Experts Detail Sustainable Agriculture Practices for Hotter, Drier World

Summary

David R. Montgomery high­lights the detri­men­tal impact of con­ven­tional agri­cul­ture on soil health and future food sup­ply in his book Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations. He argues that tran­si­tion­ing to sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural prac­tices is essen­tial to ensure the long-term health of the soil and human soci­eties. Amir Kassam and Christiane Wassman advo­cate for prac­tices like mulching and drip irri­ga­tion in the olive oil sec­tor to pro­mote sus­tain­abil­ity, con­serve water, and enhance soil health, ulti­mately lead­ing to improved pro­duc­tiv­ity and envi­ron­men­tal resilience.

In its quest to meet global food demands, con­ven­tional agri­cul­ture has depleted vital land resources through unsus­tain­able prac­tices, iron­i­cally threat­en­ing future food sup­ply.

According to Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations, David R. Montgomery empha­sizes the stark con­trast between sus­tain­able agri­cul­ture and con­ven­tional farm­ing prac­tices.

Montgomery argues that adopt­ing sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural prac­tices is cru­cial for soil’s long-term health and human soci­eties’ sur­vival.

He argues that human­ity can ensure a more resilient and pro­duc­tive future for agri­cul­ture by learn­ing from the mis­takes of past civ­i­liza­tions and embrac­ing more sus­tain­able meth­ods.

Amir Kassam, a vis­it­ing pro­fes­sor at the University of Reading’s School of Agriculture, pol­icy and Development and a United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization global forum mem­ber, advo­cates for tran­si­tion­ing to more sus­tain­able farm­ing prac­tices.

“The European Union has inher­ited a form of indus­tri­al­ized syn­the­sized farm­ing that has become the
pre­vail­ing agri­cul­tural norm, aug­mented by tillage and agro­chem­i­cal tech­nol­ogy, which is
detri­men­tal to soil health, use­ful insect pop­u­la­tions and bio­di­ver­sity,” he told Olive Oil Times.

“This model oper­ates on a sim­plis­tic input-out­put basis; increased inputs should yield greater out­puts,” Kassam added. ​“However, this approach is detri­men­tal to soil and land­scape health.”

He noted that con­ven­tional agri­cul­ture can adversely affect soil health in var­i­ous ways.

Intensive tillage and monocrop­ping prac­tices fre­quently result in soil ero­sion, whereby the top­soil is either washed or blown away. This dimin­ishes the soil’s fer­til­ity and capac­ity to retain water and nutri­ents.

The depen­dence on chem­i­cal fer­til­iz­ers and pes­ti­cides in con­ven­tional farm­ing depletes the soil’s organic mat­ter, essen­tial for sus­tain­ing soil struc­ture, fer­til­ity and micro­bial activ­ity.

Furthermore, heavy machin­ery can cause soil com­paction, which reduces poros­ity and impedes root pen­e­tra­tion, con­se­quently hin­der­ing water infil­tra­tion and drainage.

The accu­mu­la­tion of harm­ful chem­i­cals from syn­thetic fer­til­iz­ers, her­bi­cides and pes­ti­cides can dis­rupt micro­bial com­mu­ni­ties and dimin­ish soil bio­di­ver­sity.

Additionally, an over-reliance on chem­i­cal fer­til­iz­ers may result in nutri­ent imbal­ances within the soil, lead­ing to defi­cien­cies or tox­i­c­i­ties that adversely affect plant growth and soil health.

“The con­cept can be likened to an input-out­put model, wherein it is assumed that an increase in inputs results in a cor­re­spond­ing increase in out­puts,” Kassam said. ​“However, this incre­men­tal approach, along with inten­sive tillage has become prob­lem­atic, par­tic­u­larly con­cern­ing soil health.”

“Modern agri­cul­tural prac­tices have ceased pri­or­i­tiz­ing crit­i­cal inquiries, such as the over­ar­ch­ing objec­tives of farm­ing sys­tems for the farm­ers, com­mu­nity and the envi­ron­ment,” he added. ​“The focus has shifted away from sus­tain­abil­ity and has become solely cen­tered on yields and prof­itabil­ity, pay­ing lit­tle atten­tion to envi­ron­men­tal con­se­quences and sus­tain­abil­ity.”

Kassam warned that this shift has led to agri­cul­tural land degra­da­tion and top­soil ero­sion. He added that the sit­u­a­tion has become increas­ingly severe as the size of agri­cul­tural machin­ery increases, lead­ing to dust storms in the United States and Europe.

“A deeper under­stand­ing of sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural prac­tices is essen­tial for pro­mot­ing con­ser­va­tion-ori­ented regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­ture,” he said. ​“The fun­da­men­tal prin­ci­ple of con­ser­va­tion agri­cul­ture is to min­i­mize soil dis­tur­bance by avoid­ing tillage, cover the soil with bio­mass mulch and diver­sify the crop­ping sys­tem, thereby pro­tect­ing the ecosys­tem and the diverse use­ful organ­isms that inhabit it.”

“It is cru­cial to main­tain soil cover with bio­mass mulch to approx­i­mate nat­ural con­di­tions as closely as pos­si­ble,” Kassam added. ​“Additionally, the cycling of organic mat­ter is vital, as the mulch safe­guards the soil sur­face from the impacts of storms, rain­fall and wind while also pro­vid­ing nour­ish­ment for soil organ­isms and increases soil organic mat­ter and plant nutri­ents.”

He argues that by adopt­ing more sus­tain­able prac­tices, it is pos­si­ble to mit­i­gate these detri­men­tal effects.

Among these prac­tices is mulching, which Kassam said is an excel­lent source of crop nutri­ents. These nutri­ents are essen­tial to main­tain­ing bio­di­ver­sity and cre­at­ing nat­ural habi­tats for pest preda­tors.

While olive trees are well-known for their abil­ity to thrive in mar­ginal soils, olive farm­ers have noticed the neg­a­tive impact of land degra­da­tion on their trees.

“Farmers, includ­ing olive farm­ers, are see­ing a degra­da­tion of the land because of tillage and
poor man­age­ment of soil health and crop diver­sity, result­ing in declin­ing yields,” Kassam said. ​“In recent decades, many farm­ers have tran­si­tioned from con­ven­tional tillage prac­tices to
con­ser­va­tion agri­cul­ture in annual and peren­nial sys­tems, includ­ing and organic sys­tems.”

“Additionally, farm­ers in the olive sec­tor are com­pro­mis­ing soil health by engag­ing in prac­tices that dis­rupt the soil health through reg­u­lar tillage,” he added.

Christiane Wassman, the co-owner of the award-win­ning pro­ducer Rastrello in Umbria, said she and her fam­ily have suc­cess­fully revi­tal­ized sev­eral cen­tury-old olive oil trees on their farm by imple­ment­ing sus­tain­able prac­tices, par­tic­u­larly mulch.

Mulching is vital in water con­ser­va­tion, par­tic­u­larly in olive farm­ing within regions sus­cep­ti­ble to drought.

Techniques such as drip irri­ga­tion, which deliv­ers water directly to the roots of olive trees, can sig­nif­i­cantly decrease water con­sump­tion while ensur­ing that the trees receive suf­fi­cient hydra­tion. Furthermore, apply­ing mulch around the base of the trees helps retain soil mois­ture and min­i­mize evap­o­ra­tion.

“Drip irri­ga­tion is par­tic­u­larly effec­tive in sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural prac­tices,” Wassman said. ​“This method pre­serves soil integrity and enhances mois­ture reten­tion, even dur­ing rain­fall.”

“Without such prac­tices, it is esti­mated that up to 70 per­cent of mois­ture may be lost due to runoff, as water fails to pen­e­trate the soil effec­tively,” she added. ​“Therefore, it is cru­cial to max­i­mize rain­wa­ter infil­tra­tion and reten­tion. Immediate seal­ing and mulching after plow­ing fur­ther con­tribute to these objec­tives.”

According to Juan Vilar, a strate­gic con­sul­tant for the olive oil sec­tor, irri­ga­tion has become an urgent need in Spain.

“Although around 30 to 35 per­cent of Spanish olive groves have irri­ga­tion, 65 per­cent do not,” he said. ​“They do not have the infra­struc­ture for irri­ga­tion.”

Vilar added that dur­ing the country’s his­toric drought, vir­tu­ally no olive groves were irri­gated as large cities in the south­ern Spanish region of Andalusia imple­mented water restric­tions.

“Things will become more dif­fi­cult in the sum­mer, espe­cially if there is insuf­fi­cient rain in the spring,” he said.

Sustainable agri­cul­tural prac­tices within the olive oil sec­tor are increas­ingly gain­ing trac­tion.

One such prac­tice is con­ser­va­tion tillage, which min­i­mizes soil dis­tur­bance and helps pre­serve soil struc­ture and organic mat­ter.

This method reduces ero­sion and enhances water reten­tion, ensur­ing olive trees have access to nutri­ents and mois­ture for opti­mal growth.

Another sig­nif­i­cant prac­tice is crop rota­tion, which involves alter­nat­ing olive trees with other crops to mit­i­gate the accu­mu­la­tion of pests and dis­eases.

This approach also improves soil fer­til­ity by allow­ing var­i­ous plants to enrich the soil.

“In Andalusia, approx­i­mately 40 per­cent of agri­cul­tural prac­tices in olive farm­ing are already aligned with sus­tain­able farm­ing man­age­ment based on con­ser­va­tion agri­cul­ture,” Kassam said. ​“Additionally, the imple­men­ta­tion of drip irri­ga­tion tech­niques com­ple­ments con­ser­va­tion agri­cul­ture, demon­strat­ing effec­tive syn­ergy in sus­tain­able agri­cul­tural prac­tices.”

“Conservation agri­cul­ture sys­tems and their asso­ci­ated prac­tices sig­nif­i­cantly con­tribute to the enhance­ment of pro­duc­tiv­ity, eco­nomic via­bil­ity, envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­ity and social per­for­mance within the olive pro­duc­tion sec­tor in the arid and semi-arid Mediterranean regions of south­ern Europe, North Africa and West Asia,” he added. ​“These prac­tices have revi­tal­ized the olive pro­duc­tion indus­try, bol­stered resilience, improved soil and land pro­duc­tiv­ity poten­tial, and mit­i­gated land degra­da­tion.”

• ArcGIS
• Haryana Agricultural University
• International Journal for Multidisciplinary Research