DUST THOU ART

The title of this post was extracted from scriptures: Genesis chapter 3 verse 19(old version of King James Version). The NIV puts it this way: …dust you are. These are speaking of the human species. The original Hebrew/Aramaic term used for the word dust is Aphar, and according to The New Strong Expanded Exhaustive Concordance (pg. 217) Aphar means porous loose earth.

Man was carved out of the earth, and his physical life is sustained from the soil. Man is therefore inextricably linked to the soil. The state of your health is dependent on the state of the soil.   

Individual health begins with healthy soil. Soils vary widely in composition, but most fertile soils are defined as “the highly dynamic, living, breathing combination of rock and mineral particles, organic matter and humus, large and small air and water pores, and a vast array of small animal and plant organisms”.

Dr. Louise F. Gray, a biochemist and member of the staff of the US Plant, Soil and Nutrition Laboratory wrote: “The soil is the source of all the minerals the plant contains. With these and with water, carbon dioxide from the air and energy from the sunlight, the plant synthesizes the organic components-carbohydrates, fats, proteins, and vitamins- that man and animals need for life” (FOOD. 1959 Yearbook of Agriculture, p. 390).

The organic matter of the soil serves as a storehouse for important plant nutrients. Over 95% of the soil’s nitrogen, 98% of the sulfur, and up to 60% of the phosphorus reserve may be stored there. Humus, a product of organic matter decomposition, is also important as a soil conditioner and colloid, which makes the soil suitable for plant growth.

Humus-rich land absorbs heavy rain into the soil, while humus-poor soil allows rapid runoff and soil erosion in even a light rain. Centuries of soil formation and favorable weather has given virgin soil in America an abundance of humus, nitrogen and organic matter. The single most important responsibility of agriculture today is to replenish, rebuild and maintain that soil fertility.

SOIL DEPLETION

Many of today’s deserts, jungles, and wastelands are the farmlands of yesteryear. They were ruined through improper agricultural management. Early Americans for instance, “mined” this virgin American soil until it lost much of its fertility. Then they moved on to “rape” yet more acres of virgin soil.

In 1860, every American had 60 acres per capita, most of it untouched and “undeveloped”. By 1900, the average American had only 25 acres; he had 15 acres in 1930; and less than 10 acres today (1974). Just one-fifth of American soil is devoted to cropland, so, in effect, each American has two acres from which to wrest enough nutrients to live.

Most American land is eroded, in need of immediate conservation and care, according to the US Soil Conservation Service. The fertility of the remaining soil is declining since more plant nutrients are taken out each year than are added. The health of a nation’s citizens is proportional to the nutrients in the soil, and in America at least both are declining.

Between 1950 and 1970, the vast implementation of chemical fertilizers increased yield per acre by 53%, although it took 700% more fertilizer to accomplish this growth. But fertilizer mainly increased the quantity of crops, not quality. In the Asian "Green Revolution," beginning in 1965, the quality and edibility of crops also declined although quantity increased.

Excessive use of the nitrogen fertilizers has at times resulted in nitrate toxicity in livestock and high nitrite levels in canned and frozen processed vegetables. Wide varieties of soil have been loaded with too much of the wrong types of fertilizer, while the right balance of available minerals and organic matter would build up soil fertility.

A beginning solution to the soil fertility problem is the use of animal manure as fertilizer, yet in most areas the animals and crops are segregated and “ne’er the twain shall meet”.

VARIATIONS IN FOOD QUALITY

Ecologists like to look at the earth as a large space capsule- a limited biosphere with its own self-contained life-support system. This “biosphere” is the thin sheet, extending five miles above sea level and, in places, five miles below, and covering the 200 million square miles of the earth’s surface. Within that thin lacquer layer of your desk globe, virtually all life forms thrive and interrelate in dozens of cyclical systems.

 The cycle of food nutrients is just one of many such systems. The nutrients in food depend on the soil, the weather, the seed and soil management. Those nutrients which are taken away by harvest can be returned through the judicious use of food “waste”, thus completing the cycle. American’s nutrient cycle, however, is an “open” system- commercial fertilizer alone does not complete the cycle. Consequently, soils become depleted or imbalanced, causing foods to vary widely in nutritional value.

As an example of the variation in food nutrients, the National Canners Association (USA) tested various fruits and vegetables for consistency of vitamin C: for the same amount of orange juice, vitamin-C content ranged from 11.1 to 52.2 milligrams per 100 grams, spinach varied from 3.4 to 35.5 milligrams, and tomato juice varied from 1.8 to 45.5 milligrams per 100 grams.

The variation in trace minerals was even more extreme. Processed milk has run from 362 parts per million (ppm) of iodine down to zero ppm, while vegetables grown on soil in one part of the country assay 1100 ppb(parts per billion) iodine, against 20 ppb elsewhere. This severely affects human health; especially was this so before iodine was added to table salt.

Minerals such as iron and zinc are very important for soil fertility and human health, yet iron in spinach has varied from 10 ppm to 1584 ppm, and iron in tomatoes has varied from 1 ppm to 1938 ppm. Zinc, though less publicized, is also vital to health, but has become deficient in many of the major fruit and vegetable growing areas of the US.

Climate affects nutritive qualities of crops in several ways. The protein content of small grains such as wheat is higher in hot, dry climates and is lower in moist, cold climates. The nitrogen and mineral content of soils in dry, hot regions generally is higher because less leaching of these nutrients occur than in wet regions. A limited moisture supply means that less vegetative growth takes place, and more nitrogen is available for grain production. High protein grain is produced in dry years and lower protein grain in wet years.

Studies in North Carolina showed calcium and vitamin C content of crops to be 35% and 39% higher respectively, in the spring than in the fall. This was attributed to differences in weather. Vitamin C in tomatoes and turnip greens was also directly correlated with exposure of the tomato fruit or the turnip leaf to sunlight during the period just before harvesting. Vitamin C in turnip greens varied directly with light intensity, with 28.2 mg under lowest light intensity, and 235.5 mg under highest light intensity. Fertilizer treatments such as nitrogen have been associated with reduced levels of vitamin C in the fruits.

Weather factors such as temperature and rainfall affect plant composition indirectly through their effect on soil formation and mineral availability. Soils that have a high content of organic matter absorb and hold more moisture and tend to be drought resistant. Organic matter in the soil also tends to stabilize soil temperature, keeping it cooler in the hot summer and warmer in the winter.

Soil fertility, weather and climate all affect the nutritive quality of plants and the types that can be grown in a given area.

QUALITY OF LIFE

Protein deficiency is a major problem. In Africa this disease is called kwashiorkor, or literally, “the disease the older baby gets when the new baby comes”. Since mother’s milk is the only protein available to such children, the older (age 2-4) child begins to swell in the belly, his hair turns gray, his skin cracks, and he slowly dies in mute misery.

The “quality of life”, however, means more than money. Many poor people make nutritional ends meet, but the lifestyle and eating habits of the rich often their dietary habits worse than some of the poor. Many poor tribes of the world routinely live to be 100 years old, due to natural foods and peaceful lifestyle: the Mabaans of the Sudan, the Hunzas of Kashmir, the Abkhasians of Georgian Russia, the Andeans of Ecuador, and other small tribes. Their rate of centenarians (those living beyond age 100) is up to 20 times that of the US.

Source:

World Crisis in Agriculture (1974) - By Gary Alexander and the Ambassador College Agricultural Research Department, USA

http://herbert-w-armstrong.com/books.html