Human activity is responsible for serious soil degradation due to erosion, organic matter depletion, salinization, pollution, etc. In most cases, soil pollution by organic and inorganic substances is site-specific. Sources of pollutants, pollutant pathways, and the medium of pollution vary. Soil properties also are site-specific: soil adsorption capacity, buffering capacity, clay minerals and so on affect the dynamics of pollutants in soils. This paper recapitulates the mode of pollution and summarizes the chemical forms of heavy metals in soils. This paper also shortly reviews conventional and new countermeasures for Cd pollution, and discusses the "risk trade-off" among the many forms of soil degradation and environmental risks with the aim of sustaining life and the environment.