"Soil is the foundation of life and friendship."
I gave a talk at Braziers Park College last Friday, to begin their Wider Community Weekend, entitled "For Our Children's Earth - building the soil, sustaining the future."
Here is a summary:
“Soil is the fragile living skin of the Earth. It is living because it contains an amazing number of different organisms, and a billion microbes are present in a single teaspoonful of soil. It is fragile because it is prone to degradation, principally by erosion. According the United Nations, 30% of the world's crop-land has been abandoned over the past 40 years due to degradation and desertification.
However, we must produce 60% more food by 2050, to match a population that is predicted to increase from 8.3 billion now, to 9.8 billion, then. Thus, we are destroying the productivity of that same land from which we demand a relentless increase in production. Is disaster inevitable?
Soil is also connected to water and energy supplies. Lose the soil, and we lose everything. Local community resilience, permaculture, and changing our education system are all critical to a thriving future. Things have to change."
The audience was enthusiastic and engaging, providing excellent questions for the Q&A session, ranging from the nature and properties of soil itself, through energy, human ecological overshoot, national and world governance, Transition Towns, and the need to transform the university system in the times at hand.
I sold a copy of my black-comedy novel, "University Shambles" to a very warm and friendly American chap who gave me £20, and said, "keep the rest as a donation for all your good work." I wrote a dedication in the book for him: “To... "Soil is the foundation of life and friendship,” which I believe is actually the truth!He also asked me where I bought my shirts from, as he thought they were very smart and wanted some to wear himself. :-)
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