In the United States articles have been bemoaning the loss of our topsoil since the 1930s. They seem to follow a template. We need our soil; we'll die without it. Then explaining the rate we're losing it at; how much we have left, finishing with dire warnings.
My parents were farmers. We haven't depended on topsoil to fill our collective larder since those 1930s. We add nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and various minor minerals.
Nitrogen made from and by the petroleum industry. We use it to grow corn, a heavy feeder, turn that corn into a gasoline additive and pretend it's green. Phosphates are dug from the ground a few miles from where I live by giant drag lines. We use petrochemicals to compensate for massive mono-cropping and now we have gene-splicing. The soil? It's just a grow medium for petro-food.
Anyone who still pretends our modern cornucopia is the fruit of the soil is being willfully ignorant.
My parents were farmers. We haven't depended on topsoil to fill our collective larder since those 1930s. We add nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and various minor minerals.
Nitrogen made from and by the petroleum industry. We use it to grow corn, a heavy feeder, turn that corn into a gasoline additive and pretend it's green. Phosphates are dug from the ground a few miles from where I live by giant drag lines. We use petrochemicals to compensate for massive mono-cropping and now we have gene-splicing. The soil? It's just a grow medium for petro-food.
Anyone who still pretends our modern cornucopia is the fruit of the soil is being willfully ignorant.