Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations - Kootenay Local Agricultural Society

soil. In contrast, the conventionally farmed field shed more than six inches
of topsoil between 1948 and 1985. Direct measurements of sediment yield
confirmed a fourfold difference in soil loss between the two farms.
The bottom line was simple. The organic farm retained its fertility
despite intensive agriculture. Soil on the conventional farm—and by
implication most neighboring farms—gradually lost productive capacity
as the soil thinned. With fifty more years of conventional farming, the
region’s topsoil will be gone. Harvests from the region are projected to
drop by half once topsoil erosion leaves conventional farmers plowing the
clayey subsoil. To sustain crop production, technologically driven increases
in crop yields will have to double just to stay even.
European researchers also report that organic farms are more efficient
and less detrimental to soil fertility. A twenty-one-year comparison of crop
yields and soil fertility showed that organic plots yielded about 20 percent
less than plots cultivated using pesticide-and-fertilizer-intensive methods.
However, the organic plots used a third to half the input of fertilizer and
energy and virtually no pesticides. In addition, the organic plots harbored
far more pest-eating organisms and supported greater overall biological
activity. In the organic plots, the biomass of earthworms was up to three
times higher and the total length of plant roots colonized by beneficial soil
mycorrhizae was 40 percent greater. Organic farming methods not only
increased soil fertility, profits from organic farms were comparable to those
of conventional farms. Commercially viable, organic farming need not
remain an alternative philosophy.
Other recent studies support this view. A comparison of neighboring
farms using organic and conventional methods on identical soils in New
Zealand found the organic farms had better soil quality, higher soil organic
matter, and more earthworms—and were as financially viable per hectare.
A comparison of apple orchards in Washington State found similar crop
yields between conventional and organic farming systems. The five-year
study found that organic methods not only used less energy, maintained
higher soil quality, and produced sweeter apples, they proved more profitable
than conventional methods. An orchard grown under conventional
methods that became profitable in about fifteen years would show profits
within a decade under organic methods.
While the organic sector is the fastest-growing segment of the U.S. food
market, many currently profitable conventional farming methods would
become uneconomical if their true costs were incorporated into market
pricing. Direct financial subsidies, and failure to include costs of depleting
dirty business 209