Humusica 2, article 19: Techno humus systems and global change – Conservation agriculture and 4/1000 proposal

In: Applied Soil Ecology, 2018, 122 (Part 2), pp.271-296. Philosophy can overlap pedology. It is not casual that life begins and finishes in the soil. We separated the concepts of Humipedon, Copedon and Lithopedon. Some sections were dedicated to the founders of the movement for a new type of agriculture (agroecology). They simply proclaim to accompany the process of natural evolution instead of spending a lot of energy in hunting competitor organisms with pesticides or boosting the soil with mineral fertilisation and tillage. The core of the article is built on a biological concept of the soil and shows researches supporting this view. After pointing to the soil structure and illustrating its natural genesis, explaining which cultural conditions may improve its quality, we finished the article with economic considerations, combining at planet level a program of soil restoration with a mitigation of the greenhouse effect. What a reader should have in mind at the end of the article: soil organisms have a prominent positive influence on soil structure and fertility; their mass is proportional to the amount of soil organic matter; it is possible to counteract climate warming by using soil as sink of C. We estimated that the Agro Humipedons of a European economically active region could sink about 13 or 20% of its emissions, by switching from conventional to minimum or no tillage during the coming 40 years. At planetary level, a well-programmed 4 per 1000 action can even be more efficient and might compensate part of the global greenhouse gas effect.