It is obvious that the agricultural industry has not learnt or doesn’t want to know how soils are designed to function and as a result has led to catastrophic soil degradation on a global scale. Just look at the following soil disturbances: physical, chemical and biological.
Whatever we do to our soils we must think about how it affects the soil organisms. First lets look at physical soil disturbance. When the soils are ripped open by cultivation; carbon leaves the soil as carbon dioxide and the additional oxygen added consumes the most fragile components of organic matter that produce the glues to hold the soil aggregate together (soil oxidation). These biologically produced glues (glomalin) from mycorrhizal fungi. They need to be continually produced in the soil because microorganisms and bacteria are constantly feeding on them. It is this soil tilling (aerobic erosion) that has led to and is therefore responsible for the depletion of organic matter in our soils that we see today.
The above problem is linked to nutrient density of foods which has decreased anywhere form 15 to 65% in the last 50 years. The consumers are not satisfied with this. They are now gravitating to healthy food which only healthy soils can produce through plants uptake of nutrients. We need to look at the nutrient density of what we are producing.
Everything we do must benefit soil health, increase quality and nutrient content which is found in our organic extra virgin olive oil. The next discussion will be chemical and biological disturbances.