By Dr. Mercola
Judith Schwartz is a freelance writer and author of the book Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth. I recently met Judy at a conference held by Allan Savory of the Savory Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
The Savory Institute helps farmers to holistically manage their livestock in order to improve soil quality and heal the environment. In fact, according to Savory, an African ecologist, dramatically increasing the number of grazing livestock is the only thing that can reverse desertification (when land turns to desert).
This was Savory's first conference, and turned out to be quite a memorable event. Judy has summarized a big portion of what was presented in that conference in her book. But what made her hone in on the issue of soil health to begin with?
Surprisingly, it all began with an investigation into the economy. Around 2008, just before the economic downturn, she'd started writing about the transition movement:
"One of the things that transition initiatives were dealing with was local currencies," she says. "Looking into local currencies kind of helped me understand how local economies work and primed me to ask questions when the economic downturn hit, like 'What is money? What is wealth?'
I was on that trajectory, writing about environmental economics and new economics... Basically, it's the notion that our economy can and should serve the people the planet as opposed to the other way around.
This I fear is the scenario that we've kind of gotten stuck in – that people and the planet, meaning all of our natural systems, exist to serve the economy.From that framework, I started looking at ecology and observed the disconnect between our financial system and the natural world, which just cannot be separate. That disconnect doesn't work."
The Environmental Impact of Conventional Farming
This led her to learn more about soil health, economical land use, and how modern agricultural practices affect our environment.
For example, did you know that our modern agricultural system is responsible for putting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than the actual burning of fossil fuels? Understanding this reveals an obvious answer to pressing global problems.
There are only three places for carbon to go: land, air and water. Our agricultural practices have removed massive amounts of valuable carbon from land, transferring it into air and water. By paying greater attention to carbon management, we have the opportunity to make a dramatic difference in this area, which is having major negative consequences to our agriculture, and the pollution of our water and air.
As explained by Judy, early this past summer, concentrations of atmospheric CO2 crossed the 400 parts per million-threshold—the highest it's been in thousands of years. According to an organization called 350.org, scientists believe our CO2 levels need to be around 350 parts per million in order to maintain favorable living conditions on earth.
Carbon management is a critical aspect of environmental health and the growing of food.
That said, CO2 levels are not constantly or continuously rising in a straight line. The level rises and falls, and this is a clue to what's going on.
Read more at: http://articles.mercola.c...
