EVERY year, Earth Day is commemorated on April 22 under the auspices of the United Nations. Modern man is now gradually rediscovering that life, including human life, is impossible without the soil and earth. Accordingly, in all the ancient religions, the earth was deified.
In ancient Rome and Greece, there were special temples or altars for Mother Earth, and the entire population, not only the agricultural sections, paid worship. Mother Earth is a main deity in the Hindu religion; Hindus obey her every day.
The caption we have used for this article is borrowed from the “Save the Soil” movement founded by Sadhguru, the famous international spiritual teacher. The themes and prescriptions of Earth Day and the Save the Soil Movement coincide, and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), UN Environment Programme (UNEP), The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and The World Food Programme (WFP) have all accorded their support to the movement. Sadhguru has travelled on his motorcycle to nearly 100 countries, where he met leaders and heads of state who have all committed themselves to saving the soil.
Last year, he visited Guyana and met President Dr Irfaan Ali when 100 square kilometres of land was pledged to restore and safeguard agricultural land. As a result of this visit, a Save the Soil mural was created by three young Guyanese artists – Sadia Vasquez and Bevan and Eldon Allicock – and erected in the National Park.
The main causes of soil degradation are erosion, urbanisation, deforestation and unsustainable management practices. Each of these could be explained at greater length, but we will focus on unsustainable management practices.
When crops are grown on the soil without allowing the soil to recuperate, the nutrients disappear from the soil, or when the soil is ploughed from crop to crop with agricultural machines, the microbial diversity and bacteria diminish or disappear, and the soil becomes infertile. The “dust bowl” in the American Midwest, as described in the novel “Grapes of Wrath” or the hills of Haiti, are examples of land misuse.
The endemic food shortage in Haiti is due to the mismanaging of their soil for nearly two centuries.
Human beings could save the soil and prevent soil degradation. The best way is to allow leaves, animals, and other biological waste to return to the earth, and this would include crop production waste, terracing to limit soil loss and using vegetative buffers which work as filters around surface water.
Some fertilisers will still be necessary in modern farming owing to the insensitive and ignorant destruction of the soil which had already occurred, and it is recommended that fertiliser be applied in certain periods to prevent storm run-off and such fertilisers should not have a high phosphorus or nitrogen content.
This year, 2024, the theme of Earth Day was “Planet versus Plastics” and though it does not ignore the other factors damaging or destroying the soil and earth, it focuses on plastics. When plastics were first introduced, they were regarded as an environmental solution. But soon, their damaging effects on the environment, biodiversity and human health came to the fore. When they break down into microplastics, they release toxic chemicals into food and water sources, presenting a grave threat to human health.
Today, plastics are pervasive in ecosystems, from urban drains to pristine environments. For example, they become entangled with the root systems of mangroves, impairing their ability to stabilise shorelines and act as a sea defence or to provide a habitat for various species of fish and other marine life and birds. Marine animals, like turtles, mistake plastic wastes for food and ingest them, leading to internal injuries, blockages, starvation and death. This contamination extends to the human food chain when fisherfolk unwittingly supply contaminated fish to society. On the Guyana coast, plastic bottles and other plastic waste regularly clog up the kokers, impede drainage and cause mosquito breeding puddles to develop.
Plastics provide such a cheap and useful item of normal human existence that it is unlikely that the pre-plastic era would ever return. However, some damage control could be effectuated if there are regular community clean-up campaigns to bring about a clean environment for all: reducing the use of single-use plastics, properly disposing of plastic waste, avoiding buying goods with plastic wrappings when there are alternatives, avoiding the use of disposable plastic food containers when substitutes such as cardboard could be used; and use baskets or cloth bags when shopping.
