Having read the article, I'd say it wasn't the use of synthetic fertilizers so much as the improper use of one synthetic fertilizer. Two Tylenol take away the headache so I'll take twenty to feel even better kind of thinking.

As far as claiming India produces less than it's neighbours, looking at the numbers on the graph, the difference between some of those neighbours isn't statistically significant.

Lloyd

Here's a quick link.

Lloyd, overuse is a product of the underlying problem, industry exploitation, and government intervention, which encourages and promotes the overuse with subsidies. The farmers are not stupid or careless, they rationally use the cheapest materials they can get, with government help and blessing, to maximize this year's harvest. The national government unwittingly created the problem, but now it is knowingly continuing it.

Joe

I don't doubt that some farmland in India is lacking the ability to sustain healthy crops, due to overuse and failure to replenish all of the elements that are being depleted by intensive cropping. But, they are using groundwater at a rate that is causing the level to drop, and this can't go on too much longer. Hard to see a solution for that one...

overuse is a product of the underlying problem, industry exploitation, and government intervention

Hmmm, you can probably start a pretty good discussion on that topic.

But.....Your intentionally misleading, emotionally exploitative, irrational and over-stated head line, that was designed to manipulate feelings rather than convey good information, is exactly the sort of irresponsible and self serving tripe that erodes the credibility of people working to move things towards more sustainable solutions. Keep up the good work.

My thoughts on farming in general it that it works best when livestock animals are rotated across the fields used for crops. The dung and dung beetles that the livestock contribute help the soil recover for future crops. Unfortunately I think the Indian religions won't go for that approach.

What is this fly by night rag, the Wall Street Journal, and who is this anarchist crackpot Geeta Anand?

Thanks for posting jsfink.

The WSJ headline - "Green Revolution in India Wilts as Subsidies Backfire"
==
Joe's headline - "Chemical Fertilizers Do Ruin the Soil - India"
==
Sorry, but I don't find the second headline to be any more "...intentionally misleading, emotionally exploitative, irrational and over-stated... designed to manipulate feelings rather than convey good information..." than the first. Both describe a distressing development.

And the article, which describes the seduction of an essential industry in an important nation, is hardly "self-serving tripe"

I've been known to use purple descriptives, but you may be outdoing my most impassioned 'best'.

I think it is truly pointed out that the damage done to India's soils is due as much to over-use as to any other reason. But wherever one comes down on the dangers of chemical ferts, the article perfectly describes the damage done by 'sold to the highest bidder' politics. Hmmm, now where have I seen that phenom before?

Once again our news media reports about a known problem as if it is something totally new. This is old and well reported information, kind of like the stuff on the last page of the March 1 issue of Newsweek magazine.

The head line states emphatically that "Chemical Fertilizers Do Ruin the Soil". It's a statement meant to whip up emotions and rally the troops against chemical fertilizers. (emotionally exploitative)
The designation of "chemical" is conspicuously included while all other types of fertilizer are conspicuously excluded as though only chemical fertilizers can ruin the soil. (intentionally misleading).
The headline states with an air of finality that chemical fertilizers do ruin the soil as though it is a foregone conclusion rather than something more rational like "may...if misused", or "over use does..." or "improper use of any fertilizer can..." (irrational)
The use of the word "ruin" is purely for effect. It sounds final and horrible rather than describing the situation as it truly exists. And yes, remediation is possible for soils in which plants have a tough time growing due to misuse of any fertilizer. It is not permanently "ruined". (over-stated)
If the original poster can get people all worked up, they can then sit back and enjoy being the "hero" that has brought this ray of enlightenment to the masses while all nod their heads and agree with their emotion-packed headline. (self-serving tripe).

Of course, not everyone can see the subtleties in such a tactic. You have to be able to actually understand what a sentence means rather than get your switch flipped by buzz words (as the original poster intends).

Here are some good examples of reading comprehension problems.

A statement was clearly addressed to the original poster on this discussion board:
"Your intentionally misleading, emotionally exploitative, irrational and over-stated head line..."

Which elicited these responses:

"What is this fly by night rag, the Wall Street Journal, and who is this anarchist crackpot Geeta Anand?"

and,

"And the article, which describes the seduction of an essential industry in an important nation, is hardly "self-serving tripe""

I mean, seriously, what the *@!#?
I clearly said those things about the headline of the original post and the statement was addressed to the author of the post on this board. What does that have to do with the original article, the title of that article, the paper it was printed by or the author of said article?

Some people are good at misleading and some people are quick to be mislead. When someone misrepresents information, as the original poster did, to get a rise out folks it's utterly transparent to many of those who want to undermine environmentally responsible growing. They point to headlines and whole articles full of the type of misleading garbage in the original post title. Then they point to all the bobbing heads of the duped masses and it discredits the entire movement. It's a great way to erroneously undermine solid ideals because it allows them to say things like, "Organic has no real value because it's just a fad that is blindly followed by people who like the sound of it rather than actually understand what's going on. Just look at the sort of stuff they'll gobble up when it's fed to them!" And, as illustrated by the fact that there were those willing to pick up the original poster's football and run with it, there is some validity to the second half of that statement. That's what makes it so effective.
There has been a lot of good work done out there and a lot of progress has been made. This kind of garbage sets back the efforts of those of us who try to provide good information and shift people's thinking towards lower-impact solutions.

I've been known to use purple descriptives, but you may be outdoing my most impassioned 'best'.

Thanks, be sure stop by the gift shop and pick up a copy of my book and a "Gargwarb" bumper sticker.

Gargwarb, if you're ever in Manitoba, stop by, I'd like to buy you a cup of coffee.

Lloyd

I posted on the organic forum about a similar situation about five miles from here (northern Nova Scotia, Canada): friends who've exhausted their farm soil primarily by using only chemical fertilizer. The article is perfectly relevant to us in the west today. Lloyd, you till tonnes of leaves into your soil - I'm surprised at your equivocating.

gangwarb, you imply that jsfink wants to profit from posting such an article. But how, exactly? Maybe he runs a business selling compost to India?

This is current news, kimmsr. The article repeats information that was on the national news here late last year, about rising suicide rates among Indian farmers:

"Agriculture in this area, and in much of India, is dying. The village economy is in crisis, assailed by migration to the cities, decades of ecological neglect, and the growing unsustainability of farming.

The scientist M.S. Swaminathan, often referred to as the father of Indiaâs green revolution, has spoken of a âdisasterâ in Indian agriculture. The sociologist Dipankar Gupta has written of âhollowedâ villages.

According to a recent report in The Hindu newspaper, almost 200,000 farmers committed suicide between 1997 and 2009 �" a national tragedy (although it is rarely treated as such) brought on by rising debt and the resulting economic and existential despair.

Earlier this week, President Pratibha Patil called for âa second green revolutionâ to stem spiraling food prices and declining supplies. Such calls have emotional resonance in a country that still remembers the humiliation of American food aid in the 1960s. Itâs not clear, however, how Ms. Patilâs goal can be achieved. The forces arrayed against Indian farming are formidable; they are part of the countryâs great leap toward modernity.

A few months ago, before the monsoons, when the fields were still barren, I met a man named A.P. Govindan in the South Indian village of Molasur. He was 56 years old. He was wearing the white robes and prayer beads of a holy man, but he called himself a farmer. Agriculture was in his blood: his father and his grandfather had worked the land, and their parents, too. Mr. Govindan and his brothers grew up in the fields, plowing and sowing a two-hectare, or five-acre, plot of land owned by the family.

In truth, Mr. Govindan wasnât a farmer anymore. He quit the profession around 10 years ago, with his family in economic distress. Now he worked two jobs. In the mornings and evenings, he collected milk from surrounding villages for a milk processing company. He also worked during religious festivals at local temples, piercing the tongues and eyelids and stomachs of pilgrims eager to prove their devotion.

Change had crept up on Mr. Govindan gradually, almost imperceptibly. He could still remember a time when his land had been fertile enough not only to feed a family, but also to provide a healthy income. For a while, in the â70s, when the green revolution introduced new fertilizers and pesticides, yields actually went up. Back then, farming seemed to have a bright future.

By the late â80s, the chemicals had started taking a toll. Mr. Govindanâs land dried up. Yields declined. Mr. Govindan said the quality of his crops did, too. In the old days, he told me, if you cooked too much rice for dinner you could keep it overnight and eat it the next day for breakfast. Now, rice from the fields around Molasur turned rotten overnight.

Other things had changed: labor was more expensive, the price of fertilizers and seeds had increased, and the overall cost of living had outstripped the rise in crop prices. It was also harder to irrigate the land. Twenty years ago, the water table was high. Even a cow could pull water from the shallow wells that dotted the area. But as farmers started using diesel and electric pumps, the water table declined. Now only farmers with the most powerful (and expensive) pumps can reach deep enough to irrigate their fields..."

I wasn't being equivocal paul, I was disappointed at the choice of 'subject of posting' headline versus the actual content of the story. Similar to the "care about soil" thread, it may have been better in the "hot topics" forum if that is what the OP was looking for.

Overuse or improper use of any substance, synthetic or natural, is not beneficial and may in fact be extremely harmful, I assume any reasonable person could see that. Surely we don't need a discussion on that.

Lloyd

"gangwarb, you imply that jsfink wants to profit from posting such an article. But how, exactly? Maybe he runs a business selling compost to India? "

Who said anything about profit or selling things, for crying out loud?! That was manufactured entirely by you to avoid the real issue. (By the way, if you wanted to put a technical name to your logical fallacy, you could call it the "straw man". It's the grown-up version of pointing over someone's should and yelling, "look over there!" while you kick them in the shin)

As for the rest of your post, the point is

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As Lloyd pointed out, nobody has voiced a problem with the fact that materials can cause a problem if misused in Molasur, Madrid or Memphis.

It's the misleading nature of the original poster's presentation that I take issue with. It was overtly designed to piggyback a misguided agenda onto a topic that, without the distraction, is a genuine concern.

"Gargwarb, if you're ever in Manitoba, stop by, I'd like to buy you a cup of coffee. "
You buy me coffee and I'll buy you a beer or three. :)

And just so that people don't put too much blind faith in the newspapers discussed here, I'm attaching a link to an article by the New York Times on concerns related to geothermal energy development. There've been a few thoughtful discussion of the incendiary tone of this article in the scientific community since then, and I found it interesting to read the type of comments that an article like this inspired. They include things like "Those d*mn scientists are going to start a new plate boundary with their drilling!!!" Folks definitely got a bit worked up, particularly those who seem to think that Hollywood earthquake disaster movies were documentaries.

Ro

Can you imagine the barrage of responses to a thread on Hot Topics, about soil? In India? No mention of American celebrities or squabbles? You should start such a thread over there Lloyd and we'll place wagers on how many posts you get. We're getting a blizzard here, again, when the forecast was for sun and cloud, again, so I'm indoors and in a betting mood. :)

gangwarb, I think you and others are simply over reacting to what was meant to be an informative article, posted for people who care about soil.

I think you and others are simply over reacting to what was meant to be an informative article, posted for people who care about soil.

Probably. The post title landed squarely on my hot button. Sorry if I got out of hand.

Ya, you're right, the HT folks would laugh that off for sure. Maybe the organics forum, a couple of extremists over there. There are half a dozen threads over there designed to whip the pack into a foaming at the month frenzy.

I think gargwarb was correct, reasonable people working towards reasonable solutions to an extremely complex issue over time. Extremism on both sides of the issue just ticks everybody off and gets nothing accomplished.

Lloyd

While this might be recent news, it is an old story. Overuse of chemical fertilizers without feeding the microbes will eventually exhaust the supply of carbohydrates and the microbes will die. Without a healthy population of beneficial microbes, the crops will suffer.

Interesting. What I see is Lloyd and Garg getting quite personal rather than debating the admittedly complex issue.

How about this, Lloyd? Is it a good idea, long term, to use enough fertilizer in highly arid climates such that large amounts of ground water must be pumped? As in India, and as in many parts of arid north america? In that case, it hardly matters what the fertilizer is; if a lot is used, it is wasted if water is not obtained somehow. That's the real question behind this thread, IMO.

To answer your direct question(s) I will re-post and bold some of what I posted earlier...

"Overuse or improper use of any substance, synthetic or natural, is not beneficial and may in fact be extremely harmful, I assume any reasonable person could see that. Surely we don't need a discussion on that. "

and

"reasonable people working towards reasonable solutions to an extremely complex issue over time"

I think that pretty well answers your question(s) does it not?

Lloyd

What I see is Lloyd and Garg getting quite personal
What can I say? I'm a people person.

No, you didn't answer it. I'll re-ask it more simply: do you think it is a good plan to massively exploit ground-water reserves?

Wow! I didn't get the intent of your second question (19:40) from reading your first question(s) (07:52) at all!

Which definition of "exploit" would you like me to comment on? I only ask because the two are obviously different and I'd hate to be misunderstood. ;-)

Lloyd

Definition #1, sir.

I would have no issue with making a productive use of a resource with some caveats such as abiding by the laws of the land, ownership of said resources, that kind of thing.

Does that answer your question(s)? If not, maybe take it off-line?

Lloyd