Recently, different groups have produced reports
addressing the state of the soils, impacts and pressures
and recommendations for soil protection policy making
at the EU level. The report of van-Camp
et al
. (2004)
as part of the technical group working on «Contamina-
tion and Land Management» established the need to
measure soil heavy metal concentrations and to iden-
tify contamination processes. Moreover, the intensifi-
cation of agriculture in Europe encouraged by the
Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has resulted in the
incorporation of several types of pollutants to soil, such
as heavy metals, due to excess use of agrochemicals
(Groom
et al
., 1995). The analysis of heavy metal con-
centrations in agricultural soils is, therefore, critical
for policy making orientated toward reducing heavy
metal inputs to soil and guaranteeing the maintenance
or even the improvement in soil quality.