One-third of world’s soil has already been destroyed, says UN official
ROME, Italy (Thomson Reuters Foundation) — All of the world’s topsoil could be gone within 60 years if current rates of degradation continue, says a senior United Nations official.
It takes 1,000 years to generate three centimetres of the natural resource.
One-third of the world’s soil has already been degraded, said Maria-Helena Semedo of the Food and Agriculture Organization.
Soil destruction is caused by chemical-heavy farming techniques, global warming and deforestation, which increases erosion. Experts say that policy-makers often ignore the earth under our feet.
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“Soils are the basis of life,” said Semedo, FAO’s deputy director general of natural resources.
“Ninety-five percent of our food comes from the soil.”
The FAO said increasing populations and soil degradation will reduce the global amount of arable and productive land per person in 2050 to only a quarter of the level in 1960 unless new approaches are adopted.
Soil plays a key role in absorbing carbon and filtering water, according to an FAO report. Soil destruction creates a vicious cycle, in which less carbon is stored, the world become hotter and the land is further degraded.
“We are losing 30 soccer fields of soil every minute, mostly due to intensive farming,” said Volkert Engelsman, an activist with the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements.
“Organic (farming) may not be the only solution, but it’s the single best (option) I can think of.”
