Last week at Rose Cafe, Dawit Solomon, Senior Research Associate at the School of Integrative Plant Science, Soil, and Crop Sciences Section, came to discuss why soil matters. Soil serves many diverse functions, much more than meets the eye. For example, soil is essential not only for growing crops, but for providing fuel and promoting carbon balance. I thought it was fascinating how soil is intricately connected to climate change. Most people are aware that carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere have increased dramatically since 1950. However, many people are probably not aware that 25% of carbon dioxide emissions come from the soil, and that the total amount of carbon in the soil is four times the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. A warmer planet is changing the carbon composition of the soil, both leading to increased carbon emissions in the atmosphere and soil degradation/poor fertility.

We rarely talk about the relationship between soil and climate change, but I learned that they are closely connected. Moreover, this discussion served to emphasize the severity of climate change, as soil erosion presents a great food security threat in poorer regions. For example, Ethiopia is currently experiencing extreme levels of soil degradation. Its land has been overused and exhausted, exacerbating risk of food depletion and malnutrition. The topics of climate change and the negative effects of a warming planet have been a consistent theme in Rose Cafes, and its urgency is only increasing.