Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The founding of the three Australian organic growers' societies and their
development during the next 10 years was based on three fundamental principles:
(1) Humus-rich, fertile soil; (2) Chemical free; and, (3) Biodiversity and ecological
wellbeing. Each of these three principles will be discussed, in turn, below.
11.2.1
Humus-Rich Fertile Soil
Humus-rich fertile soil, including the promotion of methods for increasing soil
organic content, was the vision upon which Australia's first organic agricultural
societies were founded in the 1940s. Members of these societies argued that humus-
rich fertile soil was the basis of plant, animal and in turn, human health. Issues both
in Australia and abroad were a catalyst for the founding of the Australian societies
at this time and for their focus on soil humus and fertility. Most Australian native
soils differ markedly from agricultural soils in the northern hemisphere. Phosphorus,
nitrogen, copper, magnesium, iron and boron are present in different quantities in
many Australian soils compared to agricultural soils in Europe and North America
and most native Australian soils are characteristically low in soil organic matter
(Young and Young 2001 ). Soils dominated by clay or sand predominate in Australia
which have a very different tilth from loamy soils common in agricultural areas in
other parts of the world.
European settlers, who occupied Australia in the late eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries, cleared native vegetation, plowed, sowed and reaped European
staples such as potatoes, wheat and vegetables and they introduced sheep and
cows as well as rabbits. On the surface of the land, settlers were attempting to
domesticate and Europeanize the environment, but beneath the surface, imported
farming techniques further compounded the differences between Australian and
European soils. Their cultivation techniques, over time, eroded soil structure and
exacerbated naturally low levels of soil organic matter and soil fertility. After only
15-20 years of cultivation, Australian soils lost half of their stored organic matter
(Charman and Murphy 2000 ).
After 100 years of European occupation, many agricultural areas were experienc-
ing significant erosion as stock damaged river and creek banks and wind whipped
up the dry, sandy, exposed and damaged soil. Just as in the United States' Midwest
where erosion rendered formerly productive agricultural areas almost uninhabitable,
during the interwar years, the Mallee district of southern Australia faced its own
'dust bowl' and drought in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s that exacerbated the
problem (Keating 1992 ). In the final years of the Second World War, the years the
first Australian organic societies were established, vast quantities of soil in semi-
arid South Eastern Australia eroded. Declining soil condition became a national
preoccupation (Barr and Cary 1992 ).
Some Australian farmers sought solutions to declining soil fertility in the
increased application of agricultural fertilizers. However, British agricultural writer
Albert Howard, whose books were readily available in Australia, offered an alterna-
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