The Soil and Health

Howard, Albert. 1947. The Soil and Health A Study of Organic Agriculture. New York The Devin-Adair Company. 

This practice went on until recently. Four hundred eighty-one formulations and compounds were included in the official list of pesticides permitted for use in agriculture from 1986-90 [14]. In 1990, the MPC and other health protocols were developed for only 127 pesticides in food products, 105 pesticides in bodies of water used for hygiene and drinking, 78 pesticides in fishery reservoirs, 31 pesticides in farm animal feed, 81 pesticides in the soil, and 119 pesticides in work zone air [1]. There were no MPCs for the remainder of the pesticides permitted for use and, according to existing rules, they should not have been used. Nevertheless, they were. 

Investigations regarding the soil - human health pathway and types of land use... 

Determination of sampling points and sampling depths for the soil -human health and soil - plant pathways, and the soil - groundwater pathway (Table 3)... 

In this sense, pesticide and fertilizer use can undermine the goals of lawn care itself, impoverishing the soil and plant health required to maintain turf. This effect, known as the chemical treadmill, emerged vrith the dawn of the green revolution in agriculture in the 1960s. The term was coined to capture the frustrating cycle where increased use of inputs leads to increased demand of the... 

Soil can have a dramatic effect on plant health. Get to know your garden soil (see pp.26-31) and, where necessary, improve its structure and fertility. Composted organic materials can help to reduce pest and disease levels in the soil, and to grow plants less prone to attack. 

It was the work and publications of people such as Howard, McCarrison and Steiner that influenced the next wave of organic pioneers. This second wave brought the organic movement into being, with the establishment of the early associations such as the Rodale Institute in the United States of America (USA), Soil and Health in New Zealand and the Soil Association in the United Kingdom (UK). The term organic was first used in relation to farming by North-bourne (1940) (see above). 

PTMs-contaminated soils pose a human health risk on the basis of the potential of the contaminant to leave the soil and enter the human bloodstream. In order to assess human health risk, several pathways of transfer of metals from soil to humans have to be taken into account. The most important metal intake takes place via the food chain in which plants or meat of animal play a key role. The direct ingestion of soil can be a major route of exposure for humans to many low mobile soil contaminants, particularly for small children through putting hands into the mouth (Gupta et al., 1996). The contribution from the inhalation of particles smaller than 10 pm and from dermal contact with soil have little meaning compared with oral ingestion and are found to be less than 1% and 0.1% of the total intake, respectively (Paustenbach, 2000). 

The Biodynamic Farming and Gardening Association in New Zealand Inc was formed in 193 7 and incorporated in 1945 to fiirther the biodynamic method of agriculture, horticulture and forestry as elucidated by Rudolf Steiner. It is responsible for the Demeter logo in New Zealand and, while they have a membership of over 800, their licensees number only 37. Many of their members are small producers dedicated to the concept of healthy food for the local community. There is no incentive or requirement at this stage to get certified. A member of the association executive sits on the board of Bio-Gro and the OPEG executive, showing a healthy level of co-operation. Soil and Health, the founder of Bio-Gro, also maintain a seat on Bio-Gro. 

Resorption and metabolism in plants vary with the composition and pH of the soils and with the seasons in animals and man they vary with age, sex, health, diet and other factors. In cases in which radionuclides are resorbed selectively and accumulated in certain organs of animals or man or in certain parts of plants or in which the rate of excretion in animals or man is small compared with the rate of sorption, these radionuclides will be enriched in the body or in the plant (bioaccumulation), with the result that the activity may reach high values. 

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