It's symptomatic of our materialist age that Boxing Day is now better known as an occasion for consuming leftovers, watching sport on television, and for attending large and frenetic retail sales than it is for the giving of "Christmas boxes". In the English Boxing Day tradition, the wealthy or privileged gave gratuities or boxed presents to their servants and tradesmen. Postmen, errand boys and or dustmen were also acknowledged for services rendered, usually unobtrusively, throughout the year.
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Nowadays, hardly any of us knows who delivers our mail or who collects our garbage, and only the wealthy few employ servants. So it is perhaps inevitable that Boxing Day's reason for being has faded. Yet the day remains an apt one for the contemplation and appreciation of those who provide for us, often with scant recognition or appreciation.
It might not occur to many Australians, this being one the most highly urbanised societies on the planet, but our soils are surely some of our hardest-worked and least understood "servants". Providing the basis for food, fuel and fibre production is the least of their many virtues. They filter water, store carbon, prevent erosion and enable the creation of habitats that support plants and animals. Mistreat or abuse them, and soils are washed away or carried off by the wind. This can lead to diminished crop yields, to erosion or salinity, to deforestation and eventually to the creation of wastelands.
The world is replete with landscapes that have been denuded of their topsoil by the carelessness, greed and incompetence of farmers, miners, villagers, and developers. And while Australia's farmers, pastoralists and graziers are generally more enlightened stewards of the land than the slash-and-burn cultivators of Asia or South America, large areas which hosted rich biodiversity have been damaged by hard-hoofed grazing animals, introduced rabbits, and extensive land-clearing.
It might be supposed that because Australia's soils are uniquely thin, our husbandry would be more enlightened than most – and that their preservation and protection of our best farmland would be accorded a high priority. Instead, these irreplaceable assets continue to be degraded or swallowed up by our ever-expanding cities and coal mines.
Anyone who's driven the New England Highway from Maitland to Tamworth would be aware of the collieries that dot the Hunter Valley. It's only from the air, however, that the extent of the ravages wrought by coal mining in one of NSW's most productive agricultural areas becomes really noticeable.
One reason these losses fail to concern us as perhaps they should is that our connection of soil with food, water, climate and biodiversity is becoming more tenuous. Suburban backyard gardens are dwindling in number as apartment living becomes the norm. The industrialisation of agriculture has depleted rural populations and hollowed out the once thriving family farm, deepening the urban-rural divide. Little wonder, then, that the International Year of Soils (as 2015 was designated by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations) passed with relatively little fanfare or interest. Even World Soil Day on December 4 generated next to no publicity.
It's not just our own health and wellbeing (and that of the natural environment) that's at risk from poor soil management. If efforts to mitigate global warming are reliant in the main on restricting coal-burning, they are also heavily dependent on the establishment of carbon sinks and on increases in the carbon content of soils. How well we manage our soils will also determine whether the 9 billion people expected to inhabit the planet by 2050 can be adequately fed and resourced.
Australia's capability and expertise in soil research and management is generally first-class, and 99.9 per cent of our farmers are committed to keeping their properties healthy and productive. Whether our politicians and governments are as dedicated to such a goal is open to debate, however.
Voters can stiffen their politicians' resolve by demanding they promote policies to sustainably manage and preserve our soils. More money should be made available to improve biodiversity management and to rehabilitate our badlands. Planning guidelines need to be changed to ensure that established market gardens and orchards close to the big cities are not paved over for new housing. And the collection and recycling of green waste ought to be mandatory. Our soils are too valuable and important to our way of life and our future to be neglected.
