The land comprises of numerous biophysical components like flora and fauna, water and soils which are all embedded within the landscape completely shaped by the geomorphology which it has and the climate it is subjected to which is usually under the manipulation of diverse forms of human activities. All these aspects make land to be the sustainer of life on the entire globe. The land is considered as the provider of natural habitat in addition to serving multiple purposes for pastoralism, tourism, development of infrastructure, forestry, mining, and agriculture among others. Also, land offers a variety of services to the ecosystem such as air and water purification, nutrient cycling and sequestration (Vlek, & Khamzina et al., 2017). Land degradation mostly occurs when its natural resources are destroyed or overexploited. Lands natural resources usually take a lot of time to regenerate, for instance, the soil may take up to centuries to be generated (Vlek, & Khamzina et al., 2017). Sustaining the global food security would require that the global land be first maintained and made productive. The global land is faced with numerous threats which may cut short the supply of land for use in sustaining food as well as land for developing purposes. The only way of ensuring this is by understanding and tackling threats to land sustainability such as drought, soil erosion, and overpopulation among others.
Drought
Drought refers to the state where there is not enough water on land for the purposes of maintaining vegetation cover and sustaining life experienced over lengthy periods. Water is usually the most important aspect which land provides as well as the most needed in order to sustain food production, life, and the global land itself. Drought is usually as a result of numerous human activities such as farming with the application of different chemicals which may result in global warming leading to climate change i.e. high temperatures, overpopulation and deforestation among others. Drought can also be as a result of over-exploitation of the land and shortage of precipitation. Also, droughts can be due to agricultural, meteorological, and hydrological causes (FAO Land and Water, n.d.).
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Drought whenever it strikes, one major component of land is usually reduced in supply or cut short, water. Water is the most crucial component of land which may come through rainfall as well as underground water, all needed for the purposes of survival in both the plants and animals as well as food production and sustaining the land. When droughts occur, vegetation cover (crops and forests), become at risk; crops may include global food. Since drought affects water, there will be lack of moisture within the soil for the purposes of meeting particular crops needs (FAO Land and Water, n.d.). In the end, the vegetation cover may start drying up and eventually die. As a result, soil, which is usually held together with the vegetation cover would become loose and become vulnerable to wind and other forms of erosion. More so, the land would become hard to till in addition to lacking the needed minerals to support food production. Food production is very sensitive when it comes to climate change; failing to get enough rainfall would result in significant impacts on the production of crop yields as well as livestock (Clark, 2012). Extreme heat as well as temperatures and lacking precipitation usually harm and hinder the growth of crop yields. On the other hand, livestock’s would also not be spared. Since drought, it dries up all the vegetation cover, it would mean that there would be no enough supply of feeds and pasture. In addition, the extreme heat waves and temperature may be a direct danger to the livestock, affecting their fertility as well as milk and meat production (EPA, 2016). Droughts, exposing the land to different forms of erosion would mean that the soil cover would be blown away thus leaving the land barren which may again take time to form thus global food insecurity.
Soil Erosion
Soil erosion is a process which occurs naturally affecting all types of landform due to lack of vegetation cover. Soil erosion may be due to the physical, natural forces of wind and water. Despite the cause of soil erosion, whenever it occurs, three different actions are usually involved; they include detachment of soil, followed by movement of soils and then the deposition of soil. Soil erosion is usually caused by overpopulation, overgrazing and overstocking, and poor farming techniques (Borrelli et al., 2017). Deforestation, water runoff, land overuse and desertification can also result in large-scale soil erosion (Turner, 2015).
The soil is the most important aspect when it comes to crop production. Generally, most of the global food is generated from the soil; thus soil productivity is directly depended upon by the food security (Blanco-Canqui & Lal, 2010). Without vegetation cover, the level of soil erosion is very severe, carrying away nutrients which would have been important in the production of food crops. What is more, soil erosion decreases the soil for the purposes of production of food thus increasing the risks associated with worldwide food insecurity (Blanco-Canqui, & Lal, 2010). What is more, soil erosion would not only affect crop production but also pasture production for the purposes of livestock feeding simply because the ecosystems, natural productivity has been reduced (Pimentel & Burgess, 2013). Every year, it is estimated that 10 million cropland ha are lost because of soil erosion, which eventually reduces the available cropland for global food production (Pimentel & Burgess, 2013). With better management of soil, then the future of food production can possibly be salvaged (Turner, 2015).
Overpopulation
The human population across the globe is rapidly growing and it is estimated that by the year 2050 it would be bursting with over 9 billion people (Ruiz, 2017). The worst thing is that the production land would not be able to keep up with the pace of population growth. Human population is the most dreaded aspect of land degradation. When the population of humans is high, then it would mean that the available resources would be overexploited. Considering the fact that the present population of more than 7 billion experiences food insecurity, then it would mean that the future population would have more food insecurity issues.
Human’s need a lot of resources in order to survive the most important being water and shelter. In order to build shelters, forests would be cut down. Cutting down of trees may result in deforestation which would eventually leave no trees to hold the soil together thus resulting to soil erosion and desertification. Soil erosion would mean that soil rich in nutrients for the purposes of crop production would be reduced which may result in hunger issues due to reduced crop production. As the human population increases so do the level of hunger and global food insecurity. Livestock would also put pressure on the available pasture thus leaving the soil exposed to the agents of erosion. Exposing the soil to agents of soil erosion would mean that the most important nutrients of the soil would be carried away and precipitation levels would also reduce which may result in nutritional challenges. Production of food usually relies on the available land as well as the constant supply of water for the purposes of irrigation. With a high human population, these resources are bound to be overstrained thus reducing or cutting their supply short which would eventually result to starvation and increase the global food insecurity (Population Action International, 2011).
The global land is faced with numerous threats which may cut short the supply of land for use in sustaining food as well as land for developing purposes. The only way of ensuring this is by understanding and tackling threats to land sustainability such as drought, soil erosion, and overpopulation among others. Droughts, soil erosion, and overpopulation are no doubt a threat to the sustainability of global land and food. Dealing with these threats would require efforts from all governments to ensure that the global land, as well as food, is sustained.
References
Blanco-Canqui H., & Lal, R. (2010). Soil Erosion and Food Security. In Principles of Soil Conservation and Management (pp 493-512). Dordrecht: Springer Link. Retrieved from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4020-8709-7_19
Borrelli, P., Robinson, D. A., Fleischer, L. R., Lugato, E., Ballabio, C., Alewell, C.,…Panagos, P. (2017). An assessment of the global impact of 21st-century land use change on soil erosion. Journal of Nature Communications . 15(3): 550. Doi: 10.1038/s41467-017-02142-7
Clark, D. (2012, September 19). How will climate change affect food production? The Guardian . Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/sep/19/climate-change-affect-food-production
Druiz, B. I. (2017, July 11). Sustainable food for everyone? The challenge of our century. Deutsche Welle (DW) . Retrieved from http://www.dw.com/en/environment-world-population-day-agriculture-sustainability-food-waste-food-security-overpopulation/a-39628974
FAO Land and Water. (n.d). Drought . Retrieved from http://www.fao.org/docrep/017/aq191e/aq191e.pdf
Pimentel, D., & Burgess, M. (2013, August 8). Soil Erosion Threatens Food Production. Agriculture , 3(3), 443-463. https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture3030443
Population Action International. (2011). Why Population Matters to Food Security . Retrieved from https://pai.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/PAI-1293-FOOD_compressed.pdf
Turner, J. (2015, May 12). Soil erosion may threaten global food security. Sci Dev Net . Retrieved from https://www.scidev.net/global/farming/news/soil-erosion-threatens-global-food-security.html
United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). (2016). Climate Impacts on Agriculture and Food Supply . Retrieved from https://19january2017snapshot.epa.gov/climate-impacts/climate-impacts-agriculture-and-food-supply_.html
Vlek, P. L. G., Khamzina, A., and Tamene, L. (2017, May). Land degradation and the Sustainable Development Goals: Threats and potential remedies. CIAT.CGIAR . retrieved from http://ciat-library.ciat.cgiar.org/Articulos_Ciat/biblioteca/LAND_DEGRADATION_AND_THE_SDGs-THREATS_AND_POTENTIAL_REMEDIES.pdf
