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This article elaborates the role of soil and land management in a circular economy. The circular economy is highly dependent on the functioning of soils and land for the production of food and other biomass; the storage, filtration and transformation of many substances including water, carbon, and nitrogen; the provision of fresh mineral resources and fossil fuels; and the use of their functions as the platform for nature and human activities. Resource demand is increasing as a result of the growing human population. In addition to the shrinking availability of resources resulting from their unsustainable use in the past, our planet's diminishing potential for resource production, due to a range of reasons, is leading to resource scarcity, especially in the case of depletable resources. As an economic system that focuses on maximizing the reuse of resources and products and minimizing their depreciation, the circular economy greatly influences, and depends on, soil and land management. The concise management of the resources, land and soil is thus necessary, to make a circular economy successful., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

This article presents and discusses the main elements for a fundamental policy change for groundwater management in The Netherlands. The study analyzes the status and current use of groundwater, the increasing pressure in The Netherlands and many other countries on the natural soil-water system, the effects on quality and quantity of groundwater and the use of the subsoil. An overview is given of the current national and European regulations regarding groundwater and related policies for e.g. drinking water, soil policies and other interventions in the subsurface. The Dutch National Government is developing a new framework for groundwater management that aims a sustainable use of groundwater not only in environmental, but also in economic and social perspective. This framework for groundwater will benefit the Structure vision on the subsoil. The question is how 'sustainable use' can be a guiding principle in groundwater management, strengthening the relation between groundwater quantity and quality. It is proposed to define a generic National approach for the assessment of new and existing activities with potential effects on groundwater and for groundwater quality assessment. Additionally it is proposed to give local authorities the opportunity to set area-specific objectives on a regional or local scale to adjust for specific societal needs and area-specific characteristics. For setting these objectives it is recommended to use the concept of ecosystem services as a leading principle for defining the groundwater quality and quantity (e.g. for use as source for drinking water, aquifer thermal storage and sustaining terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems)., (Copyright © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)