![]() While artificially enriching depleted soils means more emissions from fertilizers, healthy soils actually sequester greenhouse gases, helping protect us against climate change. More than 40% of the carbon footprint of an ordinary loaf of bread is down to the fertilizer used to grow the grain it's made from. "This is catastrophic when you think that it takes about 500 years to form 2.5 cm (1 inch) of topsoil," the authors of the study said.īrazil, as well as some countries in the Caribbean, Central Africa and Southeast Asia, have lost 70% of their agricultural land to erosion, and around the world an estimated 3.2 billion people - particularly rural communities in the Global South - are already suffering from failing or reduced harvests as a result of land degradation.įertilizers are also problematic because they require a lot of energy to produce. In 2015, a study from England's University of Sheffield found that 33% of the world's arable land had been lost to pollution and erosion over the previous 40 years. Plowing takes a toll, too. It destroys natural networks of fungi and microorganisms while breaking up the resilient structure of soil, leaving it more prone to flooding and drought, and vulnerable to erosion. Industrial argriculture boosts yield in the short term, but saps the soil of nutrients Image: picture alliance/Inderlied/Kirchner-Media Synthetic pesticides and fertilizers also kill off vital microbes in the soil. This means that farmers have to rely on artificial fertilizers, which pollute water sources and disrupt the natural balance of ecosystems. Planting huge expanses of a single crop can boost yield - at least in the short term - and makes mechanized harvesting easier.īut as the same crop draws the nutrients it needs from the soil year after year, that soil becomes depleted. Over 50% of the world's arable land is devoted exclusively to rice, maize, soy and wheat. But what scientists do know is that our soils are in bad shape and their biodiversity is fast declining. Only a fraction of the organisms living in our ground have been properly studied. Intensive agriculture drains soils of life These organisms decompose leaf litter, dead plants and animals, recycling precious nutrients back into the soil to feed new generations of plants.Įarthworms, ants and other creepy crawlies further enrich the soil as they burrow, mixing the rich debris of the topsoil into the layers below. At the same time, they help give soil its structure, ensuring it's well aerated and can absorb and drain water. The humble earthworm: making our soils rich and fertile Image: picture-alliance/blickwinkel/H. A square meter of soil can contain up to 10,000 different species, and a single gram can be home to a billion bacteria. A mix of mineral and organic matter, they are among the most species-rich habitats in the world, teeming with worms, insects, bacteria and fungi. Soils are the living, breathing surface of our planet. But there is a world of difference between the rich, fertile earth that nourishes ecosystems and the desiccated ground that gave the US depression - compounded by crop failures - the nickname the "dirty thirties." A teeming microcosm of biodiversity We still use the word "dirt" to mean soil. Overplowing and the displacement of prairie grasslands that anchored the topsoil had reduced once-fertile plains to a parched, barren wasteland swept by dust storms. Roosevelt back in 1937 when the United States was in the midst of its dust bowl years. ![]() ![]() "A nation that destroys its soil, destroys itself." Such were the words of Franklin D. ![]()
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