Title : The silent crisis: Restoring global soil health to safeguard future food and nutritional security
Abstract:
Soils are the silent foundation of life on Earth. They are at the heart of global food security, biodiversity conservation, climate regulation, and sustainable development. A single teaspoon of healthy soil contains more microbes than there are people on Earth Over the past few decades, the role of soils in supporting humanity has gained increasing recognition. Facilitated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the global soil science community, the International Year of Soils (IYS) 2015 reached a major public awareness milestone. Soil health is the fundamental biological engine driving global food and nutritional security, directly accounting for the production of roughly 95% of the food consumed worldwide. The solid soil phase (such as soil minerals and soil organic matter is the main reservoir of essential nutrients. The soil supplies 14 mineral elements required for the nutrition of higher plants, which are taken up by plants. Soil-derived nutrients which are required in large amounts by plants, especially nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), potassium (K), calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg) and sulphur (S) are classified as major nutrients. Elements such as iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), zinc (Zn), copper (Cu), boron (B) and molybdenum (Mo) which are required in lesser quantities, are classified as micronutrients. When soil is supplied with an adequate amount of nutrients for food production, nutritional health also benefits. Hence, the availability of crucial nutrients like potassium (K), sulphur (S), iron (Fe), and zinc (Zn) in the soil plays a vital role in ensuring food and nutritional security.
Soil degradation threatens the future food supply for an estimated global population of 9.7 billion by 2050. Future food and nutritional security require transitioning from simply producing enough calories to ensuring that sustainable, nutrient-dense food is affordable and accessible to all. A balanced diet is one which includes a variety of foods in adequate amounts and correct proportion to meet the day’s requirement of all essential nutrients such as proteins, carbohydrates, fats, vitamins, minerals, water and fiber. Soils play a major role in all of these Abstract Submission Template areas of quality food production and security for better human health nutrition. Ninety-four percent of the global average daily protein intake by humans is from the soil (58 percent directly from plants and 36 percent indirectly from animals raised on soil-grown foods) (FAO, 2024). The contribution of soil to daily food energy intake is even greater, with 98.8 percent of the daily average food energy intake being from soil-grown foods (83 percent from plants and 15.8 percent from animal products). Approximately 78% of the average per capita calorie consumption worldwide comes from crops grown directly in soil, and another nearly 20% comes from terrestrial food sources that rely indirectly on soil.
