Composting Improves Soil Health
“The nation that destroys its soil, destroys itself” -Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Healthy soil essentially acts as an ecological immune system. Conventional, intensive farming is compromising the long-term viability of soil fertility. The diversity and productivity of living things depends on healthy soil. Compost is increasingly being recognized as a critical tool in revitalizing the fertility of soil without the use of chemical fertilizers.
Soil Health Has Been Compromised
- Intensive farming strips soil of nutrients and reduces organic matter levels
- 1/3 of the world’s cropland has been abandoned because of soil erosion/degradation over the past 40 years
- The total annual cost of erosion from agriculture in the U.S. is approximately $44 billion per year
Key Functions of Healthy Soil
- Water retention, preventing erosion
- Sustaining plant and animal life
- Carbon sequestration mitigates global warming
- Filtering pollutants by buffering and detoxifying organic and inorganic byproducts
- Cycling nutrients: Carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and other nutrients are stored and cycled through soil
How Compost Improves Soil Health
- Suppresses plant diseases and pests
- Reduces or eliminates the need for chemical fertilizers
- Promotes higher yields of agricultural crops
- Improves soil structure: Both water holding capacity/erosion control along with drainage and permeability
- Buffers soil acidity
- Facilitates reforestation, wetlands restoration and habitat revitalization
- Cost-effectively remediates soils contaminated by hazardous waste
- Removes solids, oil, grease and heavy metals from storm water runoff
- Captures and destroys 99.6% of Industrial volatile organic chemicals (“VOCs”) in contaminated air