Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
tens of thousands of people as environmental refugees, and the dramatic erosion in
Haiti today are just some examples of recent and ongoing unsustainable use of soils
which has been documented in many soil science and agronomy papers and
monographs over the past decades.
Feeding 9 billion people is a challenge for the soils of the world, although much
of this challenge is politically rather than naturally induced. Poverty and lack of
education are damaging to soils, as is a high-input lifestyle based on the excessive
use of fossil energy.
The recent (2008) attempt to write a blueprint for the development of sustainable
agriculture (International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and
Technology for Development
76
) calls for sustainable use of agriculture
s natural
resources, most importantly of soils and water, but the ideas how to reach this goal
differ widely, from more implementation of traditional knowledge to increased use
and development of GM crops. Some of the stakeholders left the process because
visions about a sustainable future could not be reconciled. Such a vision would
bene
'
t from inclusion of historical data.
What Peter Lindert wrote about China and Indonesia in 2000 still holds true:
“
The study of trends in soil quality needs the kind of quantitative history that has so
enriched climatology and geology. Virtually all estimates of current soil trends, are
in fact, not data. Rather they are expert
'
s predictions, derived by combining data on
slope, climate, and land use with what happens to such soils under experimental
conditions. Sometimes they are re
as in the GLASOD
map, but they are still not based on any observation before the mid-1980s
ned into
“
expert opinion
”
.
77
”
Unlike other
elds of environmental history, the environmental history of soils is
still in its infancy. Providing long-term data on sustainable and unsustainable use of
soils in the past is a daunting task for environmental historians for the next years
and decades.
Acknowledgments The empirical work for this contribution was compiled during an APART
fellowship of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (2003
-
2006). Herwig Weigl and Richard
Hoffmann helped improve this text with their critical remarks. Anita Hipnger assisted with
formatting and references, Andrea Bottanova produced the newly formatted footnotes.
References
Altieri MA (1999) The ecological role of biodiversity in agroecosystems. Agric Ecosyst Environ
74(19
31):22
Arnold RW, Szabolcs I, Targulian VO (1990) Global soil change. Institute for Applied Systems
Analysis, Laxenburg
Bakels CC (1997) The beginnings of manuring in western Europe. Antiquity 71:442
-
445
-
76
International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Develop-
ment (IAASTD) (
2014
).
77
Lindert (
2000b
).
