Abstract: Soil quality standards are the basis for soil environmental quality assessment. After a preliminary analysis of the present state of soil environmental quality research in western developed countries,this paper elucidates the application and problems of China's soil environmental quality standards. According to the factors affecting the bio-toxicity of pollutants in soils,combined with the data of the current multi-purpose geochemical surveys,the paper proposes the basic principle for establishing the regional soil quality standards.