First of three Parts
Soils are where our food begins. Without healthy soils, growing nutritious food would be next to impossible. Problems like soil erosion can cause up to 50 percent in crop yield losses, impacting farmers’ livelihoods, our environment, agriculture and food. Soil health affects us all.
Around the world, farmers face different challenges. Misuse of fertilizers and pesticides and lack of knowledge about soil conditions are among them.
To address these issues at their roots, the Global Soil Doctors Program, implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), is creating a legion of “soil doctors,” educated and trained to support farmers on sustainable soil management. This program, a key initiative of the Global Soil Partnership, provides heaps of educational resources to support the doctors and farmers to teach and learn from each other.
Here are four countries where FAO-trained soil doctors are healing farms and bettering soil management practices:
Tajikistan
Only a scarce seven percent of land in Tajikistan is suitable for agriculture. Even then problems such as soil erosion and land degradation pose threats to sustainable farming. To mitigate these problems, the country implemented the Global Soils Doctors Program in two districts prone to fertility loss. The program trains champion farmers and certifies them as “doctors” to then help other famers in their community manage soils sustainably. (To be continued)