Acording to the UN for the food and agriculture, 95% of our food comes directly or indirectly from soils. So their health plays a vital role in reducing global hunger and poverty.
Did you know that there are more living organisms in a spoonful of soil than there are people on the planet? The ground beneath our feet is a whole world composed by organisms, minerals, and organic matter that provide food for humans and animals through plant growth.
Just like us, soils need a balanced and varied supply of nutrients in appropriate amounts to be healthy.
When the crops are harvested, such nutrients are removed from the soil, so proper monitoring and management is necessary to revitalize them and make future plants optimal in nutritional content.
The loss of soil nutrients is one of the main degradation processes that endangers the nutrition, the food safety and the sustainability.
In the last 70 years, the level of vitamins and nutrients in food has been drastically reduced and it’s estimated that more than 2 billion people worldwide suffer from micronutrient deficiency, also known as “hidden hunger” because it is difficult to detect.
The degradation and lack of nutrients in the soil also leads to the loss of its capacity to produce food, causing hunger, poverty and desnutrition, while if there’s a very high concentration of nutrients, the soil creates a toxic environment for plants and animals, pollutes the environment and promotes climate change.
World Soil Day 2022 and its campaign “Soils, the source of food” aims to raise awareness about the importance of soils for optimal food production, nutrition and diets, while calling for sustainable management to ensure the health of our soils.
Let’s take action and empathize with those who bear the worst part of these threats.
Did you know that…?
95% of our food comes from the soil.
Out of the 18 chemical elements essential to plants, 15 come from the soil.
The agricultural production will have to increase 60% to satisfy the worldwide demand of food by 2050.
However, 33% of the planet’s soils are degraded.
If soils are managed sustainably, food production could increase up to 58%.
Sources:
https://www.elcucodigital.com/cada-5-de-diciembre-se-celebra-el-dia-mundial-del-suelo-de-donde-proviene-el-95-de-los-alimentos/
https://www.ecoticias.com/medio-ambiente/dia-mundial-del-suelo-2022
https://www.un.org/es/observances/world-soil-day