This is really not an accurate depiction of the problem.
First of all, it may take a 1000 years to naturally create topsoil, but that's not our problem. We have topsoil and can make topsoil much much faster. So how do we preserve, and continue to create topsoil faster than it is depleted.
What is top soil? A collection of macro and micronutrients, microorganisms, and organic matter in the first 5-10 inches of soil. Essentially, its compost.
Traditional farming depletes topsoil because it takes more than it gives. By traditional, I mean subsistence up until early industrial. After we figured out that plants need food, and supplemented it accordingly, the draining of nutritive value of the topsoil largely ended 100 years ago.
However, industry brought about destructive methods such as deforestation and deep tillage which increase erosion. Even if you are adding in enough inputs to balance out what your crops are taking, erosion may simply sweep away your 5-10 inches of good soil. However, in the last 40 years, tiling and no-til methods have vastly improved this. No-til and more efficient combines have also much improved soil organic matter (which take decades to build, but not 1000s of years).
In general. Yes, the erosion of soil is the erosion of civilization, but don't believe the media hype. Farmers aren't dumb, they are incentivized to manage their soil as best they can.
> Farmers aren't dumb, they are incentivized to manage their soil as best they can.
Farmers aren't dumb but:
1. they've made serious mistakes like this in the past, across cultures and civilizations
2. farmers are not necessarily the people making the decisions in the contemporary vertically integrated "food business" economy of US agriculture in 2020
If it is owned by folks in the community, there is some social incentive. Out-of-state landlords? Profit and loss.
A feedback loop for remote landlords to pay the price for letting their land get overworked might be nice. More than just the crop yield loss, but rebuilding the soil for the next generations.
No-till and cover crops are a great approach, but I’ve been told there’s a steep learning curve. But the results are impressive.
> Farmers aren't dumb, they are incentivized to manage their soil as best they can.
Farmers are definitely not dumb. But many are not currently incentivized to manage soil and (more broadly) agricultural ecosystems with long-term viability in mind.
I think the biggest problem is nitrous oxide accumulation in the atmosphere (it comes from denitrifying bacteria acting on nitrogen fertilizers). But there may be ways to address that directly.
First of all, it may take a 1000 years to naturally create topsoil, but that's not our problem. We have topsoil and can make topsoil much much faster. So how do we preserve, and continue to create topsoil faster than it is depleted.
What is top soil? A collection of macro and micronutrients, microorganisms, and organic matter in the first 5-10 inches of soil. Essentially, its compost.
Traditional farming depletes topsoil because it takes more than it gives. By traditional, I mean subsistence up until early industrial. After we figured out that plants need food, and supplemented it accordingly, the draining of nutritive value of the topsoil largely ended 100 years ago.
However, industry brought about destructive methods such as deforestation and deep tillage which increase erosion. Even if you are adding in enough inputs to balance out what your crops are taking, erosion may simply sweep away your 5-10 inches of good soil. However, in the last 40 years, tiling and no-til methods have vastly improved this. No-til and more efficient combines have also much improved soil organic matter (which take decades to build, but not 1000s of years).
In general. Yes, the erosion of soil is the erosion of civilization, but don't believe the media hype. Farmers aren't dumb, they are incentivized to manage their soil as best they can.