Issue Brief
Soil Health Issue Brief
July 28, 2021
Issue Area
Soil Health
Overview
Healthy soil provides clean air and water, bountiful crops and forests, productive grazing lands, diverse wildlife, and beautiful landscapes. Along the Mississippi River, when present, healthy soil: increases farm profitability, reduces flood risk and improves drought resilience, improves water quality, recharges groundwater, and improves water infiltration into soil. States through the Mississippi River corridor and beyond are exploring programs and methods of increasing state funding for soil health.
Key Facts
Soil has five essential functions: managing water resources, sustaining plant and animal life, filtering nutrient runoff, cycling nutrients, providing physical stability and support.
Healthy soil retains many times its weight in water, reducing severity of stormwater run-off and soil erosion while also making it more resilient to droughts and floods.
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) estimated that 33% of soil is moderately to highly degraded through erosion, salinization, compaction, acidification, chemical pollution and nutrient depletion, hampering soils’ function and affecting food production.
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