake beyond soil science.

Community service: Meaningful contributions to ISMC activities and international collaboration.

Mentorship & inclusion: Evident support for early-career researchers and inclusive practices.

Open science: Reproducible code, data, or training materials where feasible.

The members agreed to follow up this suggestion and the chairs will choose an appropriate name for the award.

Add a rule of conduct

As several other non-profit organizations have been launching rules of conduct, Attila also suggested to add a rule of conduct for ISMC. The chairs and coordination will work on this and provide a draft to the members within the next year.

Add a rule of procedure

As Yijian and Lutz pointed out, some members of the executive board have never shown up at any board meeting nor do some reply to any emails. Additionally, it has been already discussed after the last election that some maximum number of executive board members should be defined. Therefore, the chairs propose to clarify the role of executive board members and to define the maximum number of members in the executive board. The suggestion was presented as:

Rules of Procedure of the International Soil Modelling Consortium e.V.

By resolution of the General Assembly of 10.10.2025, these Rules of Procedure shall apply from 01.01.2026 until revoked by the members

Addendum to the ISMC Statutes § 13 Executive Board

The extended board is limited to 13 person. The Extended Board is composed of the 6 leaders of the Science Panels (Do-Link, Soil-MIP, and CROSS Connect), the ISMC Coordinator and Treasurer, the elected Chairs, and 4 other elected persons, 2 of whom should preferably be young or mid-career scientists under 40 years of age.

An executive board member can voluntarily remove him/herself as board member by not maintaining paid membership, as stated by ISMC’s statutes, for over a year.

The rules will be added as an appendix to the status, which do not need official approval by a notary. All participants agreed to the rules of procedure (with no objections).

Topic 6: Information for the Election of ISMC coordinator and treasurer

Lutz Weihermüller’s term will end in February 2026. In general, the treasurer has to be located in Germany. Otherwise the status of ISMC has to be changed. The term is always for 3 years and the Executive Board elects the treasurer. Volunteers are welcome (should send interest by end of October to coordinator and co-chairs). Lutz Weihermüller expressed his willingness to serve as a treasurer for another term.

Topic 7: Working Group Reports

• The following working groups reported on their activity:
• Soil carbon potential working group (Kathe Todd-Brown reported)
• Math in Soils (Kathe Todd-Brown reported )
• Soil Thermal Properties (Anne Verhoef and Yijian Zeng reported)
• Soil Systems in Agro-Ecological Modelling (Claas Nendel reported)
• Pedotransfer function and LS parametrization (Yonggen Zhang reported)
• Teaching and Dissemination (Lutz reported)

There will be a new WG launched for Soil Pollution Modelling. This WG will be setup in close cooperation with the EU Project SOILPROM.

Mehdi asked about the status of the machine learning WG, which should have started already in 2024. As Martine is too committed at the moment Mehdi Rhamati and Sarem Norouzi would like to take over. Lutz will inform Martine and all gathered information about potential interested person will be handed to Mehdi and Sarem

In general, the WGs presented are active and output has been or will be generated. We asked the WG leads to check if ISMC can be acknowledged whenever it comes to publications as acknowledgement will increase ISMC visibility. Especially papers from the PTF WG is a highlight of ISMC work and networking. Same will hold for the soil carbon and math papers being close to submission. The chairs also pointed out that there is some budget to allow compensation for high publication charges.

Topic 8: Any other Business

The ISMC coordination team (Chairs, coordinators, newsletter team) meets bi-weekly online for newsletter preparation and ISMC organization. The organization meeting is scheduled every 2^nd Thursday a month 4 PM CET and the newsletter preparation meeting the 4^th Thursday every month same time. The link for the meeting can be provided on request (send an email to Yijian, Attila or Lutz).

Tom Hengl pointed out that there will be the World day of Soils on 5^th of December and proposed some ISMC activities.

Jannis asked for the status of the ISMC position paper. Unfortunately, this initiative has been on hold for a while but Yijian promised to reactivate asap.

Note: A the full minutes including budget information, photos and signitures of co-chairs and treasurer can be requested by sending an email to the coordination team.