LANDSCAPE regeneration and food security issues need to be addressed now for the world to be able to meet demand for food production in the future, according to General Michael Jeffery.
The former Governor-General was speaking about regenerative culture at a Designing Resilient Farming Systems conference last Friday.
General Jeffery said without action now the world would not be able to feed a projected increase in population from six billion to 10b by 2050.
There would be less available agricultural land, an aridifying landscape and increasingly degraded soils along with all its associated problems like salinity and erosion.
Longer droughts also increased the risk of wildfires and severe flooding.
"These climatic factors, together with rising input costs of fuel and fertilisers, will impact significantly on our wise management and the sustainable productivity of agricultural enterprises," General Jeffery said.
General Jeffery said there were proven practical solutions at hand to address the physical and social implications but people needed the will to implement change.
"We need to recognise water as our primary, natural strategic asset and to manage and probably price it accordingly," General Jeffery said.
"And we need to understand how healthy soil structure enhances water retention and flourishing plants."
General Jeffery said vegetation biodiversity, either a combination of forests, shelter woods, grasses, crops and even weeds, were necessary for healthy soils.
Carbon biosequestration was a key aspect of addressing the situation.
"If we are not building carbon we are not sustainable," General Jeffery said.
He said normal soil carbon levels for quality agricultural soils should be above five per cent but it was unusual to find more than 1.5pc across Australia's dryland cropping and grazing sector.
"We need now to 'mimic' nature as much as possible in order to regenerate healthy soils and sustain its productivity," General Jeffery said.
He said Australia had considerable carbon sequestration opportunities available through the restoration of its degraded soils.
"In increasing soil carbon levels we not only have the means to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and draw down on CO2 emissions but also the potential to increase productivity," General Jeffery said.
He said farmers could enhance soil fertility, sustainability and profitability by taking a holistic approach to animals, soil and water management.
"For example, the Haggertys near Wyalkatchem had increased the biological activity in their soil and were growing higher quality, more resilient crops and pastures," General Jeffery said.
"They are getting crops with five inches of rain in sustained drought conditions."
Proper management of water was also essential.
He said healthy soils had an immense and essential capacity to enhance surface water retention and infiltration into ground water reservoirs.
"Unfortunately we have altered these essential natural hydrological water cycles of much of the land through intervention to deliver above ground water to storage and irrigation systems," General Jeffery said.
"To facilitate the changes needed to restore our landscape, we need to acknowledge there needs to be a unified co-operative approach for all farmers, land managers and agricultural policy and scientific agencies.
"Governments must ensure our remaining prime farm land is not lost to new urban development and excessive mining activities and recognise the significant role agriculture can play in carbon emissions reduction."
Email a friend