Sadhguru: Keeping Soil Alive Is a Generational Responsibility

Sadhguru: Generally, we think richness means striking oil, gold or diamonds. But if you want the next generation to live a rich life – not in terms of the stock market or their bank balance but in terms of the life that is throbbing within them – what is important is clean air, pure water and nutritious food. For all these to become possible, there must be strength in the soil.

Our concern for soil and human wellbeing are not separate things. These are one and the same. The topsoil, which is on average thirty-nine inches around the world, is the basis for eighty-seven percent of life on this planet, including ourselves. Plants, birds, animals, insects and worms – all thrive on the richness of the topsoil.

Who you are right now is a consequence of the living activity that is happening in the soil. A handful of soil has over five to seven billion organisms. It is from that microbial life that all the other life has evolved on this planet. They are the first forms of life and we are still alive today because of them. Even now, what is happening in the soil and what is happening in the bio system of the human body are not very different. If you take individual cells, sixty percent of your body is microbes, only forty percent are genetically-influenced cells from your parentage. So, this is not any different from the soil. The richness in the soil and the richness in human life are very directly connected.

Death of Life

But the level of degradation of soil that has happened in the last fifty years is scary because for example, the insect biomass has come down by around eighty percent – this is really the death of life. "Okay, if the insects die, what's our problem? We anyway don't like insects!" This is the attitude of the urban populations. What we need to understand is that if all the insects die tomorrow, in two-and-a-half to four-and-a-half years, all life on this planet will end. If all the worms die, you have approximately eighteen to thirty months of time. If all the microbes die today, well tomorrow, everything will end. Suppose there is no microbial life in the soil, well, trees will not survive, none of the crops will come up. If all the microbes die - we are finished. But every year, on an average, 27,000 species are going extinct.

The United Nations agencies, with enough scientific data, are saying that the planet has agricultural soil only for another eighty to hundred crops. That means we would run out of soil in forty-five to sixty years. If that happens, there will be a serious food crisis on the planet.

The First Step

If we want to reclaim soil, the first and foremost narrative that needs to change in the world is that it is living soil, not dead material. Even agricultural scientists, universities and agricultural departments are still addressing soil as a material. Their approach is still, "It just needs a little more nitrogen, a little more potassium, a little more phosphorus." No, that is not what soil needs. What soil needs is living organisms.

If we want to put back biodiversity, the most important thing is to have a rich soil. Rich soil, essentially, is a consequence of more organic material going into the soil continuously. And whatever you do, there are only two ways you can put organic content back into the soil – green litter from vegetation, and animal waste. These two things must be available. 

A time has come where we need to address soil and take corrective measures now. If we start now, in fifteen to twenty-five years, there will be a significant turnaround. But let us say we wait for another twenty-five to fifty years, and then try to turn it around, they say it may take up to 200 years to turn around. And that period is going to be disastrous for human beings as a species.

A Global Movement to Save Soil

This is why, in 2022, we took up the Conscious Planet – Save Soil movement, because this is the only issue right now. Since then, the response from governments, global agencies, and citizens has been overwhelming. The need of the hour is urgency to revive the world’s agricultural soils and regenerate microbial life, and in turn ensure the safety and wellbeing of all Life

I want each one of you to join this movement. Take this as your movement and bring awareness in this nation, and in the rest of the world that the soil upon which we stand and walk is the basis of our life; that the life which is happening in the first twelve to fifteen inches of topsoil is actually the basis of our existence. In fact, we are a consequence of this life, not the other way around.

Taking care of the soil, ensuring that desertification and degradation of soil richness does not happen is the most vital responsibility that we have as a generation of people. This one thing should be taken up as an express mission by every citizen, by every government of the many nations on this planet. Without ensuring the richness of the soil, we are in a way giving up on life. Please, let us make it happen.