Historical and Sociocultural Aspects of Soil Organic Matter and Soil Organic Carbon Benefits - Soil Carbon: Science, Management and Policy for Multiple Benefits - page 173

N-fixing bacteria (Giller, 2001), which still
have to be matched with other groups of
microorganisms.
In managed sustainable agriculture, the
modern concept of SOM as a dynamic, bio-
logically regulated pool of energy, carbon
and nutrients is congruent with the concept
of fertility as defined by Balfour for organic
agriculture: 'the capacity of soil to receive,
store and transmit energy' (Balfour, 1976, in
Merrill, 1983). This has the effect of enhan-
cing the status of SOM management as an
essential component of the design of new
cropping schemes. In the Western world, for
instance, research stations devoted to or-
ganic farming were created as early as 1939
(Haughley Research Trust in the UK by
Balfour), 1945 (Rodale Institute in the USA),
1950 (Germany) or the mid-seventies (Switz-
erland and the Netherlands). At first, they
were privately funded, but they are now
financed, at least partly, by governments
(Krell, 1997; Lotter, 2003).
The worldwide adoption of precision
agriculture, along with the increased pro-
motion of agroforestry systems (Steppler
and Nair, 1987; Ewel, 1999), of composting,
mulching and direct-sowing techniques
(CIRAD, 1999) demonstrate the scientific
value of integrated SOM management in
terms of sustainable cropping schemes that
were widely used before the mineral era but
that had only been preserved in small-
holders' agriculture (Altieri, 2002; Jackson,
2002; Tilman et al ., 2002). On the other
hand, and slow though it has been to grow,
introducing ecological concepts into mod-
ern agriculture represents a return to prin-
ciples that had been derived empirically
from observation, many of which had been
retained in traditional indigenous know-
ledge in various parts of the world. This de-
velopment has been documented recently
by McNeely and Scherr (2002), who cele-
brate the achievement of what they call
'ecological agriculture'.
Beyond its role in regulating global cli-
mate change (soil's capacity for C sequestra-
tion), and as a key compartment in nutrient
cycles, SOM has also come to be valued for
its influence on a wide range of so-called
'ecosystem services' in the sense of the

Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA,
2005); for example, food production, water
management, climate protection/regulation,
provision of energy, biodiversity preserva-
tion, transformation and dynamics, landscape
management, cultural services, etc. Such
services also include water availability and
quality, soil erodibility and SOM as a source
of energy for soil biota acting as biological
control of plant, livestock and even human
pathogens and diseases.
The numerous ecosystem services pro-
vided by soil through appropriate SOM
management represent both 'soil OM benefits'
and 'soil C benefits'. In that perspective, many
new agricultural systems are nowadays
being proposed under the generic terms of
'agroecology'; for example, 'organic farming',
'conservation agriculture' (with reduced or
no tillage), 'agroforestry', etc. All these alter-
natives are based on the use of locally avail-
able natural resources (leguminous plants,
rock phosphate, etc.) and the restitution of
any plant or animal residue to the soils.

Religious and Sociocultural
Perception of 'Soil OM Benefits'

The concept of SOM is linked strongly to
scientific development in the western hemi-
sphere, while the very notion of organic
matter never really emerged among practi-
tioners in other past or present civilizations.
Nevertheless, the latter had, by and large,
a holistic perception of the environment.
The ideas of earth, soil and fertility were
universal. One of the archetypal myths is
that of the Goddess Earth, or Mother God-
dess, found in almost all cultures as a symbol
of fertility and fecundity, both of fields and
of women. This deity was a woman: Demeter
for the ancient Greeks, Ceres for the Romans.
The denomination of Mother Goddess
has been adopted not only solely by priests
and religions but also by scientists, as
shown by Patzel (2010) in an article devoted
to what belonged (in the psychoanalytical
sense) to the 'unconscious' in the discourse
of the pioneers in soil science at the end of
the 19th century, like Fallou (1862) and
Senft (1888), or Steiner (1924), Howard (1940,