American scientists have made an unsettling discovery. Crop farming across the Prairies since the late 19th Century has caused a collapse of the soil microbia that holds the ecosystem together.
They do not know exactly what role is played by the bacteria. It is a new research field. Nor do they know where the tipping point lies, or how easily this can be reversed. Nobody yet knows whether this is happening in other parts of the world.
A team at the University of Colorado under Noah Fierer used DNA gene technology to test the 'verrucomicrobia' in Prairie soil, contrasting tilled land with the rare pockets of ancient tallgrass found in cemeteries and reservations. The paper published in the US journal Science found that crop agriculture has "drastically altered" the biology of the land. "The soils currently found throughout the region bear little resemblance to their pre-agricultural state," it concluded.
You might say we already knew this. In fact we did not. There has never before been a metagenomic analysis of this kind and on this scale. Professor Fierer said mankind needs to watch its step. "We really know very little about one of the most productive soils on the planet, but we do know that soil microbes play a key role and we can't just keep adding fertilizers," he said.
The Colorado study has caused a stir in the soil world. It was accompanied by a sobering analysis in Science by academics from South Africa's Witwatersrand University. They fear that we are repeating the mistakes of past civilisations, over-exploiting the land until it goes beyond the point of no return, and leads to a vicious circle of famine, and then social disintegration.
American scientists have made an unsettling discovery. Crop farming across the Prairies since the late 19th Century has caused a collapse of the soil microbia that holds the ecosystem together.
At last, someone has woken up. Practices in general have probably been to blame but the great scourge, glyphosate, is probably the biggest bogie.
To become an extremist, hang around with people you agree with. Cass Sunstein
You might say we already knew this. In fact we did not.
Well, I think we probably did actually.
I don't understand why we squander time searching for 100%, scientifically- analysed, cast-iron proof of something that we already know in our hearts. It's the same with climate change. The irony is that, when we eventually pronounce ourselves satisfied that, yes, this is a real issue, it will be too late to do anything about it.
The Living Soil (1943) by Lady Eve Balfour is considered a seminal classic in organic agriculture and the organic movement. The book is based on Balfour's agricultural and medical research, and the initial findings of the first three years of the Haughley Experiment, the first scientific, side-by-side farm trial to compare organic and chemical-based farming.
The Living Soil was also published as The Living Soil and the Haughley Experiment.
The Living Soil (1943) by Lady Eve Balfour is considered a seminal classic in organic agriculture and the organic movement. The book is based on Balfour's agricultural and medical research, and the initial findings of the first three years of the Haughley Experiment, the first scientific, side-by-side farm trial to compare organic and chemical-based farming.
The Living Soil was also published as The Living Soil and the Haughley Experiment.
Now perhaps "conventional" agriculturalists won't rubbish organic, true conventional, production quite so much. This discovery, unfortunately, may well be put to one side by conventional agriculturalists and their chemical paymasters to die quietly.
This certainly happened to research carried out at Basingstoke's Park Preweat Hospital by a Mr MacHarness (not sure of the spelling) in the early 1970s into ADHD and hyperactivity in children. He found a direct correlation between junk food consumption and ADHD, hyperactivity and criminality in children. It was splashed across the papers at the time and then forgotten but has resurfaced recently.
