39. Soil Security for Agricultural Productivity: The Policy Disconnect and a Promising Future

For industrial agricultural nations like Australia and the USA, securing the soil resource in order to ensure ongoing sustainable production of food and fiber is a vital issue for policy makers. The soil security framework provides a useful and holistic approach for planning of soil policy. Policy settings within national boundaries at multiple levels are a key determinant of soil security. In addition to traditional government policy, field policy established and applied by farmers to their land will have direct consequences for soil security. Examples are provided of this mechanism at work at an individual farm level and across the cropping sector in Australia. Despite the centrality of soil to agriculture, Australia suffers from a policy disconnect between soil and agriculture at the national and state government levels. This is due to the long-term treatment of soil as a natural resource management issue, rather than as a key resource and determinant of agricultural productivity. This has also led to lost opportunities for soil research to drive productivity. The USA is further ahead, having established a new soil health division in 2014. The policy gap in Australia will be closed by linking the trend for digitization of agriculture with technologies for digitally mapping and managing soil.