{"id":2559,"date":"2019-05-22T08:56:40","date_gmt":"2019-05-22T08:56:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=2559"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:18","slug":"stop-soil-erosion-now-or-face-starvation-soon-scientists-warn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/05\/22\/stop-soil-erosion-now-or-face-starvation-soon-scientists-warn\/","title":{"rendered":"Stop Soil Erosion Now or Face Starvation Soon, Scientists Warn"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Thomson Reuters<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nworld’s food production is in jeopardy because the fertile layer of soil that\npeople depend on to plant crops is being eroded by human activities, scientists\nsaid on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate\nchange is likely to make it worse even as demand from a grown population is\nsoaring, they said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Soil\nerosion happens naturally, but intensive agriculture, deforestation, mining and\nurban sprawl accelerate it and can reduce crop yields by up to 50%, according\nto the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

FAO\nalso said the equivalent of a soccer pitch of soil is eroded every five\nseconds, and the planet is on a path that could lead to the degradation of more\nthan 90% of all the Earth’s soils by 2050.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We’re\napproaching a critical point at which we need to start acting on soil erosion\nor we are not going to be able to feed ourselves in the future,” Lindsay\nStringer, professor at England’s University of Leeds, said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She\nwas speaking on the sidelines of a three-day conference on soil erosion\nco-organized by the FAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Erosion\ndegrades soil, meaning it is less able to withstand stresses such as changes in\nrainfall and longer droughts, Richard Cruse, professor at Iowa State University\nin the United States, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A\nrepeat of weather conditions like those experienced in 2012, including drought\nand famine in the Horn of Africa and hurricanes in the United States,\n“could really cut our food supply in a way that we haven’t\nexperienced,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet,\npolicy makers are too caught up in day-to-day issues to focus on soil erosion,\nhe added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“They\nhave to deal with poverty, health, roads, things that are of immediate effect.\nSoil erosion is long term. It’s like sands through an hourglass. We know what’s\nhappening, but we’ll worry about it tomorrow.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nis not hopeless, said Stringer, whose research in Kenya found using manure as\nfertilizer or growing more than one crop on the same plot of land are simple,\ninexpensive actions that improve both soil quality and crop yield.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However,\nother proven methods to reduce erosion, such as building terraces and engaging\nin agroforestry – planting trees on cropland – can be too expensive for\nfarmers, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ownership\nof land is key here, Cruse said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In\nmy conversation with farmers, they tell me, “If I own my own land and I’m\nfarming, conservation is an investment. If I have to use these practices on\nrented land, it’s a cost.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Governments\ncan give incentives to farmers through subsidies and other means, because good\nsoil benefits the wider society, while things would worsen if nothing is done,\nsaid Jean Poesen from Belgium’s KU Leuven university.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Ninety-five\npercent of our foods come from soil. Can you imagine how the food section of a\nsupermarket would look like if we had no soils? There would be nothing on the\nshelves,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Once\nthe soil is gone\u2026 people end up with hard, bare rock, and nothing grows. Then\nyou have to migrate or start a fight with your neighbors and conquer.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read\noriginal article<\/a> on Thomson Reuters Foundation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Thomson Reuters The world’s food production is in jeopardy because the fertile layer of soil that people depend on to plant crops is being eroded by human activities, scientists…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}