Soil contributes in a wide variety of ways to the stability of society. Climate change and population growth will affect soil’s health and its ability to support Earth’s many inhabitants. |
Under
our feet and ubiquitous, lowly soil can be easily overlooked when it
comes to addressing climate change and population growth. But in the
January-February issue of the Soil Science Society of America Journal,
a team of scientists say soil is an essential piece of the biosphere
and more attention should be paid to protecting it. Strategies for doing
so include refocusing and boosting research, and communicating its
importance to the public.
“The
article is a call to better engage with each other and with those
concerned about the coming stresses to the planet,” said soil scientist
Cesar Izaurralde of the Joint Global Change Research Institute in
College Park, Md., a collaboration between the Department of Energy’s
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Wash., and the
University of Maryland. “A better understanding of soils is needed to
help us weather the changes, many of which will be around for future
generations to contend with.”
While
people don’t think much about soil, it quietly and continuously
services life on Earth. Soil provides the basis for food and fiber
production; it supports a diversity of plant, animal, and microbial
life; it regulates nutrient cycles and gas exchange with the atmosphere;
it cultures our inner feelings for home, for place, for renewal of
spirit.
However,
changes occurring to our planet are affecting the services provided by
soil. Whether these changes are natural or stimulated by the activities
of an ever-increasing population, there is an urgent need to rejuvenate
the essential services provided by soil. After all, soil depletion has
hastened the collapse of at least one society, the Greeks, and
contributed to economic hardship as recently as the last century in the
Great Plains of the United States.
The
international team of researchers suggest how soil scientists and
others can work together to devise strategies to save the soil for the
benefit of the planet, the people that inhabit it now and in the future,
and all other life that depends on human stewardship.
Representing
the 2008 Emerging Issues in Soil Science Committee of the Soil Science
Society of America, this team defined some of the most urgent questions
that humanity will be facing in coming decades and explored ways that
research in soil science might help address those questions.
In
their broad discussion, the scientists address eight critical issues:
demands for food, water, nutrients, and energy, and the challenges of
climate change, biodiversity loss, biological waste recycling, and
global resource equity.
For
example, feeding the burgeoning population will require planning to
protect the soil and environment, and managing soil can help people use
dwindling pools of freshwater more wisely. Nutrients in the soil can be
depleted, so it will be important to preserve soil’s fertility while
improving harvests. Climate change will undoubtedly affect the
productivity and resilience of soil, and soil underpins the biodiversity
of organisms large and small. Using soils to recycle biological wastes
has the potential to replenish our invaluable renewable resources.
Finally, soil is the skin of the Earth and as such must be viewed as a
global resource managed locally.
The
authors recommend four steps soil scientists should take to address
these critical issues. They include refocusing research to the most
urgent problems, broadening their vision from soil to entire ecosystems,
enticing young scientists to pursue careers in the field, and improving
soil science’s image problem with better stories of its past successes
and future prospects.
The
conversations the researchers hope to elicit may help direct soil
science toward greater relevance in preserving our fragile home on this
changing planet.
Reference:
H.H. Janzen, P.E. Fixen, A.J. Franzluebbers, J. Hattey, R.C.
Izaurralde, Q.M. Ketterings, D.A. Lobb, W.H. Schlesinger, Global
Prospects Rooted in Soil Science, Soil Sci. Soc. Am. J. 75:1-8, DOI:
10.2136/sssaj2009.0216. (Freely available from the journal until March
4, 2011. https://www.soils.org/publications/sssaj/abstracts/75/1/1)
