08/11/2024
SUSTAINABILITY SUNDAY
Soil health, food, and flowers
So, this is a 2,3, or 4-part series for sure. How our planet’s soil health determines the health of our food, bodies, and of course flowers, is a long and layered discussion.
What I may start with is our treatment of soil, our reliance upon it, and how this affects our bodies and food. Subsequent conversations may include how we can better manage our soil for better crop quality in both food and flowers/plants.
It’s amazing to me how little soil health is considered within the Agricultural Industry, and how much profit and efficiency are prioritized. Well, it’s not that surprising.. Truthfully, some mainstream Ag ideas don’t even consider the soil when making production decisions.
People often forget that all food comes from the soil in some capacity, or is at least grown from the earth, and we forget what the primary foundation for food growth is: soil. Healthy soil.
Many societies, if not most, do not prioritize their soil health, and those communities simply do not last. Impoverished communities and soil degradation go hand in hand, and as soil erosion becomes more commonplace, communities and farms struggle to keep up and keep their land flourishing. While soil erosion is indeed natural, the issue is how much erosion is taking place and how often.
The average pace of natural soil building is 2% of a millimetre per year, or 2/100s of a millimetre - fingernails grow father than this. The average erosion rate across the American midwest, for example, is 1.8mm a year, and on average, it takes roughly 2 decades to lose an inch of topsoil, though this is faster with less fertile soil.
One may think ‘what’s the problem? There’s tons of dirt on earth..’ Yes, there is. But there are crucial differences between ‘dirt’ and soil. Soil is rich in microbial fungi, nutrients, and minerals, whereas dirt is simply lacking the life needed to make it usable, both in nature and industrial Ag. We certainly won’t ‘run out of dirt’ on earth, but it is possible that we may eventually run out of the usable soil necessary to feed everyone.
(Continued in comments)
