A team of researchers from ̽̽ has recently published their Food Systems Research Center-funded work, which discusses the needs and priorities of soil health in relation to small- and medium-sized farms. Led by Deborah Neher, Professor of Plant and Soil Sciences, the article titled was the Editor’s Pick in in October 2022.
“I like to think of soil health as an orchestra. Each musician plays their part, the conductor, strings, woodwinds, brass, and percussion instruments all join to create something more complex than their individual components.”
This analogy was used by Neher to describe the complexity of interactions that make up soil health. A silent orchestra where all internal aspects of soil characteristics and external elements of agricultural communities play their part in the overall composition piece, which is soil health. The research, produced by Neher, along with an interdisciplinary team of ̽̽ scientists, including Jeanne Harris, Catherine Horner, Matthew Scarborough, Appala Raju Badireddy, Joshua Faulkner, Alissa White, Heather Darby, Joshua Farley, and Eric Bishop-von Wettberg discusses a new framework to promote further understanding of a soil’s microbiome and its role in the production of food and sustainability within the food system.
Traditionally, research within the field of soil ecology tends to focus on specific pathogens or specific populations of microorganisms within soil. Although there is an increased understanding of the importance of microbial diversity of soil within current research, the incorporation of this understanding into agricultural practices has lagged behind. Neher et al.’s work promotes a paradigm shift in the current understanding, asking the community to adopt a more complex view of soil health as a whole to fit the needs of farmers and future researchers alike.
“We should be thinking about soil as a community rather than single species or populations,” said Neher. “Microbes work together within a community. Their interactions with each other and their environment produce the foundations of soil health.”
Neher and her close-knit team propose four priority needs that should center the focus of future research and internal cooperation within the agricultural community.
- Research that links soil microbiome variation to agriculturally important aspects of of plant health.
- Connect agricultural management practices with the microbiome and soil health.
- Identifying the value of soil health as it relates to crop production and society.
- Strengthening of relationships between scientists, farmers, and policymakers to develop new data-driven soil health policies.
The research concludes by linking these four priorities to improved sustainability for small and medium-sized farms against the ever-present environmental and economic challenges of climate change. Neher and her ̽̽ colleagues hope their proposed framework and four identified priorities prompt new researchers to take up this mantle and bring the new complex view of soil health to the forefront of the sustainable agriculture conversation.
