Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) warns that global soil degradation needs to be given the same attention as climate change or deforestation. Arable land in Vojvodina was once synonymous with fertility, but is now rapidly losing its quality. The content of organic matter, i.e. humus, which is the basis of all life in the soil, has decreased from 6-7% to half and in some places it is even less. The causes are various: excessive mechanization, chemicals, burning of plant residues, lack of organic fertilizers, but also corruption and negligence in managing state land. While nature has been trying to create fertile soil for centuries, humans have exhausted and destroyed it in just a few decades.
The Biosens Institute's "Guardians of Soil Health" project aims to educate farmers and young people, especially about the need to monitor soil health. Strategies for sustainable management of natural resources include, for example, supporting the use of organic fertilizers, funded green manure, or plowing plant residues instead of burning them, which should be more heavily sanctioned. Intensive land use, especially in sugar beet cultivation, is depleting the soil, with almost no controls by state institutions to prevent this. Fertility restoration is further complicated by the lack of manure caused by the reduction in the number of livestock. Regenerative agriculture and educating new generations are the only way to preserve the land, because nature can no longer tolerate the current way of farming.
The article by Dragan Gmizić was originally published with the support of the project Enhancing the Capacities of Serbian Independent Media in Informing about the Green Transition Challenges by Autonomic.
