Soil biodiversity and related ecosystem functions are neglected in most biodiversity assessments and nature conservation actions. Through an overview of how society, and particularly policy-makers, have addressed these aspects in the past, we here show that the protection and nature conservation targeting of soil biodiversity has been insufficient. First, soil-related policies are unenforceable and lack soil nature conservation goals, focusing instead on other environmental objectives. Second, we found no evidence for positive effects of current nature conservation measures on multiple soil ecosystem functions in Europe. Third, we explored the role of soils in nature conservation management by using German management plans as an example, and found soils to be considered from a limited perspective only. By exploring these three dimensions (i.e., policy, evidence, management), we are able to highlight potential ways forward to improve nature conservation as a central instrument for soil biodiversity protection.
