World Soil Day

Healthy soils are the foundation for food, fuel, fibre and even medicine, said the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) as it kicked off the 2015 International Year of Soils today on the first-ever World Soil Day . Healthy soils are the foundation for food, fuel, fibre and even medicine said the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) today as it kicked off 2015 the International Year of Soils on the first-ever World Soil Day. Soils are also essential to our ecosystems, playing a key role in the carbon cycle, storing and filtering water, and improving resilience to floods and droughts, and yet we are not paying enough attention to this important “silent ally,” the UN agency explained. The International Year of Soils kicks off today at events in Rome, New York and Santiago de Chile, in an effort to raise awareness and promote more sustainable use of this critical resource. “Today, we have more than 805 million people facing hunger and malnutrition. P...

  The Chemical, Physical and Biological Status of a soil.

Soil organic matter (SOM) plays a central role in maintaining soil functions and preventing soil degradation. Soils constitute the largest organic carbon pool on the Earth and play a critical role in regulating climate and mitigating climate change through trade-offs between greenhouse gas emission and carbon sequestration. For this reason, SOM is strategic for climate change adaptation and mitigation, and global stores of SOM should be stabilized or increased. A loss of soil organic carbon (SOC) due to inappropriate land use or the use of poor soil management or cropping practices can cause a decline in soil quality and soil structure, and increase soil erosion, potentially leading to emissions of carbon into the atmosphere. On the other hand, appropriate land use and soil management can lead to increased SOC and improved soil quality that can partially mitigate the rise of atmospheric CO2 . • Increase biomass production by increasing water availability for plants using methods (e.g.,...