Abstract: Using sodium hydroxide as the solvent,inductively coupled plasma emission spectrometric determination of total phosphorusr in soil has been carried out. Study shows that the detection limit is 0.025mg/kg. Precision of 6 actual soil samples were 1.27﹪～3.40﹪, and the recovery rate was 95﹪～102﹪. The method has been applied to the determination of phosphorus in national standard reference and the results accord with the certified values. The method is rapid, accurate .