gNATSGO Soil Database - Rasters

This collection contains the table data for gNATSGO. This table data can be used to determine the values of raster data cells for Items in the gNATSGO Rasters Collection. The gridded National Soil Survey Geographic Database (gNATSGO) is a USDA-NRCS Soil & Plant Science Division (SPSD) composite database that provides complete coverage of the best available soils information for all areas of the United States and Island Territories. It was created by combining data from the Soil Survey Geographic Database (SSURGO), State Soil Geographic Database (STATSGO2), and Raster Soil Survey Databases (RSS) into a single seamless ESRI file geodatabase. SSURGO is the SPSD flagship soils database that has over 100 years of field-validated detailed soil mapping data. SSURGO contains soils information for more than 90 percent of the United States and island territories, but unmapped land remains. STATSGO2 is a general soil map that has soils data for all of the United States and island territories, but the data is not as detailed as the SSURGO data. The Raster Soil Surveys (RSSs) are the next generation soil survey databases developed using advanced digital soil mapping methods. The gNATSGO database is composed primarily of SSURGO data, but STATSGO2 data was used to fill in the gaps. The RSSs are newer product with relatively limited spatial extent. These RSSs were merged into the gNATSGO after combining the SSURGO and STATSGO2 data. The extent of RSS is expected to increase in the coming years. See the official documentation

Rasters/SoilLoss_NaturalVegRemoved

The Digital Soil Map of the World is a global vector dataset based on the original FAO-UNESCO World Soil Map, published in 10 volumes and 19 cartographic sheets from 1972 to 1977. The digitized soil map, in geographic projection (latitude - longitude) and at a scale of 1:5,000,000, was intersected with a layer containing hydrographic features (coasts, lakes, glaciers, and dual-course rivers) and, with the exception of the African continent, with the map of national boundaries obtained from the World Data Bank II (United States Government) updated in January 1994 at a scale of 1:3,000,000. For Africa, national boundaries were derived from the boundaries of the Original FAO/UNESCO World Soil Map of the World. In both cases, national boundaries have been verified and, where necessary, adjusted based on FAO and UN conventions. The Digital Soil Map of the World in PDF and GIS formats is available for download in the **Data and Resources** section of this metadata. Maps and legends can be also found on the **FAO Soil Portal**, along with the related reports, for the following regions: North America, Mexico and Central America, South America, Europe, Asia, South Asia, North and Central Asia, Southeast Asia, and Australasia. **Data revision:** 2007-02-28 **Contact points:** Resource Contact: [ Land and Water Division](mailto:land-and-water@fao.org) Metadata Contact: [FAO-Data](mailto:fao-data@fao.org) **Data lineage:** More information regarding the production and use of the digital soil map of the world can be found in the layer (.lyr), legend (.avl), readme and excel files contained in the zip files available for download. Please note that the Digital Soil Map of the World is also available in a raster version at 5 arc minutes resolution. **Resource constraints:** This work is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY-4.0) **Online resources:** Digital Soil Map of the World - ESRI shapefile format Digital Soil Map of the World - Erdas format Digital Soil Map of the World (by Regions) - Erdas format Digital Soil Map of the World - IDRISI format Digital Soil Map of the World - high resolution map (PDF format - 28MB) Harmonized World Soil Database FAO Soils Portal: FAO/UNESCO Soil Map of the World

Rasters/SoilLoss_AvoidedDueToNaturalVeg

Rasters/SedimentYield_NaturalVegRemoved

Texture class (USDA system) at 7 standard depths predicted using the global compilation of soil ground observations. Accuracy assessement of the maps is availble in Hengl et at. (2017) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0169748. Data provided as GeoTIFFs with internal compression (co='COMPRESS=DEFLATE')