Support the Soil, Support Ourselves: The Benefits Beneath Our Feet

Soils are the foundation of life. They contribute to human well-being, most evidently through agriculture, but also by providing many other regulating, provisioning and cultural ecosystem services. In many Mediterranean landscapes, soils have been degraded by conventional farming practices. Climate change poses additional challenges to soil and water resource management. Therefore, it is vital to practice ways of farming which support healthy soil — Conservation Agriculture is one of them.

Photo source: Yahia Boukharsa. Photo shows farm in Morocco, shown first on ConServeTerra Twitter Feed, April 13, 2021

Conservation Agriculture has been promoted across the world as a means of protecting soil integrity while farming. The three pillars of Conservation Agriculture are:

• minimal soil disturbance
• keeping permanent soil organic cover, and
• diversifying crop species (FAO, 2017).

Reduced soil loss, increased water retention, and climate regulation, including carbon sequestration, have been demonstrated to be among the benefits of these practices. However, the uptake of Conservation Agriculture has been less prevalent among farmers in Europe and North Africa.

In the ConServeTerra project, we seek to understand the socio-cultural factors influencing farmers’ implementation of Conservation Agriculture, and to understand farmer perceptions of soil-related ecosystem services.

Various studies show that a range of socio-cultural factors can influence farmers’ decisions for land management. These factors include traditional knowledge and practices, perceived adaptive capacity, identity, and social capital, meaning social participation and integration into the community. We have designed a survey to investigate some of these factors among farmers across three different Mediterranean countries: Spain, Morocco, and Tunisia. So far, the survey has been tested with a small group of farmers in Catalonia, Spain, with colleagues from the Consortium of Gallecs (Figure 1). Later this year, this will be implemented across all three participating countries.

Figure 1. Trial survey with farmers conducted by Jordi Puig Roca and Albert García Macian of L’Espigall association and Consortium of Gallecs, Catalonia, Spain. Photos: Albert García Macian

The benefits beneath our feet

In the survey, we also seek to understand farmers’ perceptions of soil-related ecosystem services. The table below shows some of the ecosystem services identified in the scientific literature. By ecosystem services we mean the benefits soil provides to humans. For example, we extract raw materials from soil, we build our infrastructure and grow our food on soil, and soil is part of our cultural heritage. We intend to ask farmers to identify the ecosystem services they deem most important for themselves as individuals, and those most important for wider society.

Different types of ecosystem services provided by soil, as identified in the literature. Based on Comerford et al, 2013; Adhikari & Hartemink, 2016 and Dominati et al, 2010

This question reflects the nature of soil as both an individual and as a societal resource. In turn, the farmer’s relationship with soil reflects their role as both an owner and a steward of land. Soil management must reflect these simultaneous roles, which leads to interesting questions.

• Is what is best for the farmer also best for society?
• How do we prioritise different soil-related ecosystem services?
• If farmers implement soil conservation measures, how does this contribute to biodiversity conservation at a landscape level?
• How do soil conservation measures fit with Mediterranean farmers’ ongoing relationships with their land?

In addition to the survey, we plan to use a photo-sorting method based on Q-methodology. Farmers will be asked to sort a series of photographs of farming practices and landscape features according to what they most like to see and least like to see in their farming landscape (Figure 2). Their choices will be analysed using factor analysis to reveal participants’ diverse perspectives on their surroundings. Sorting techniques can complement quantitative surveys by providing a way for farmers to reveal their inner preferences non-verbally, and are often described as enjoyable for the participant.

Figure 2. Selection of different agricultural practices in the Mediterranean for photo-sorting exercise. Photo sources: www.conserveterra.org, Cristina Quintas-Soriano, www.data-driven-investor.com

Initial insights from farmer field schools

A key component of regional strategies for increasing the uptake of Conservation Agriculture is farmer field schools. The aim of these schools is to improve farmer soil literacy by providing knowledge on how to evaluate soil and how to effectively implement recommended practices. So far, ConServeTerra partners have conducted farmer field schools in Catalonia, Spain and in Meknes and Oud Zem, Morocco (Figure 3). More schools are planned in Tunisia and Turkey.

Figure 3. Farmer field schools taking place in Morocco. Photo source: ConServeTerra / agrimaroc.net

In order to understand field school participants’ current soil knowledge and opinions on Conservation Agriculture practices, we developed a baseline survey in collaboration with project partners. The results have given insights into farmer views which can help inform the next surveys described above. Some observations include:

• When asked which practice they currently implement for good soil management, Spanish farmers identified crop rotation more than any other practice, whereas Moroccan farmers identified fertilization the most.
• In Spain, the most frequently identified indicator of good soil quality is organic matter, whereas in Morocco it is the colour of the soil.
• Crop diversification and cultivation of legumes were universally perceived as positive by farmers, whereas permanent soil cover and mixed-row cropping could also be perceived negatively by some Moroccan farmers (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Perceptions of Conservation Agriculture (CA) practices by farmers engaged in farmer field schools. Note that the number of responses varied (Morocco n=58, Spain n=18).

We will repeat the survey later in the project to see if perceptions have changed. Please stay tuned for more information on project progress and the future results.

Please also see www.conserveterra.org for more information about the project including partners, and for a recent post on sociocultural factors and soil management. Also visit https://twitter.com/ConServeTerra for frequent project updates.

Further reading / References:

Adhikari, K., & Hartemink, A. E. (2016). Linking soils to ecosystem services — A global review. Geoderma, 262, 101–111. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoderma.2015.08.009

FAO Brief on Conservation Agriculture (2017) Plant Production and Protection Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, Italy. Available at www.fao.org/ag/ca/

Comerford, N. B., Franzluebbers, A. J., Stromberger, M. E., Morris, L., Markewitz, D., & Moore, R. (2013). Assessment and Evaluation of Soil Ecosystem Services. Soil Horizons, 54(3), 0. https://doi.org/10.2136/sh12-10-0028

Dominati, E., Patterson, M., & Mackay, A. (2010). A framework for classifying and quantifying the natural capital and ecosystem services of soils. Ecological Economics, 69(9), 1858–1868. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2010.05.002